Facilitating curriculum transformation through effective language teaching: Insight from students’ learning experiences

Abstract

The Hong Kong education system has recently undergone a major structural reform, changing from the seven-year secondary and three-year tertiary education system to the six-year secondary and four-year tertiary one. This has led to significant curriculum transformation in the local higher education sector. During the transformation, many universities sought to enhance students’ communicative competence in order to optimise their learning in an increasingly internationalised environment, where English is the language for knowledge exchange among students of various first language backgrounds. However, many students, both native and non-native speakers of English, find it challenging to express their ideas critically in academic contexts (Hyland, 2014; Tsui, 2014). In this connection, the University of Hong Kong, an international English-medium university, has developed Core University English (CUE), a mandatory English for academic purposes course taken by over 3,000 first-year undergraduates per year. Students acquire the necessary communication skills which facilitate their learning in the newly developed Common Core Curriculum, covering science and technology, humanities, global issues, and China as the four areas of inquiry. This study explores the impact of curriculum transformation driven by the structural reform and the demand of internationalisation in higher education through students’ evaluation of their English learning experiences in the transition to university studies. First-year undergraduates were invited to respond to a questionnaire about their English learning backgrounds and expectations of university learning. Among the 1,012 respondents, 66 with diverse backgrounds were recruited to participate in two one-to-one semi-structured interviews to evaluate their learning experiences in CUE. Their learning gain was also observed through the analysis of students’ diagnostic, interim and end-of-course writing. The data revealed a gap between their language skills learnt in secondary school and those required in university studies. Writing and speaking were considered most needed in university studies; and key aspects such as critical argumentation, features in academic writing and tutorial discussion strategies seemed to be missing in their pre-university experiences. Acquiring these skills in CUE effectively enhanced students’ disciplinary learning and university experience. The findings provide curriculum developers and university teachers with insight into the significant role of academic English for communication, and how good practices of language teaching can enhance students’ learning experiences. The study also sheds light on the importance of considering students’ backgrounds for curriculum transformation and innovation.