Transnational Teaching at UOW

TRANSNATIONAL 

TEACHING AT UOW 

Anne Melano, Maureen Bell and Ruth Walker 

CONNECT: 

LEARNING AND 

TEACHING 

ACADEMIC SERVICES DIVISION

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 

This booklet draws on rich experiences of University 

of Wollongong (UOW) staff who have taught, 

administered and/or coordinated subjects and 

courses across international teaching sites. We thank 

and acknowledge their generosity in sharing their 

valuable insights and expertise: 

UOW Executive – Rob Castle, Joe Chicharo 

Faculty of Arts – Chris Barker, Guy Davidson, Philip 

Kitley, Mark McLelland, David Marshall, Brian Yecies 

Faculty of Commerce – Peter McLean, Gary Noble, 

Karin Wells 

Faculty of Education – Peter Kell 

Faculty of Health & Behavioural Sciences – Angela 

Brown, Janette Curtis, Bill Janes, Joanne Joyce- 

McCoach, Moira Williamson 

Faculty of Informatics – Gene Awyzio, Penney 

McFarlane, Katina Michael, Anji Phillips, Ian Piper, 

Willy Susilo 

Faculty of Law – Mark Loves, Judith Marychurch 

Transnational Education & Alliances Unit – Bill 

Damachis, Amanda Warren 

Faculty International Support Unit – Robyn Phillips 

Learning Development – Meeta Chatterjee, Kim 

Draisma, Bronwyn James, Paul Moore, Alisa Percy 

CEDIR – Ric Caladine, Gerry Lefoe 

Published by the Centre for Educational Development, 

Innovation and Recognition 2012 

University of Wollongong 

Northfields Avenue 

Wollongong NSW 2522 

Australia 

2 University of Wollongong

CONTENTS 

BACKGROUND 

How to use this booklet 4 

Introduction 5 

Modes of transnational teaching 6 

The qualities of effective transnational teachers 8 

Staff support services 10 

Student support services 11 

PREPARING FOR TRANSNATIONAL TEACHING 

What are my students’ academic skills? 12 

How does culture affect subject materials? 15 

How does language affect learning? 18 

Integrating academic skills – a few ideas 21 

Preparing for intensive transnational teaching 24 

Carrying out quality assurance 27 

DURING THE TEACHING SESSION 

How does culture affect classroom interaction? 29 

How does culture affect student engagement with 

assessment? 32 

What sort of feedback should I give to students? 35 

How explicit should I make the assessment 

criteria? 38 

How can I help my students avoid plagiarism? 40 

Preparing and inducting tutors and co-teachers 43 

Communicating with tutors and co-teachers 45 

Communicating with students 47 

What about student support? 48 

Learning and teaching using technology 49 

Connecting and networking 51 

UOW Learning-Teaching-Research Nexus 54 

Approaches to evaluation 55 

Discussing and sharing experiences 56 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 58 

Transnational Teaching at UOW 

3

BACKGROUND 

HOW TO USE THIS BOOKLET 

This booklet is intended primarily for: 

●● 

●● 

University of Wollongong (UOW) academics 

who are involved in transnational teaching for 

the first time 

new transnational subject coordinators 

employed by partner institutions to deliver 

UOW programs. 

The booklet does not cover UOW policies, guidelines 

or procedures. These can be found on the UOW web 

site. Rather, it offers a perspective on the preparation 

needed, as well as tips and suggestions for how to 

coordinate effective teaching and learning during the 

transnational experience. 

The booklet will also be of interest to course 

coordinators, co-teachers/tutors and others with 

a management or support role in transnational 

teaching. 

Much of this advice has been drawn from interviews 

with UOW subject and course coordinators and 

co-teachers, located both in Australia and at 

transnational locations, as well as the literature on 

transnational teaching. The perspectives of students 

from a transnational course have also been included. 

Co-teachers will be interested in much of the material 

in this booklet, particularly the sections on classroom 

engagement and assessment. ‘Co-teachers’ is an 

inclusive term covering all tutors, casual teachers and 

adjuncts – that is, all those teaching in the subject other 

than the subject coordinator/lecturer. 

