Sep.15,2011
Ying Xingjiu Foreign Language Experimental School, a social service project of SIS, located in Zhenhai, held an uncommon teaching research activity. With Vice-principal Zhang Miaoping and the English teachers of this school in the lead, the activity also involved Ben Turner, the foreign teacher of the school, Prof. Mairead Dunne, the short-term foreign expert of Zhejiang University, and Dr. Zhao Hongqin, associate professor of SIS. All the participants had a multi-aspect discussion on the foreign language education of this school.
Employing foreign teachers, as an important part of the development project of the school, has enjoyed a smooth progress since Ben Turner came. In past one-year teaching, Ben applied himself to his role in English teaching and tried the best to overcome the management problem in big class teaching. Ben is an experienced teacher specialized in small-group teaching. So the greatest challenge for him is the class management and his voice endurance in big class teaching, which involves 45-55 students. The school and other teachers helped him conquer these difficulties, such as purchasing a microphone to reduce his voice pressure and suggesting him observing native teachers’ classes to learn some class management skills.
Ben put forward the discussion on foreign teachers’ role in English teaching. He came up with some possible roles, such as the motivator of students’ interest, the language-oriented teacher, the amusement-oriented teacher and so on. Teachers shared their opinions and agreed that foreign teachers are the motivators of students’ interest, whose main purpose is to make students have fun in study. At the same time, the hard work like teaching grammar and skills for examination is native teachers’ task.
Apparently, the British educational expert Mairead could not agree with this idea. Why only foreign teachers can enjoy the privilege to have an interesting class to inspire students’ interest and gift of tongues? Why native teachers are always hard pressed by students’ examination performance? This is a basic question of foreign language teaching in China. This discussion made people realize that foreign language teaching should be student-centered to develop their learning interest and language competence, rather than examination-oriented.
Most of the teachers do not think this phenomenon can be neglected. Facing the pressure of entrance examination and parents’ high expectation for their children, both the school and teachers have to strengthen the professional power in order to avoid this socio-cultural tendency.
We are happy to see that native teachers have shown the strong career confidence, professional view and development direction in the discussion with foreign teachers and foreign experts.
(Translated by WEI Chunyu)
