Analysis of Compositions Written by a Chinese Child in Japan 31 How to Practice Posthumanism in Environmental Learning: 52 Experiences with North American and South Asian Indigenous Communities and Technology Students Towards the Environment Understanding Student Attitudes about Distance Educatio... (original) (raw)
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This qualitative study examines the accounts from Mainland Chinese adults taking part in mandatory online courses assigned and developed by their UK employer. It extends prior work on Mainland Chinese learners by examining relationships between participants’ digital backgrounds and their online experiences to garner insights which can be applied to course design and/or preparing employees for online learning in organisations. Recent literature on Chinese learners in intercultural settings has focused largely on basic or higher education contexts e.g. Chen and Bennet (2012), or was conducted with teachers e.g. Yawan (2011), Zhen (2009). This study addresses gaps in the literature by taking participants’ digital contexts into account and gathering data from a work-place setting. Qualitative data on digital behaviours, learning preferences, and online learning experiences was gathered using visual mapping techniques (White & Le Cornu, 2011; White 2013), semi-structured interviews, and focus groups (Flanagan, 1954). Transcribed data was iteratively interrogated (Dey, 1993) and thematised using an online qualitative research tool. The findings from the research begin to show what is and isn’t important for the participants in the study. In the context of the short-term mandatory courses social interaction was not mentioned as an important aspect of online experience and for one participant was considered a potential obstruction to completing the courses. This was contrary to reports in other studies. However, case-studies were appreciated more than other information delivery modes. While the study was small scale, an important insight about the Chinese employees in this study was that depth of learning may be increased when significant others from their communities are brought into the course. To this end, the notion of ‘community presence’ is put forward as one of a number of areas for further research.
An ecological psychology perspective in teaching Chinese online
Journal of China Computer-Assisted Language Learning
In this paper, we first introduce three ecological principles for designing Chinese language online teaching and learning activities drawing from ecological psychology. The first principle – perception and action cycles in an ecosystem, advocates for situating online learning in a physical environment and creates activities with potentials to engage perception-action cycles. With the second principle – intention and attention merge in an ecosystem, we advocate for designing complex, flexible and dynamic activities and providing scaffolding for attunement. The third – meaning-making and values-realizing coincide in an ecosystem, calls for designing activities that allow for care-taking of oneself, each other, and the environment and cultivate curiosity and mindfulness for values-realizing and individual meaning-making. To highlight ways to tap into learners’ interest and connect to people and places, we then share two example activities with both low-technology and high-technology op...
Bridging the Learning Gap: Cross-Cultural Learning and Teaching through Distance
This project engaged students, practitioners, and educators from University of Labor and Social Affairs, Cau Giay District, Hanoi and Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, in a cross-cultural distance learning and teaching collaboration. Two groups met simultaneously through Skype videoconferencing to discuss and learn about field supervision and about social policy that supports women who experience family violence. This collaboration strongly demonstrates the usefulness of technology in bridging the learning divide and achieving meaningful cross-cultural educational exchanges from a distance.
Interculturality in Online Learning: Instructor and Student Accommodations
Online Learning
As more distance education courses broaden their reach across borders, the chances of online classes being multicultural are high. This means that more often students may find themselves in courses designed for and by a host culture that differs from their own regarding its approach to teaching and learning. Compounding the difficulties inherent in a novel cultural environment and its unfamiliar forms of academic discourse are challenges represented by the medium itself. This year-long case study examines the experiences and reflections of a Chinese graduate student and her U.S. instructor; specifically the accommodations both made to mediate differences and mitigate these challenges. Analyses suggest that when both parties take differences into account and exercise thoughtful accommodations relative to both the challenges of the online medium and language socialization, positive learning experiences can result.
Middle Grades Review, 2020
This practitioner essay will outline a project designed by a team of three critical educators at The Experiential School of Greensboro (TESG), a new grassroots charter school in Greensboro, North Carolina. In this essay, we will describe the social context of TESG, discuss how we built towards addressing complicated topics related to systemic racism, and outline the ways we addressed anti-Asian racism and xenophobia in a remote learning context during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Distance learning is a necessary programme for any thriving and expanding university the world over. Aside from being a vital gateway to higher education for students whose locations are far from the intended university, it is also a business industry for the university concerned which markets its programmes via distance learning to the clients i.e. students. Therefore, it is imperative that the clients of such programmes, be they full-time or part-time students, receive the utmost value for their investment. This investment could be in terms of finance, time, and personal sacrifices. This paper hypothesised that there exist several linguistic and cultural constraints affecting ESL learning of adult non-native learners in a Universiti Malaysia Sabah distance learning programme. The sample for this preliminary study is 35 adult students in their third year who had already taken all the four semesters of ESL classes during their first and second year. This is a significant sample because the students are the pioneers of the university's distance learning programme. Due to this pioneer status, it is felt that the students' response to what linguistic and cultural constraints affected their learning of the English language is most important to be analysed and documented. This study found that among the linguistic constraints were the length of exposure as well as familiarity to the English language prior to entering the programme, first language interference, and language of instruction in the ESL classroom. Meanwhile, amongst the cultural constraints found were students' difficulties to differentiate between studies and other family commitment (classes were held on weekends as the students are full time teachers), students' low level of confidence in their own ability with regard to the English language, and the level of relationship between students and lecturers when the latter are often much younger in age and teaching experience than the former. This paper aims to highlight these constraints so as to 1) better improve the current ESL classes within the distance learning programme for the benefit of present and future students of the programme, and 2) to minimise any existing gaps in ESL learning in an on-campus or a distance learning programme of a university.