In this booklet ‘peers’ refers to all academics, including 

subject coordinators and lecturers, whether located at 

Wollongong or transnationally. All have a critical role 

to play. In particular, co-teachers may often be the 

students’ main learning support. 

For new transnational course coordinators, a boxed 

area at the top of each section provides additional 

ideas, including some key issues that might need to 

be addressed. Course coordinators should read this 

booklet in conjunction with the various procedures at 

https://intranet.uow.edu.au/international/overview/ 

policies/ 

For new academic staff, it is suggested that this booklet 

be read in conjunction with ‘Teaching at UOW’, available 

from the Academic Development Unit or on the UOW 

web site. 

“I prefer the term 

‘transnational’ to ‘offshore’, 

which seems like a secondary 

thing. ‘Offshore’ is putting 

Australia at the centre of the 

world.” 

— Transnational co-teacher 


INTRODUCTION 

Transnational teaching involves teaching in multiple 

countries. This includes teaching in intensive mode 

away from the professional and academic support 

of the academic’s own campus. In 2011, University 

of Wollongong (UOW) academics taught in Australia, 

Dubai, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore. 

UOW students have some fundamental similarities 

in all locations. They want to acquire knowledge, 

pass their subjects and be positively perceived by 

their peers and teachers. New students may lack 

confidence in their English language proficiency, have 

trouble understanding visiting teachers, be uncertain 

of the academic expectations of UOW, become upset 

by a poor mark or feel isolated. As students progress 

they become more adept at writing and critical 

thinking, develop their discipline knowledge and gain 

confidence in their abilities. 

Yet although the fundamentals of learning are 

similar across countries, the cultural expressions of 

teaching and learning can be very different. Teaching 

transnationally therefore involves: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

exploring cultural dimensions of curriculum 

and teaching approaches 

modifying content, teaching practices and 

assessment for a cultural context while 

maintaining high academic standards 

preparing oneself for teaching in different 

cultural contexts 

a willingness to understand and appreciate 

cultural perspectives and customs. 

Preparation also involves more than planning 

for teaching. Availability and effectiveness of 

technologies, tutor support and student expectations 

are some key issues a transnational teacher 

manages. 

Much of the advice in this booklet was sourced from 

UOW academics, co-teachers and students who have 

kindly shared their experiences and initial struggles. 

Some of these have been montaged as ‘cautionary 

tales’, while others are offered as examples of good 

practice. 

A key message is that you don’t have to do it alone. 

UOW has many experienced transnational teachers 

who are happy to give advice to others. 

UOW Learning Development can assist with 

assessment design, assessing students’ English 

language proficiency and developing learning 

activities. 

UOW Learning Design Unit can assist with subject 

design and online delivery. 

“It’s helped my teaching craft. It’s a 

marvellous experience to be able to 

think about what it is we do and how 

we do it. It really brings the pedagogy 

to the fore. … And it’s fun. The 

classroom is fun, the streets are fun. 

Hong Kong is a good place to be what 

we are and do what we do.” 

— Angela Brown, Subject Coordinator, 

Faculty of Health & Behavioural 

Sciences 

UOW Academic Development Unit can arrange 

workshops on teaching transnationally. 

Experienced UOW transnational teachers comment 

that transnational teaching can be very rewarding 

and enjoyable. We hope that you, too, enjoy the 

experience, and that this booklet will help you to feel 

better prepared for the journey. 


5

MODES OF TRANSNATIONAL TEACHING 

There is a wide variety of transnational teaching 

approaches, with the more successful involving close 

collaborative teaching with sister institutions. At 

UOW, approaches used may include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

subjects and courses delivered by a 

transnational partner, quality assured by 

Wollongong academics 

lectures delivered in an intensive teaching 

week by a Wollongong academic, supported 

by tutorials delivered by the transnational 

partner through the session 

lectures in an intensive teaching week by a 

Wollongong academic, supported by elearning 

or distance learning through the session. 

