Teaching Context

This case study aims to understand the different background and learning needs of students from different cultural and language backgrounds. I teach a module about Practice, Policy and Market of ats and cultural enterprises. It has two cohorts, one in London, the other one is in Hong Kong. 18 students from London, 18 students in Hong Kong. In each cohort, students are from mainly local area, we have to teach the same content for the two cohorts on the same day. 

Evaluation and ReflectionIn the first week of my teaching, I realised that the learning style and cultural backgrounds of students are so different between Hong Kong and London. I have been teaching in Higher Educations of China before I started to teach in the UK. The differences of learning are not only located in language, but also situated in the approaches of teaching and learning. I used to adapt a traditional transmissive teaching approach when I was teaching in China, where students were supposed to sit in the classroom, accepting and memorizing the knowledge taught by teachers. The transmissive teaching emphasizes teacher-centered forms of teaching where knowledge is delivered to students through structured planning and lecturing (Da-Silva et al, 2007). As Illery said that every teaching and learning behaviour was supposed to be closely related to its external learning conditions (2009). According to Illeris’s theory, the external interaction process between the learner and his or her social, cultural or material environment, is coexisted with an internal psychological process of elaboration and acquisition (2009, p.8). It means, Chinese students who were used to the transmissive learning approach in higher education had been used to it before they were admitted in the higher education. This specific background made Hong Kong students not used to independent discussions and critical reflections in and after class. They always found themselves less catching up the courses. Some students keep in silence when they are in group discussions. 

Action and next step

To deal with problem, I decided to deliver the class slowly to let students fully understand the content and knowledge and use more examples that are close to their life in Hong Kong to establish the constructivist pedagogy that inspires students’ autonomy and initiative in learning, providing forms of active knowledge construction rather than acquisition (Grennon Brooks & Brooks, 1993). I found that in order to help the students to construct knowledge by themselves, the teacher’s task in a constructivist’s class was different from that in a transmissive class. A constructivist teacher was making a democratic environment rather than transmitting knowledge to students (Lester and Onore, 1990); he/she was also encouraging interactive communications rather than demonstrating skills nor answering questions (Belenky et al, 1986). Therefore, I set up some discussion forum on Padlet for students to type their answer when doing group discussion in class so that they would feel more comfortable to express in writing than speaking. To build up this democratic environment, a teacher had to inspire the belief that student was the real constructor of knowledge (Lester and Onore, 1990). Their preferences need to be taken care when Hong Kong students are more comfortable with writing than speaking. For the next year, I would like to guide the students to improve their confidence. I aim to set up an interactive online discussion place for both London and Hong Kong students so that they can have a better understanding of the global context of the field. At the same time, Hong Kong students would be inspired by their London peers on interactions. 

References

Lester, N. B., & Onore, C. S. (1990). Learning Change: One school district meets language across the curriculum. Portsmith: Boynton/Cook Publishers.

Da-Silva, C., Mellado, V., Ruiz, C., & Porlan, R. (2007). Evolution of the conceptions of a secondary education biology teacher: Longitudinal analysis using cognitive maps. Science Education, 91(3), 461-491.

Grennon Brooks, J., & Brooks, M. G. (1993). The case for constructivist classrooms. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development Press.

Illeris, K. (2009). Contemporary Theories of Learning. London: Routledge.

Osborne, J. F. (1996). Beyond Constructivism. Science Education, 80(1), 53-58