Newsletter No. 88

CUHK Newsletter No. 88 4th May 1996 3 tential, and large undergraduate classes certainly don't make the task easier. The rich get richer.' This rings true in classrooms. Students who are proficient in English continue to improve with practice while the less confident ones avoid using it. It is a vicious cycle that can only be broken if students become aware of the need to improve and overcome their fear to speak in public. During presentations and discussions, my approach is always to encourage them to use English and then reinforce their efforts with praise and feedback. A positive attitude towards students is reciprocated by positive responses. Another way of 'immersing' students in English is by engaging them in conversations about non-academic subjects. When we talk about dormitory life and dental braces, students forget their inhibitions and are eager to express their views. But even in informal conversations, it may be necessary to invite individual students to talk about their feelings in English. When reading students' papers and projects, I often have to pay attention to the grammar and spelling in addition to the content. A colleague from the English Language Teaching Unit (ELTU) suggested that corrections be made in pencil. Students are less discouraged by this than by red markings all over the pages! Initiative and Resources I often recommend the Independent Learning Centre (ILC) to my students. The ILC is a cheerful place which helps students in innovative ways. It is difficult to teach English skills to students who have not had the foundation or basic training in their primary and secondary schooling. The self- learning approach promoted by the ILC may be one of the many ways for them to acquire such essential skills. What can tertiary institutions do to address the concern of the business community? The Faculty of Business Administration has responded to this problem by offering a new course — Business Communication — to its undergraduate students. The course began in September 1995 with eight sessions taught by the ELTU, who has done a first-class job designing the course. The classes are small, so that the 20 students get adequate attention. Students learn to use English effectively through the completion of a group project. They are also taught skills in managing a project, conducting survey research and group discussions, writing business and career documents and letters, and making presentations. The feedback from students is most positive. They would like more of these classes. More resources are however needed for additional sessions. The Education Commission's Report No. 6 points out that implementing a strategy to improve language proficiency also depends on 'the public, including students, parents, employers, politicians, and others with a stake in language proficiency issues, whose attitudes and concerns may have a significant impact... .' Raising language proficiency requires the collaboration of the University administration, the teaching staff as well as the students. Top management has to provide the resources and give the green light, both of which are essential for teaching staff to help their students. Many faculty members know the problem but think they cannot contribute to the solution. They can with the support of their departments and faculties. And students must see the advantage of multilingual skills in their future careers. They must want to improve. Chua Bee Leng Lecturer Department of Management istration and timetabling to accommodate more students. In this context, I would like to use the United College Language Improvement Project as an example. United College was given $1,000,000 in 1995 by the University to run the Language Improvement Project (LIP), which is a non-formal, non-credit-unit- bearing programme. A full-time programme executive has been recruited to take charge of programme administration and development as the College believes, and our initial experience has comfirmed, that if the programme is to develop on a firm footing, a full-time executive is essential. In the February-April 1996 session, a total of 170 students enrolled in seven languagemodules. They are Grammar and Vocabulary, English Grammar for Academic Writing, English Speaking Activities Workshop, Speaking and Listening, Better Reading and Writing for Academic and Practical Purposes, Written Communication for Professional and Business Purposes, and Speaking Putonghua. Classes for the modules took place after regular class hours, from 5.30 p.m. to 9.00 p.m. Initial statistics suggest that students on the whole made improvements in their chosen language skills. For the May-June 1996 session, a total of 209 students have enrolled in tenmodules. A new English module 一 Public Speaking and Leadership — has been added. A new incentive scheme has also been introduced whereby the two students who have made the most progress in each module will be invited to take part, free of charge, in a five-day Chinese/English Language Immersion Camp in a university in China. The immersion programme will include language learning activities, interaction with university students in China, and some social and sight-seeing activities, all in the context of the target language environment. As convener of the English section of the LIP, I understand that United College will continue to revise and update the LIP courses so that they can better cater to students' needs. Joseph Hung Associate Professor Department of English How the ELTU Di rector Views the Issue 'It is very popular now to do two things 一 complain about the falling standards of English, and say that language enhancement is a priority. Both are easy to say, but very difficult to do something about. ... What I am trying to do is build a programme campus-wide which will provide the most effective utilization of resources to improve English language proficiency,' says Prof. Lyle R Bachman, director of the English