1 UOW SUBJECTS AND COURSES DELIVERED BY A 

TRANSNATIONAL PARTNER (PARTNER DELIVERY: UOW 

QUALITY ASSURANCE MODEL) 

In this approach, teachers/academics who are 

employed at a partner institution or at UOW Dubai 

(UOWD) deliver UOW subjects and courses. UOW 

academics are responsible for quality assurance. 

There are often two academics responsible for the 

subject, one in each institution. The UOW subject 

coordinator is the academic responsible for the design 

and delivery of the Australian subject. This UOW 

subject coordinator (or sometimes another UOW 

academic) is also responsible for quality assurance at 

all locations, including UOWD, and in this role they are 

called the ‘Quality Assuror’. Academics in both locations 

contribute to the design of any necessary modifications 

to the transnational version of the subject. The 

transnational partner or UOWD academic carries out (or 

supervises) the teaching and marking. 

Another possibility is that the subject is unique to the 

transnational location. It will then usually be designed 

by the transnational partner and/or UOWD subject 

coordinator, and reviewed and approved through the 

transnational quality assurance procedure (see Policy 

link box). A UOW academic is assigned responsibility 

for quality assurance. 

Both versions of this model are based on partnership. 

Academics collaborate across locations on curriculum 

design, assessment tasks, case studies/examples and 

teaching methods in order to produce both localised 

and internationally relevant subjects and programs. 

Other guiding principles in this collaborative process 

are: 

●● 

equivalence of content, assessment tasks and 

learning outcomes across locations 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

internationalisation of the curriculum 

– ideally, this would extend beyond 

choosing case studies and would include 

an international perspective in subjects, 

international collaboration between 

academics and students at different global 

sites and rich opportunities for students to 

enhance their cross-cultural skills 

subjects and academic programs which are 

constantly scrutinised for their relevance 

and applicability not just at the transnational 

teaching location but at the main Wollongong 

campus of UOW as well 

mutual respect 

regular communication and sharing of good 

practice between academics at both locations. 

2 LECTURES DELIVERED AS ‘INTENSIVES’, 

SUPPORTED BY WEEKLY TUTORIALS WITH LOCAL CO- 

TEACHERS (INTENSIVES PLUS TUTORIALS MODEL) 

This has been the most common UOW experience. It 

involves coordinating a cohort of students hosted at a 

partner institution in an overseas location. In this type 

of transnational teaching, students are enrolled in 

UOW programs, and study the same subjects as main 

campus students. Typically: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

the same subject is taught at the both the 

main campus and transnationally 

subject materials, resources, and assessment 

tasks are predominantly developed by the 

UOW subject coordinator 

the UOW subject coordinator usually delivers 

the core material to transnational students 

in an intensive teaching week early in the 

session/semester at the transnational 

teaching site 

local ‘co-teachers’ from the transnational 

partner institution guide and tutor the 

students through the remaining material 

during the session, based on learning 

activities developed by the UOW subject 

coordinator 

the subjects are supported online via 

eLearning, which allows transnational 

students to access subject resources and to 

interact online with lecturers, co-teachers 

and their student peers outside of the 

intensive teaching week 

in some cases distance delivery methods 

such as eduStream lectures or activity 

handbooks are used to combine distance and 

face-to-face teaching. 


3 LECTURES DELIVERED AS ‘INTENSIVES’, 

SUPPORTED BY DISTANCE AND/OR ELEARNING 

(INTENSIVES PLUS ELEARNING/DISTANCE MODEL) 

This approach is used by the School of Nursing, 

Midwifery and Indigenous Health. As with the previous 

approach, the UOW subject coordinator has cohorts 

of students in Australia as well as at the transnational 

teaching location. They offer face-to-face teaching for 

the transnational cohort through intensive teaching 

weeks at the beginning of session/semester. 

In this approach there are no tutorials or local coteachers 

to support the student through the session. 

Instead, more attention is given to supporting 

students at a distance, using careful subject design 

which makes the best use of eLearning tools for 

learning and communication. 

This approach is successful where: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

students are highly motivated, mature 

professionals who can study independently 

teaching activities/assessments are designed 

to encourage peer learning and eLearning, and 

UOW academics are committed to 

communicating with students during the 

session and supporting them using eLearning 

and other tools. 

