Writing a School-Based Curriculum in Hong Kong: Where the Freedom Actually Is
Quick answer: A school-based curriculum is how a Hong Kong school turns CDC guide outcomes into an actual scheme of work: sequencing, pacing, resource choice, and Medium of Instruction decisions are genuinely up to the school. What isn't up to the school is the underlying set of KLA outcomes the CDC guides describe. Write your school-based curriculum by mapping against those outcomes first, then filling in the choices that are genuinely yours.
What decisions are actually yours to make?
Four areas carry real freedom. Sequencing: the order topics appear within a year and across years. Pacing: how many weeks a topic gets. Resources: which materials, textbooks or supplementary units deliver the content. Medium of Instruction: under the fine-tuning policy running since 2010/11, secondary schools set their own school-based MOI plan per subject and class rather than following one fixed national rule.
What isn't yours to change?
The underlying outcomes stated in the relevant CDC curriculum guide, whether that's the Basic Education Curriculum Guide for P1 to P6 or the Secondary Education Curriculum Guide booklets for S1 to S6. A school-based curriculum interprets and sequences those outcomes; it doesn't replace them with a different set of goals entirely. Where a subject has an HKDSE component, the HKEAA's assessment structure also sits outside a single school's discretion.
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What does a realistic drafting process actually look like?
Start with an audit: what does the current scheme of work actually cover, and where does it map against the CDC guide's stated outcomes for each year group. Gaps found here are the real starting point, not a full rewrite. From there, decide sequencing and pacing for the year, choose or adapt resources against those decisions, and set the assessment checkpoints that will tell you whether the sequencing actually worked. A packaged resource, such as a complete middle school ELA or Civics curriculum, can anchor that process, but it still needs to be mapped against your specific CDC guide outcomes rather than adopted wholesale.
How do you keep the curriculum honest across multiple year groups?
Build in an annual review point where the panel checks the current scheme against both the CDC guide and last year's actual results. A tool like Math Test Prep & Assessment Toolkit – Grades 3–5 is useful here specifically because it gives a standards-based check independent of whichever resource delivered the teaching, which helps separate "the sequencing needs adjusting" from "the resource needs adjusting."
How do you differentiate the drafting process by school context?
A new school-based curriculum from scratch: start narrower, one KLA or one year group at a time, rather than attempting the full P1-to-S6 map in one term.
An existing curriculum needing revision: audit first, revise only where the audit finds a genuine gap against CDC outcomes, and avoid replacing material that's already working.
A curriculum inherited mid-year from a previous panel head: read the CDC guide independently before trusting the inherited document, since inherited schemes sometimes drift from the guide over several years without anyone noticing.
What goes wrong when writing a school-based curriculum?
Confusing "school-based" with "anything goes." The CDC guide's outcomes still bound what counts as covering the subject.
Adopting a purchased curriculum wholesale without mapping it against the local CDC guide first, which can leave real content gaps invisible until exam results expose them.
Never revisiting the document after the first draft. A scheme of work written once and left unreviewed drifts from both the guide and classroom reality within a few years.
Frequently asked questions
Does building a school-based curriculum require EDB sign-off?
No specific EDB certification process for an individual school's scheme of work is implied here, and nothing in this article or the linked resources is an EDB, CDC or HKEAA endorsement of any particular curriculum document.
Can a school change its Medium of Instruction plan whenever it wants?
Changes follow the fine-tuning policy's set criteria around student ability, teacher capacity and support measures, not an arbitrary annual choice.
Is there a required format for a school-based curriculum document?
No single mandated format exists; schools structure their own scheme of work as long as it delivers the CDC guide's stated outcomes.
How often should the whole document be rewritten?
A full rewrite is rarely needed; an annual review against outcomes and results is more realistic than periodic wholesale rewrites.
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