A student recalls how she read the South China Morning Post to improve her vocabulary.

A student prepared for the DSE by reading BBC online news in English.

A student says it was stressful studying for the DSE. Although she has to read more now, she enjoys it because it focuses on her chosen field.

A student decided to attend a tutorial class to prepare for exams. She enjoyed reading Harry Potter.

A student attended a tutorial centre to prepare for the IELTS test. She finds reading boring but enjoyed The Hunger Games.

Studying for the IELTS exam allowed this student to build her spoken English. She seldom reads now as she is studying Chinese.

A student practised with her friends after classes when she was in secondary school. These days she enjoys reading material related to her major, Psychology.

Winning competitions can boost your confidence and encourage you to read more. Harry Potter and books by Dan Brown such as the Da Vinci Code are favourites.

Crazy English teaches students to communicate. Preparing for IELTS involves careful reading. She read TIME magazine.

A student needed to answer questions about the book ET as part of an entrance test for a school in Macau. He later moved to Hong Kong and remembers English was used in an activity-filled international summer exchange programme in New Zealand.

Reading can involve preparation for tests such as TOEFL and SAT and can be fiction like The Vampire Diaries. Dictionaries are good for developing vocabulary.

Listening to the BBC and reading online and printed newspapers were part of this student’s A-level preparations. He used a dictionary to check new vocabulary.

A student who felt frustrated during an English language summer camp practised alone by talking to herself. Most of her reading was past papers for the A-level exam but she now plans to read Gone Girl.

IELTS preparation classes are important for this student who wants to join an exchange programme to the UK. The English reading week at her school involved sharing ideas about books with fellow students. She prefers E-books.

A performing arts competition helped this student in the speaking part of the DSE exam. She also took part in the daily reading scheme during secondary school. She prefers printed books but also uses an e-dictionary.

A student who sat the DSE exam independently because he did not achieve a high enough grade in A-level English. He read course material at university and the Tiger Post newspaper in secondary school.

A student brushed up on her English by watching movies and listening to songs during a gap year. She feels a CMI secondary school was more relaxing because most subjects were in her mother tongue.

Debating skills helped an English Teaching major with the spoken component of the DSE. She prefers news media such as the South China Morning Post and TIME magazine to fiction. She feels writing is more important than reading.

Drama classes and competitions in primary and second school were good platforms for this student to practise English. She likes reading Hunger Games, and adventure books by Darren Shan and J.K. Rowling. Movies are also good for learning English.

A family trip to New Zealand as a 15 year old let this student learn more about the use of English there and the peoples’ culture. His secondary school teacher encouraged him to read Tuesdays with Morrie for a book sharing competition in which he won second runner-up.

This English major feels it’s important to master the language. She no longer sees English as a tool.

Copying a grammar book by hand taught this Social Work major important grammar items and sentence structure. Her English teacher motivated her to read English books by showing excerpts from movies.

Doing a poetry reading in a speech festival helped this student with the DSE speech examination. Despite this experience, she does not read much, just CNN.

A form teacher, classmates, and listening to Westlife helped this student win an award for best pronunciation in a secondary school drama show. He likes E-books and reads academic journals and also plays the guitar.

A student took IELTS five times after failing A-level English. She sought help from tutors for the public exams because she felt her teachers could not spark her interest. She has read the Kite Runner.

A postgraduate Chinese language teaching student worked hard to pass the IELTS exam. She reads children’s books because she feels her English is poor.

A teacher helped this student improve her speech and aural skills by encouraging her to take part in a speaking festival. The same teacher also suggested she read movie subtitles to develop better pronunciation. She also read newspapers.

An English Teaching major worked in a group as part of a competition to transform a poem into a video in secondary school. She also read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

A foreign teacher in Beijing helped this student communicate confidently. She pursued English to pass the Gaokao and IELTS. She reads Chinese language books.

Studying a higher diploma allowed this CMI graduate to focus on English to earn a university place. He reads books about Christianity and uses English when attending international events.

It took a lot of studying for this student to pass IELTS. She seldom reads material in English except for the university lecture notes.

Watching a professional drama organised by her secondary school English teacher interested this student. She worked hard to pass IELTS. She felt there was too much drilling during her school years. She likes films and songs in English.

After struggling with the HKCEE and failing A-level English, this student overcame his difficulties in his associate degree. He is planning to study overseas, but needs to improve his IELTS result.

A British Council course with NETs led to a rapid improvement in this student’s level of English. He also uses English while playing rugby. He likes to understand the lyrics to songs by Bruno Mars, Jason Mraz, and Maroon 5.

A Burmese student had to pass TOEFL to enter a Hong Kong university. She started learning English in kindergarten but her transition to tertiary education required her to read more academic material.

Adapting to university classes in English was very difficult for this student. Her secondary school English classes on the Mainland included small groups led by foreign teachers. Using Google Scholar, she found essays to help with academic writing.

Preparing for IELTS exposed this Malaysian Civil Engineering major to academic writing and argumentative essays. He has read many news magazines and the dictionary. He says he uses English more in Hong Kong but the standard is not as high as Malaysia.

Preparing for a public exam in the Mainland made this student focus on a good grade and not interpersonal communication. She started to read a lot more in English in university when she was studying course textbooks. It’s easier for her to read books that have been translated into Chinese.

This student was part of a secondary school team that won an inter-house drama competition with their own composition based on Mario Brothers. She bought All the Light We Cannot See because she is interested in history.

Preparing for a speech festival in senior secondary gave this student a chance to read a variety of scripts while receiving guidance on pronunciation. In university, he prefers to read English versions of some material as translations may be inaccurate.