“Whatever delivery model is used, we need to 

think about how the program will support global 

learning. How will students at transnational 

locations and Australian locations collaborate, 

in group projects or discussion groups? Global 

learning is now an important part of subject 

design.” 

— Sandra Wills, Executive Director, 

‘Global learning’ has been defined as a studentcentred 

activity where learners from different 

cultures use technology to improve their global 

perspectives while remaining in their home 

countries (Gibson, Rimmington et al, 2008). For 

example, classes or groupwork where students 

located in different countries come together online. 

SUMMARY OF RESPONSIBILITIES 

MODEL: 

1. Partner delivery: 

UOW Quality Assurance 

Model 

2. Intensives Plus 

Tutorials Model 

3. Intensives Plus 

eLearning/Distance 

Model 

Subject Coordination 

Partner institution 

academic working with 

Wollongong academic 



Lectures 


academic 



Support during 

session 


academic and tutor 

Tutorials by partner 

institution co-teacher 


available for questions, 

advice and feedback 

(mainly by email) 


teaching online through 

eLearning, distance 

education 

Marking 

Bulk of marking is by 

partner institution 

academic and tutor 

Quality assurance/ check 

marking by Wollongong 

quality assurer 

Bulk of marking is by 


Some marking eg of 

presentations is by 

partner institution coteacher 



7

THE QUALITIES OF EFFECTIVE TRANSNATIONAL TEACHERS 

The experience of transnational teaching inevitably 

challenges you to reflect on your role as a teacher. 

You may find yourself in situations where the usual 

rules do not operate, where assumptions are not 

helpful, or where your ability to deal with situations 

is diminished by a lack of understanding of local 

custom. Transnational teaching may test your beliefs 

about teaching and learning and challenge your 

flexibility and cultural awareness. 

Various writers refer to the key characteristics of 

effective international and/or transnational teachers 

(Farkas-Teekens, 1997, Leask, 2001, 2006, 2007, 

Vulpe et al, 2000). These characteristics involve 

teaching skills and approaches, personal attributes, 

cultural knowledge and knowledge of policy and 

procedures. 

TEACHING SKILLS AND APPROACHES 

In addition to providing timely and appropriate 

feedback on assessment tasks and an enthusiastic 

approach to what they are teaching, transnational 

teachers also need to: 

●● 

●● 

adapt learning activities to suit the needs of 

transnational students. This typically involves 

including local content (examples and case 

studies) in the curriculum 

make skilled use of multi-media and 

communication technology, both to support 

communication of concepts and for studentstudent 

and student-teacher communication. 

PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES 

Effective teaching in any situation requires flexibility, 

patience and collegiality. In addition, in transnational 

teaching it is important to be able to: 

●● 

●● 

communicate with people of another culture 

in a way that engenders respect and trust 

work within the local conditions and 

constraints. 

“It is really hard, there is a huge difference. Even if 

they are doing a fantastic job teaching in Wollongong, 

it may not work here, they may have to change.” 


CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE 

Transnational teachers themselves need to be 

intercultural learners, seeking to increase their 

cultural awareness and being open to learn from 

new experiences. To be effective, they need to 

acknowledge the variety in teaching styles and 

different traditions of education that their students 

may have experienced. 

“Lecturers need induction training in being 

culturally sensitive – we need to train lecturers 

how to show their interest in and respect for other 

cultures and environments.” 

DISCIPLINE KNOWLEDGE 

If a discipline varies across locations, transnational 

teachers may need to be aware of any major 

departures which could affect students’ prior 

knowledge and/or industry expectations. 

KNOWLEDGE OF POLICY AND PROCEDURES 

Effective transnational teachers are informed 

about international standards, issues, practices and 

perspectives within their discipline. They are also 

informed about the relevant policies, guidelines and 

procedures. At UOW these include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

— Peter McLean, Faculty of Commerce 

the Quality Assurance of Transnational 

Education (Offshore) and UOWD Teaching and 

Learning Procedure 

the UOW Graduate Qualities 

the Academic Integrity and Plagiarism Policy 

the Code of Practice – Teaching and 

Assessment 

the Good Practice Assessment Guidelines; the 

Teaching and Assessment Policy, and 

● ● the Code of Practice – Students. 

