Education

Welcome changes to English teaching

By David Tool (China Daily)
Updated: 2011-06-01 10:11

English learning has changed over the years in China. I taught English first at Lanzhou University in 1990-1991 and 1992-1993. I have also taught English at Beijing International Studies University from September 2001 onward.

During these 13 years of classroom teaching, while the methods used by the foreign teachers are still active and participatory, I am glad to see that the techniques used by Chinese teachers have changed dramatically over the years and are now more contemporary with their foreign colleagues' teaching style.

I can remember the English language classrooms at Lanzhou University in the 1990s and remember teachers basically standing in front of the room talking to the black board as he/she wrote out sentences and explained boring grammatical structures. Students often repeated the words and phrases spoken by the teacher.

Interestingly, sometimes I could not understand the English word the teacher was having the students repeat, nor, on other occasions, could I understand the phrases that were being drilled again and again. I thought, and the students confirmed, that these classes were boring.

In the intervening years the teaching methods at universities by Chinese teachers have come to be more like those used by US and British language teachers and the quality of their English is now much better. Students are encouraged to engage in classroom discussions, debates, and even mock negotiations. They are given reading assignments and expected to come prepared to give reports in their own words on the readings.

The shy and unsure get practice in these small groups and feel more comfortable when talking before the entire class.

Students are also encouraged to make various reports and often intersperse them with interesting events from their own life or movies or books they have read.

Yet the problem still remains of getting the students to spontaneously participate in answering questions, making comments and generally participating extemporaneously.

The Chinese method of teaching in which the teacher "knows all" and simply tells the students what is important and what they need to know because the test remains the major teaching mode, it is difficult for students to break from this style to participate fully in the language classes.

Students tend to expect foreign teachers to be entertainers and make them laugh. We often do and we enjoy being lighthearted and having fun. But Chinese teachers need to put greater emphasis on student performance rather than just transmitting information to them.

Learning is just as much students' responsibility as teachers' and much more needs to be done by Chinese teachers to encourage the participatory style of learning. Much progress has been made but there is still much room for improvement.

David Tool is a teacher with Beijing International Studies University.

(China Daily 06/01/2011 page14)