Limiting professional trajectories: a dual narrative study in Chinese language education

Abstract

Introduction: The globally expanding community of educators involved in the teaching of Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL) is being pushed to adapt to diverse educational contexts, engendering tension and dislocation. There has been limited success in efforts to modernise practice in the teaching of Chinese, with subsequent urgent calls for both a fresh approach to innovation, and for a better understanding of the nature of teacher experience in the professional community. This article reports a project which employed self-study to investigate, through analysis of reflective narratives, two career trajectories associated with Chinese as a foreign language. Results: The analysis of the narratives uncover issues of identity and power, in the shaping of the participants's practice and professional trajectories. The analysis provides illustration of how limitation in professional participation can result in limitation of innovative practice. The investigation identifies the formation of new independent decentralised professional communities for CFL. Conclusions: The study offers recommendations to promote innovative practice which can support more effective teaching and learning.

Climber, mediator, and marathoner: narrative inquiry of career motivation changes of pre-service CSL teachers throughout teaching practicum

“…This exploration illuminates the diverse path traversed by non-native individuals who aspire to become Chinese language educators, emphasizing the significance of comprehending and addressing the unique challenges and opportunities they encounter to foster more inclusive and supportive professional environments for novice non-native language teachers and students against the backdrop of native-speakerism. Furthermore, Moloney and Wang’s (2016) utilized a dual narrative self-study approach to delve into the motivational substrates underpinning the career trajectories of both native and non-native CSL educators, thus accentuating the divergent narratives and issues of identity and power that shape their professional practices and pathways and calling for establishing de-centralized communities with a note of post-modernism. This narrative inquiry, to some extent, finds resonance in the work of Wang et al (2013) , where they scrutinized the pivotal nexus between CSL teacher knowledge and international curricular paradigms of teacher education programs of Chinese as a foreign language in China and Australia through comparative and interpretive lens, advocating for the refinement and internalization of teacher education initiatives and/or programs to align with the exigencies of a globalized educational landscape and to develop teachers’ situated manoeuvre and adaptation.…”

“…Thorough investigation into the lived experiences of CSL teachers within the realm of teacher motivation research is urgently needed as the representation of this group of teachers is largely understudied, which requires a detailed examination of their unique challenges and contributions, as well as their motivations, experiences, and subsequent retention within the profession. This examination, often with the assistance of qualitative research to capture individual subjectivity and experiences, has the potential to reveal crucial dimensions and add depth for understanding CSL/CFL teachers’ role and impact within the language teaching and learning field ( Moloney and Wang, 2016 ; Wang and Mason, 2023 ).…”

Beginner CFL learners’ perceptions of language difficulty in a task-based teaching and learning (TBTL) environment in Denmark

“…This is problematic because the focus on linguistics does not yet offer the help that is really needed (Halliday, 2014). The gap between so-called 'Chinese pedagogy' and local learners' needs remains the biggest challenge facing CFL outside China (Moloney & Wang, 2016). Thus, the increased enrolment of CFL overseas learners has not led to an equivalent expansion of their achievements (Orton, 2008).…”

“…A few initiatives to diversified approaches to CFL effectiveness have been implemented. For example, involving teachers in pedagogical innovation and classroom research (Chen, 2015;Du & Kirkebaek, 2012;Moloney & Wang, 2016) and enhancing transformative learning and intercultural pedagogy for native teachers of Chinese have been utilized (Chen, 2015;Everson, 2016;Kirkebaek & Du, 2014;Moloney, 2013;Orton, 2011;Zhou & Li, 2016). Other studies report introducing technology in CFL, such as interactive whiteboards (Xu & Moloney, 2011), ICT (Lin, Huang, & Chen, 2014;Wu, 2016), online language learning (Wang, 2016a,b), virtual TBTL (Pasfield-Neofitou, Grant, & Huang, 2016, and digital tools for Chinese character acquisition (McLaren & Bettinson, 2016).…”

Research on the Role of an Automatic Resource Generation System to Promote Chinese as a Second Language Learners’ Learning in Colleges

“…The needs are usually represented by specific instructional materials or strategies. In order to solve the problem, many researchers came up with some standardized instructional materials and instructional strategies (Chen, 2015; Du et al, 2017; Moloney & Wang, 2016). However, language learning needs are connected with the learners’ situations.…”