Transnational procedures can be accessed at https:// 

intranet.uow.edu.au/international/overview/policies/ 

index.html#Transnational and the other documents 

can be accessed at: http://www.uow.edu.au/about/ 

policy/learning/ Further information regarding 

policies and procedures can be sourced by contacting 

the Director, Transnational Education and Alliances at 

UOW. 


Within the transnational teaching environment it is 

important to be alert for potentially conflicting policies 

or practices across institutions, and prepared to 

help students, co-teachers and peers at all locations 

understand UOW expectations and procedures. 

The Australian Vice Chancellors Committee’s 

Provision of Education to International Students: 

Codes and Guidelines for Australian Universities 

(AVCC, 2005b, pp 7-8) contains a number of guidelines 

dealing with teaching international students, many 

of which apply directly to transnational teaching 

contexts. For instance, it stipulates that staff 

members representing universities overseas or 

delivering programs to international students should 

be carefully selected and be: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

sympathetic and clear communicators with 

a thorough knowledge of their university’s 

courses and procedures, and of the Australian 

education system 

sensitive to the culture and customs of the 

country they are visiting and/or the students 

they are teaching, and aware of historical and 

political background and educational systems 

knowledgeable, experienced and competent 

in the administration of student policy and in 

face-to-face dealings with students 

aware of the quality of the partnership 

arrangement where the university is engaged 

in offshore provision. 

Additionally, the AVCC stipulates that Australian 

universities should “recognise their on-going 

responsibilities for the education and welfare of 

international students, and take appropriate account 

of the potential cultural and linguistic difficulties that 

international students may encounter. Australian 

universities should ensure that academic programs, 

support services and learning environment offered to 

all international students encourage them to have a 

positive attitude about Australian education” (AVCC, 

2005b, p 4). 

CRITICAL ISSUES 

FOR COURSE 

COORDINATORS 

• How will new transnational teachers be 

prepared for their role – for example, 

workshops, mentoring from course 

coordinator, mentoring from experienced 

transnational teachers? (The Academic 

Development Unit can help facilitate a 

workshop for your faculty if needed.) 

• How will you encourage teachers to see 

the transnational students as part of the 

UOW student body (not as peripheral or 

ancillary)? 

• How will you discourage assumptions 

of cultural superiority and encourage 

cultural openness? 

• How will you prepare, consult and/ 

or collaborate with academics and coteachers 

at different locations? 


9

STAFF SUPPORT SERVICES 

WHICH UOW SERVICES CAN STAFF ACCESS? 

Transnational 

Education & Alliances 

Unit 

Academic Development 

Unit 

Learning Design 

Faculty Service 

Agreements 

Learning Development 

Library 

Turnitin 

Advice and procedures for establishing new courses 

Annual review procedures 

Quality assurance procedures 

https://intranet.uow.edu.au/ard/policies/UOW091614.html 

Provides teaching development opportunities for all teaching 

staff, including casual teachers. Includes University Learning 

and Teaching program (ULT), tips for tutors workshops, 

seminars and podcasts, advice on teaching awards and advice 

on probation and promotion applications. Offered face-to-face 

at Wollongong or online at other locations (unless funding is 

availabe for travel). 

http://www.uow.edu.au/asd/cedir/academicdevelopmentunit/ 

Offers assistance with curriculum design and teaching 

technology, including assessment task design, use of eLearning 

and innovative resource development. 

http://focusonteaching.uow.edu.au/learningdesign/ 

Allocates technical and learning design staff for an agreed 

number of hours to help selected academic staff members to 

develop innovative teaching resources. 

http://www.uow.edu.au/asd/fsa/index.html 

Offers advice on curriculum development and embedding 

student academic skills and English language skills. Produces 

resources and handouts for students. 