Language Teaching Unit (ELTU). Multi-pronged Approach This programme he is spearheading for the ELTU is multi-pronged. One prong is the English for Specific Purposes courses, wherein ELTU specialists work with content specialists of other departments in developing courses, to be delivered by ELTU staff. These skills-oriented courses are designed to cater to the specific language needs of students in specific disciplines. A second prong is the content-based adjunct model. A content teacher and an ELTU specialist work together in developing lectures, this time to be delivered by the former in English. The ELTU specialist sits in on the lectures and works with the students on language problems after class. Another prong emphasizes teaching in English. Prof. Bachman feels that 'ultimately, this is the most important component of the whole plan. The University has accepted in principle that every department needs to conduct a certain amount of courses in English each term, so that every student is exposed to at least one course in English each term for the three years .' This will give the students an extensive and prolonged exposure to English, and will allow contextual use of the language. The Independent Learning Centre (ILC), a bilingual self-access language facility within the Faculty of Arts, is another extremely important part of the programme. The ELTU supplies the staff for the English Section of the ILC, which is frequented by an average of 2,000 students each week. The ELTU also provides classroom instruction for over 3,000 students annually. An Essentially Collaborative Effort that Allows Heterogeneity and Flexibility Prof. Bachman, who joined the University in August 1994, believes the greatest and most significant achievement of the ELTU during his tenure to have been to bring about a basic change in the perception of language teaching at the University level and among the deans, most of whom now accept that language teaching and language learning is a part of academic teaching and academic learning. It cannot be compartmentalized. He also believes it is meaningless to learn about a subject if one cannot communicate what one has learnt. 'Reading, writing, listening, speaking, are all tools for the acquisition and communication of knowledge — reading and writing particularly,' he says. Remedial language courses, Prof. Bachman feels, form only one small part of the solution to the language problem. 'What is needed is substantial and sustained exposure to the language. This exposure cannot be provided only in the English classes 一 it has to be exposure in lectures, exposure in the community. This is why the colleges also have an important role to play in ensuring that English becomes a part of the University community.' The ELTU plays the role of a facilitator in the implementation of the programme. Advice and support are supplied to whichever department, faculty, or college approaches the unit for suggestions. Prof. Bachman has consulted for many educational bodies in different parts of the world and is always apprehensive of onephenomenon: governments, ministries, and administrators tend to favour applying decisions uniformly to all schools. ‘I have never seen a country, including Hong Kong, where the education system is completely homogeneous,' he says. 'Communities are always heterogeneous. It is the same with the University. I think I have been able to convince the administration here that what we need is a plan that has many different components, and that allows a large degree of flexibility, so that different departments, faculties and colleges may implement the different pieces ofthis plan in different ways. ’ Students Motivated but Shy Prof. Bachman himself teaches a class consisting of 18 students from some 10 different departments. Most of them are in their first year and enrol because they are aware that their English is not good and wish to improve it. The course aims not only at improving their listening and speaking abilities, but also helping them to learn some communication strategies that they can use to continue their own language learning after they finish this course. Their actual progress in listening and speaking may be minimal, but just the fact that at the end of the course they feel confident enough to continue using the language is a major accomplishment,' he says. But like many other teachers in the University, Prof. Bachman feels that the students are very, very shy. 'Many of them are anxious about being laughed at when they speak English, or afraid that they will make mistakes — the same kinds of worries and concerns that non-native speakers of English have all over the world. The thing I work at the most, certainly at the beginning of the course but also right through, is to create a warm, secure, non-threatening environment in the class so that students will feel confident enough to speak up .' A Short but Rewarding Innings Prof. Bachman will be leaving the University after a two-year stint to rejoin the University of California at Los Angeles this autumn. He initially came on leave for three years, but the sudden incapacitation of one of his colleagues there has necessitated his earlier return. He would have liked to complete the three years here that he feels form the life cycle of a foreign expert. The first year, as he sees it, is largely a learning experience, wherein one gets acquainted with one's colleagues and the situation around, and formulates a plan. In the second year one starts to implement this plan. In the third year, the aim is to solidify it, and ensure that it will continue. He calls it 'the frosting on the cake', and goes on to say regretfully, 'It is a pleasure that I will not have. But it has been a very rewarding and challenging two years. My plan is in motion now, and I hope that if I return after say five years, it will still be growing, and things will not be back to what they were one and a half years ago when I joined.'