English medium instruction in China’s higher education: teachers’ perspectives of competencies, certification and professional development

Abstract

Despite the increasing popularity of English Medium Instruction (EMI) for academic subject teaching in China, there is little research regarding the competencies that an EMI teacher needs for effective EMI course delivery and professional development (PD) in the higher education (HE) context. No research has investigated how those can be recognised through certain kinds of certification. This study fills the gap by investigating teachers' perspectives on competencies, certification and PD of EMI in relation to China through 133 survey returns and 12 semi-structured interviews. Our findings show that teachers have a generally positive attitude on EMI certification and PD programmes though few universities have made either a priority. Competencies required for effective EMI teaching include not only English proficiency and teaching skills through L2 but also skills of instruction in respective academic disciplines. This poses challenges for the design and implementation of EMI PD leading to teacher certification. The lack of official government involvement (at policy level) and institutional involvement (evaluation and faculty promotion) further complicates this issue in a top-down administrative-heavy country like China.

Promoting EMI Teacher Development in EFL Higher Education Contexts: A Teacher Educator’s Reflections

“…Apart from recruiting teaching staff who are native speakers of English from aboard, it is common to see that local teachers, particularly those with degrees (e.g. a PhD) from English speaking countries, are assigned to teach EMI courses in Chinese universities, with insufficient preparation and scant opportunities for continuing development in their work contexts (Macaro and Han, 2019).…”

“…The observation and reflections based on my teacher education work and research led to a question: How can EMI teachers cope with the emotional, pedagogical and social barriers and improve their teaching quality? This question has become increasingly pressing and critical given the large scale of EMI teaching across the Chinese higher education sector with a large population of students from various linguistic, social and cultural backgrounds (Macaro and Han, 2019). Taking the emotional, pedagogical and social barriers into account, I propose a tentative framework consisting of four important dimensions to address this question.…”

“…The use of English as a medium of instruction (EMI) has increasingly become a norm in higher education settings across the globe (Macaro and Han, 2019). EMI generally refers to ‘the use of the English language to teach academic subjects (other than English itself) in countries or jurisdictions where the first language of the majority of the population is not English’ (Macro et al, 37).…”

“…In view of the challenges reviewed above, a number of scholars (e.g. Macaro and Han, 2019; Hu et al, 2014) have made a clarion call for systematic training and support for EMI teachers to enhance their teaching effectiveness and meet students’ complex learning needs in various subjects. However, as pointed out by Macaro et al (2018), currently the bulk of EMI literature has relatively little to do with the professional preparation and development of EMI teachers in higher education settings.…”

Student challenges and learning strategies at Hong Kong EMI universities

“…However, such a win-win scenario is only likely to happen in the context of the perfect readiness each participant, and the ambivalence of successful EMI implementation is a theme that has been continuously discussed in recent studies [ 10 ]. Many studies have emphasized that the success of EMI programmes can be achieved on the basis of certain conditions: first, students’ English proficiency must have reached a certain threshold for their comprehension of content instruction in English [ 13 – 15 ]; second, EMI lecturers must be equipped with fluent English communication skills, as well as professional knowledge in their disciplines and the pedagogical skills to provide effective scaffolding for both the content and language [ 16 , 17 ]; and third, only when universities provide sufficient teaching resources can EMI lecturers receive the necessary professional development to meet students’ learning needs [ 18 , 19 ]. For those whose first language is not English, this set of conditions might be harder to be fulfilled; the adoption of EMI education has therefore never been as smooth as expected.…”