If funding is provided for travel, a Learning Developer may be 

able visit a campus to offer workshop programs and integrated 

seminars for students, or a block of individual student 

consultations. These arrangements must be negotiated with the 

Head of Learning Development. 

http://www.uow.edu.au/student/services/ld/ldstaff/ 

Through the faculty librarians, academics can access facultyspecific 

advice on developing student research skills as well as 

assistance with their own research. The Library also produces 

online referencing guides for different Faculties and other 

useful online tools which can be incorporated into teaching. 

http://www.library.uow.edu.au/resourcesbytopic/UOW026621. 

html 

Anti-plagiarism software that can be incorporated into subjects 

and assessment tasks. Advice should be sought before use. 

http://www.uow.edu.au/student/services/ld/staff/UOW022082. 

html 


STUDENT SUPPORT SERVICES 

WHICH UOW SERVICES CAN TRANSNATIONAL STUDENTS ACCESS? 

Library 

Transnational students have access to e-readings, online databases and e-books 

through the UOW Library. In 2010, over 50,000 e-books were purchased by the 

Library to enhance access by students, particularly at transnational and regional 

campuses. The Library continues to add to the e-book collection. 

The UOW Library also provides a number of online tools to assist with research, 

including a referencing tool at http://www.library.uow.edu.au/referencing/. 

Students also would usually have access to a library through the partner 

institution. 

Learning Development 

StartSmart online 

modules 

Information technology 

Academic advice 

Accommodation 

Scholarships 

Counselling 

Grievances 

Students can access online resources such as the Unilearning academic writing 

tool, a range of handouts and guides to academic writing and statistical modules. 

Where a student is identified as at-risk and referred by a subject coordinator or 

lecturer, online individual consultations can be organised. 

http://learning.uow.edu.au/resources/ 

http://www.uow.edu.au/student/attributes/statlit/ 

http://unilearning.uow.edu.au/ 

An online orientation to academic skills including referencing. 

http://www.library.uow.edu.au/orientation/ 

All students are given a UOW login and email account. Course administrators 

should note that enrolments will need to be notified to ITS by ARD well ahead of 

the transnational session so that user names can be created. 

UOW eLearning (subject web sites) is available at every location. 

Some technology may need to be negotiated with the partner institution: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

access to computers 

student Internet quotas 

classes held in computer labs 

specialist software. 

Subject advice is given by the subject coordinator. 

Course advice is usually provided by the local course coordinator. Students may 

also contact the Wollongong sub-dean. 

Students can be referred to accommodation service of the partner institution. 

Every scholarship comes with eligibility conditions. Some scholarships may be 

available to UOW students at any location, but many are restricted. Interested 

students should check the UOW scholarships web pages. 

Students seeking counselling should be referred to the counselling service of the 

partner institution. 

Students at any location can instigate an Academic Grievance Resolution 

Procedure. http://www.uow.edu.au/about/policy/UOW058653.html 


11

PREPARING FOR TRANSNATIONAL TEACHING 

WHAT ARE MY STUDENTS’ 

ACADEMIC SKILLS? 

WHAT CAN I EXPECT? 

You can expect that students at all locations will 

be similarly capable of learning. They will generally 

be interested in developing deep understandings 

and problem-solving skills, consciously seeking 

an international outlook, and viewing international 

education as a long-term investment in career 

advancement (Bell, 2008a, Gatfield and Hyde, 2005, 

Pyvis and Chapman, 2004, Rizvi, 2005). However, they 

may well have different educational experiences or 

training to draw on this capacity for learning. 

“Learning styles are similar to any class 

anywhere. Students range from highly 

autonomous independent learners to dependent 

learners. We need to be careful not to 

stereotype. It’s a global classroom.” 

— Peter Kell, Course Coordinator 2003–2009, 

Faculty of Education 

It is a good idea to question any assumptions 

about the learning capacity of students based on 

nationality. For instance, various researchers have 

refuted the earlier stereotype of students from Asian 

cultural backgrounds as taking a surface approach 

to learning (Beasley & Parson, 1999; Biggs & 

Watkins, 1996; Chalmers & Volet, 1997; Choi, 1997; 

Kelly & Ha, 1998; Kember, 2000; On, 1996). While 

students’ earlier educational experiences may have 

encouraged particular approaches such as a focus 

on memorisation (Ng, 2001), globalisation influences 

on educational cultures in Asia are increasingly 

emphasising critical thinking skills and active learning 

(Bell, 2008b, 2009; Ng, 2001; Mok, 2003; Tan, 2003). 

