Revamping a core academic literacy course for undergraduate students: Experience and Implications

Activity: Conference/talk/lecture/symposium/speech/workshop, etcEvent organized by non-HKBU units

Description

This presentation reports the revamping of a compulsory academic English course (i.e. University English II) provided for year 1 students of a local tertiary institution in Hong Kong, the rationale behind and its positive impacts.

University English II aims to elevate students to an advanced level in academic reading and writing, and reinforce the effective use of communicative strategies in English for academic purposes. As a new Course Coordinator, I revisited the assessments and rubrics accordingly, and adopted a research-informed approach to refine the course content and teaching materials. Quantitative and qualitative feedback collected at the end of the semester shows that students appreciate the changes. The means ratings were significantly higher than those of the past year in terms of effectiveness of the learning tasks/activities, assessment methods, assessment standards, course workload, dissemination of course information and documents, the overall learning experience, level of difficulty, and whether the course has stimulated critical thinking, achieved the intended learning outcomes, and met students’ learning needs.

Implications will be discussed and there are suggestions to further refine the course to address the needs of students who are less proficient.
Period10 Aug 202211 Aug 2022
Event titleMAAL Asia Pacific Conference
Event typeConference
Degree of RecognitionInternational