JISCMail - MANDARIN-CHINESE-TEACHING Archives

On 19/02/07, Frances Weightman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Dear Anne, Judith and Terry et al

As I said before in a posting to this list, I believe all university Chinese departments will be very keen to find a solution to this.

Clearly we can't teach post-A-level students in the same classes as ab initio students (who, realistically [and at least for the time being], are likely to be a far larger group). However, it is absolutely imperative that universities do accommodate students at all levels and I agree with the sentiments expressed.

It is wonderful that more and more school students are studying Chinese, and this is a challenge that all HE institutions are trying to meet. At Leeds, while we can't accept native Chinese (Mandarin) speakers to do Chinese language degrees (they can however follow a studies programme on East Asia) but we would certainly encourage all other applicants with school level qualifications and/or gap years in China etc.

It may be that applicants would be advised to take a joint honours programme in Chinese with another subject, rather than single honours, but this issue is usually dealt with on a case by case basis, and we are a very large department which makes things a bit simpler. In future, if we had larger numbers of post-A-level applicants then we would need to develop more long-term solutions, but at the moment this seems to have worked.

If we followed the logic that students shouldn't work hard on their Chinese while on their gap years, then equally we would be forced to reject students who have read more than 2 books on Chinese History before arriving.. (don't worry, we don't do this either!!)

It may, as Judith suggested in an earlier posting, be useful to have a meeting about this -- we are all, at the end of the day, striving to educate young people about China and Chinese and clearly we need to work together on this, regardless of which sector we are in. I will also pass this on to Don Starr, President of the British Association of Chinese Studies, for any comments.

Frances Weightman
Head of Chinese, University of Leeds

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mandarin Chinese Teaching [mailto:MANDARIN-
> [log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
> Terry Lamb
> Sent: 19 February 2007 11:41
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Chinese at University
>
> Thanks for this Anne. I have expressed an opinion
> on this before. Much as I
> understand the reasons offered by universities for
> this, given the particular
> nature of Chinese, I still find it unacceptable
> and very shortsighted. The
> Confucius Institutes are wanting to promote
> Chinese in schools, and the
> language is developing rapidly, so it is an
> anomoly not to plan for this. Why
> am I putting so much effort into trying to dvelop
> PGCE places if their pupils
> will be rejected from HE courses? There is indeed
> an important ethical issue
> here.
>
> Universities need to look at ways in which
> differentiation is possible, using
> different levels of attainment to contribute to a
> community of practice. This
> is what I had to do when teaching languages in
> schools where there would often
> be a native speaker of the language present as a
> pupil. The development of
> greater individualisation is clearly crucial.
> Perhaps it is a resource issue,
> in which case we need to support Chinese
> departments in gaining access to
> greater resource.
>
> I think a meeting with Bill Rammell would be
> important, at least to draw his
> attention to the situation. Let me know if I can
> be of any help.
>
> All the best
>
> Terry
>
>
> Quoting Anne Martin <[log in to unmask] >:
>
> > Some more worrying news about University
> attitudes to students with GCSE and
> > A level Chinese
> >
> > I am teaching a non native mature student who is
> taking GCSE Chinese this
> > year. He already has some A levels and has
> applied to SOAS and has been given
> > an unconditional offer to study Chinese.
> >
> > At the open day last week an admissions tutor at
> SOAS was asked by someone
> > how they viewed students with A level Chinese.
> The admissions tutor replied
> > that a student with A level Chinese would
> probably not be offered a place to
> > study Chinese at SOAS as their course starts
> from the beginning and they have
> > no course for those with A level already. My
> student who is taking GCSE was
> > told to ease off on his studies.
> >
> > I am appauled by this attitude.
> >
> > We in secondary schools are working hard to get
> our students through GCSE and
> > A level with good grades to be told this by an
> admissions tutor at a leading
> > University.
> >
> > I would like to take this up with the Minister
> for Higher Education Bill
> > Rammell who spoke at the recent HSBC conference.
> > What do others think about this ?
> >
> > Regards
> > Anne Martin
> >
> >
>
>
> Dr Terry LAMB
> Director, Initial Teacher Education
> University of Sheffield
>
> President, FIPLV (Fédération Internationale des
> Professeurs de Langues
> Vivantes)
> Convenor, AILA Research Network on Learner
> Autonomy in Language Learning
>
> School of Education
> The Education Building
> 388 Glossop Road
> Sheffield
> S10 2JA
>
> Tel: (+)44 (0)114 222 8118
> Fax: (+)44 (0)114 279 8631
> http://www.shef.ac.uk/education/staff/academic/lam
> bt.html
> FIPLV website: http://www.fiplv.org/
> AILA SC website: http://lc.ust.hk/~ailasc/