WHAT CAN’T I ASSUME? 

You can’t assume that transnational students will 

have the same academic skills as students at another 

location or from another course, even across groups 

that may seem similar. Students may have come 

through very different national education systems 

and/or prior studies, each with different emphases. 

It follows that extra development of some academic 

skills may need to be built into the course/subject. 

HOW DO I FIND OUT IF STUDENTS HAVE SKILLS GAPS? 

Consider the level of skill needed to succeed in 

the subject/course, in areas such as: independent 

research; referencing; literature reviews; essay 

writing; critical thinking and analysis; problem solving; 

mathematics; computer programming; group work; 

presentations; and academic English. 

Some possibilities are: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

talk to colleagues who have previously taught 

and marked work from this student cohort 

if students are entering from an articulated 

course ask the course coordinator or faculty 

officer to show you the subject outlines and 

assessment tasks from prior courses 

ask for advice from the tutors, co-teachers or 

subject coordinator in their country of study, 

as they will best know their students 

consult with Learning Development at UOW, 

as they may have previously worked with 

similar transnational student cohorts, or can 

CAUTIONARY TALE High failure rates in an 

undergraduate subject. Students were admitted 

to a course based on success in a very different 

subject area. When they performed poorly in their 

first year the academics were shocked and unsure 

how to handle the problems. It took some time to 

identify the skills gaps and put support in place. 

help you realistically assess the academic 

and English language standards of students 

set an assessment due very early in the 

session which can help to identify individual 

and group skills issues, and plan to follow up 

with support where needed. 

“Students coming from NSW high schools come 

from a homogenous experience, but this isn’t 

the case for people coming to our transnational 

campuses. Don’t assume. They are often very 

bright students but they don’t have the same 

background as our students. Their starting 

point can be very different. Get help – it’s a joint 

effort, not an individual one. Work with Learning 

Development and other colleagues.” 

—Rob Castle, DVC(A) 


WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO ADDRESS SKILLS GAPS? 

Strategies can be grouped into two main approaches: 

●● 

offer extra support outside of class – 

‘supplemental support’ 

●● 

offer support within the subject – ‘integrated 

support’ 

Supplemental support can include extra tutorials 

for struggling students, English language workshops, 

handouts or links to learning support resources. 

For some courses, a special bridging program may 

be effective. This approach is attractive to subject 

coordinators as it does not take up valuable class time 

during the intensive teaching weeks, draws on existing 

learning support material, and can take less time to 

develop or access. However, without clear guidance it 

can be hard for students to conceptually link generic 

advice to their immediate learning needs. Access to 

learning resources does not guarantee understanding 

or necessarily develop students’ capacity to apply the 

instruction to their assessment tasks. 

Integrated support is generally considered to be the 

better model. An integrated approach is one which 

finds ways to develop students’ academic skills at 

the same time as they work with subject content. 

Language and learning support are most effective 

when integrated into course and teaching design 

(Percy et al, 2005). 

Integrated support has the additional benefit of 

ensuring that all students have the same learning 

support and avoids the stigma of ‘remedial’ assistance. 

Usually integration of academic skill development 

is done by modifying learning and assessment tasks 

to build skills to the levels needed. For example, you 

might: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

give students tasks in class that model the 

approach that will be expected in assessment 

tasks 

provide examples of work that show what is 

expected 

explicitly focus on a particular academic skill 

in different assessment tasks 

incrementally develop academic skills across 

assessment tasks 

make expectations clear in marking criteria 

if students are unpractised at writing complex 

reports or long essays, consider splitting the 

assessment into two or more components. 

Although it might initially take more time to 

collaboratively develop curricula using integrated 

learning support, it has the benefit of being 

sustainable over time and across multiple deliveries. 

CRITICAL ISSUES FOR 

COURSE COORDINATORS 

• How will you arrive a good understanding 

of students’ prior learning, for example are 

there articulated courses where you could 

examine their previous curricula? 

• What are the academic skills needed? 

