ELC Hosts Inaugural Language Centre Symposium
In June, the ELC hosted an inaugural one-day symposium for all the tertiary sector English language centres in Hong Kong. With the theme of ‘The challenge of the 4-year curriculum for English Language Centres in Hong Kong’, it brought together ELC staff from across the territory so that they could share experiences, reflect upon practice and examine ways in which the centres can best prepare for the challenges and opportunities presented by the introduction of the four-year undergraduate university curriculum in 2012.
Presenters exchanged ideas on a number of issues ranging from needs analysis and curriculum design to assessment, that are common to most of Hong Kong’s university ELCs and the discussions sparked by the presentations were particularly useful to participants. The need for a forum of this kind was clearly demonstrated by the particularly well attended round table discussion between the heads of two of the territories ELCs. Two of the Fulbright scholars, who are in Hong Kong this year particularly to focus on the implementation of the new curriculum, lead the discussion, which was lively and involved a large number of the audience.
The feedback from all those involved was that they found the day throught-provoking and the exchange of views and experience were particularly helpful. So much so that the consensus of opinion was that the ELCs should try to meet more regularly.
Jane Robbins, Symposium Co-ordinator
This academic year saw the ninth cohort of UGC funded participants take part in the English Award Scheme (EAS), which is a scholarship funded by the Faculty of Humanities. The Scheme aims to develop PolyU students to become effective, independent and self-driven language learners. Participants have to set their own learning goals, go through a self- developed language learning journey and submit an ePortfolio at the end of the programme. Winners were funded HK$20,000 to take an overseas English summer course. Among the 18 winners this year, one chose to go to York University in Canada, three chose to go to UCLA and 14 chose to go to Queen Mary College, University of London for the next stage of their learning journey.
The award presentation ceremony was held on 30 April 2010. The Director of the ELC, Dr. Bruce Morrison gave a speech and presented certificates to the winners. Two winners, Renee Lo and Arthur Zhang, also shared their feelings and learning experience of the EAS journey.
Congratulations to all our winners!
Do you want to be one of the EAS winners? Come and join the Scheme this year! Click here for more information but hurry, applications close in late October.
Ellie Law, EAS Co-ordinator 2009-10
The third CILL seminar, presented on 23 March by Dr Julia Chen on Understanding common errors in English and improving advanced academic writing, was well received. Dr Chen is a Senior Lecturer in the ELC and the Coordinator of materials development and staff development, as well as a recipient of the President’s Award for Excellent Performance/Achievement in Teaching. She is also currently Deputy Chair of the Faculty of Humanities’ Learning and Teaching Committee. In this CILL seminar, she discussed common errors in English and ways to improve advanced academic writing. There were 24 participants, including both undergraduate and postgraduate students who asked a great deal of questions on how to improve their English writing skills, especially on the use of concordancer searches to study word collocations for use in advanced academic writing.
The fourth CILL seminar took place on 16 April when Mr Walter Wong, a former chairperson of the HK Polytechnic University English debating team, delivered a talk on How to demonstrate your English speaking skills in a job interview. There were 23 participants, including both students and teachers. During his talk, Mr. Wong shared with participants how English proficiency can be ideally demonstrated in a job interview and how an interview can be handled in an appropriate manner. He encouraged participants to think carefully in order to develop useful strategies to prepare for future job interview opportunities.
Joe Ching, CILL Co-ordinator
Summer Course for Visiting Korean Students from Seoul
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Nineteen students from Sookmyung Women's University in Seoul attended a three-week English language programme at the ELC this summer. The programme comprised classroom learning, small group interaction, and many excursion activities. Programme members not only had a chance to meet ELC teachers and use our facilities, they also had opportunities to work with international students, who served as teaching assistants on the programme, and mingle with PolyU students, who served as their buddies. The programme members had great fun in these three weeks and left their footprints in various parts of HK, including the Peak, Stanley, Disneyland, and Macau. This fun-filled programme has brought the programme members joy, English and friendship.
Anna Ho, Programme Co-ordinator
ELC Staff Invited to Lead International Staff Development Workshop
Two members of the ELC staff, Mr Dan Barlow and Dr Jane Robbins were 
invited to lead workshops at a conference hosted by Yuan Ze University in Taiwan in June. The aim was to help Yuan Ze teachers with their progression towards using English as a medium of instruction. Dan led a session on encouraging students to use the target language, with a focus on presenting and practicing key content words in lexical chunks. Jane’s session on pronunciation focused on what sounds are key to ensuring listeners can understand. Other sessions were led by Yuan Ze staff.
Preparation for the Writing Requirement - ELC style
In the spirit of meeting the challenge of the four-year curriculum, including the implementation of the Writing Requirement, head on, the ELC is forging ahead with its preparations of language provision. Together with its planning a range of offerings in various credit-bearing English Language Subjects, the ELC is getting ready to coach the influx of students needing to complete the Reading and Writing requirements in 2012.
Teaching staff development is the key to developing a positive and effective learning experience for learners. Accordingly, the staff development session on 11 May 2010 on Language and Writing Requirements in GE subjects, conducted by Prof. Paul Hanstedt and Prof. Joe Chaney on the illusion and reality of peer-evaluation was well attended. Profs Hanstedt and Chaney were Fulbright Scholars sharing their expertise on writing in a liberal arts curriculum with HK’s tertiary institutions in the last academic year. They talked about making peer-evaluation an important stage in the process of writing. This, they argued, developed critically-aware writers who are better editors of their own work, resulting in a much higher quality of work not to mention the engagement of students in their own and their peers’ writing. Staff discussed ways in which peer-evaluation could be effectively integrated into seminars which the ELC will conduct for the Writing requirement for the new curriculum.
Shari Nazir, Writing programme co-ordinator
Faculty of Humanity eLearning Forum
On 4th May, FH hosted a blended learning forum: The Road to 334 – and How Blended Learning can HELP? Following a welcome from Professor Huang Chu-ren, over fifty attendees enjoyed a series of presentations by staff from the English Language Centre, Departments of English, Chinese and Bilingual Studies, Chinese Culture and the General Education Centre. The presentations covered definitions of blended learning and a variety of current examples of applications of eLearning for different study programmes, including how to make quizzes, find images, use an e-portfolio and use Second Life. The forum finished with an open discussion of eLearning and its potential for application in achieving learning outcomes for the 2012 curriculum.
Andy Morrall & Jane Stokes