Are there likely to be any skills gaps? For 

example, you might compare students’ 

skills to those of other cohorts you are 

teaching (writing, maths, referencing, 

research, analysis etc) 

• If there are skills gaps, how will you plan 

opportunities for students to acquire the 

skills needed to succeed in subjects? For 

example through orientation programs, 

online academic skills modules, and/or the 

development of subject-specific integrated 

activities and resources. The Library and 

Learning Development academics can 

help develop these with you. 

DOES THE SUBJECT HAVE TO BE TAUGHT IN EXACTLY 

THE SAME WAY AT EACH CAMPUS? 

No. Diverse teaching strategies can be used to 

bring students to the same standard. The Quality 

Assurance of Transnational Education (Offshore) & 

UOWD Teaching and Learning Procedure states that: 

“The content of subjects, textbooks and readings and 

the nature of assessment tasks may vary between the 

equivalent UOW and offshore and/or UOWD subjects 

so as to reflect the pedagogical needs of the student 

cohorts at each location, and to reflect particular 

requirements imposed by relevant higher education 

accreditation agencies.” 

All variations must be approved by the faculty as part 

of quality assurance of subject outlines. 

“The students love to have a Western person bring a 

completely different experience to their education. 

They love it and they hate it at the same time 

because you have different expectations of them 

compared to local teachers; you have a different 

teaching style; you expect a lot more autonomy and 

independence; you tend to have higher expectations 

of their performance in the classroom.” 



13

GOOD PRACTICE: PROVIDING 

EXAMPLES OF PAST WORK – 

FACULTY OF ARTS 

Hong Kong students in the early intakes of a 

transnational BA program reported their ‘culture 

shock’ and confusion about the academic 

expectations. One returning lecturer decided to 

address their concerns by working with Learning 

Development to find models of good/poor academic 

writing by his main campus students who had 

just completed the same assessment task (with 

their permission). The Hong Kong students were 

delighted with these models and the insights into 

their Wollongong peers’ experience, and grew 

more creative not only in the selection of research 

projects but in their reflection of their local cultural 

expectations. 

— Mark McLelland, Subject Coordinator, Faculty of 

Arts 

GOOD PRACTICE: SKILLS 

INDUCTION – CENTRE FOR 

TRANSNATIONAL CRIME 

PREVENTION 

Many students in transnational crime prevention 

are police or legal officers who have not been 

to university before. To help them understand 

expectations and build their academic skills, students 

in both Wollongong and China complete a series of 

online modules on academic expectations, research, 

reading strategies and writing that were developed 

by Learning Development and the Library, who also 

taught a two-day workshop program of workshops on 

campus at Wollongong. See http://ctcp.uow.edu.au/ 

resources/ 

While students reported that they referred to the 

online modules several times across the session, 

they also reported not fully appreciating the generic 

workshop program as it was not attached to any 

‘real’ assessment task. In 2010, follow-up workshops 

were offered immediately before assessment tasks 

rather than at the beginning of session, so that 

students could immediately see how they could 

use the academic skills needed for specific learning 

tasks. Additionally, a core subject was redeveloped 

to include scaffolded assessment tasks and learning 

resources designed to incrementally build students’ 

academic research and writing skills. 

— Mark Loves, Course Coordinator, and Judith 

Marychurch, FEC Chair, Faculty of Law 

WHERE CAN I GET HELP? 

1. Talk to your course coordinator for guidance and 

assistance. 

2. Make contact with your Faculty’s Learning 

Development representative (the current list can be 

found at http://www.uow.edu.au/student/services/ld/ 

ldstaff). These specialists are available to help with: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

embedding academic skills and language 

support into a subject 

developing subject-specific resources or class 

activities 

designing sample exercises to help students 

acquire suitable vocabulary, evaluate 

research, practice critical thinking etc 

refining assessment tasks and marking 

criteria 

delivering formative feedback on English 

language and writing in an early assessment 

task 

subject to funding approval, in cases of high 

need Learning Developers may be available to 

accompany you to classes to collaboratively 

teach academic skills. 

Be sure to give Learning Development plenty of notice 

if you are going to need their assistance. 

“I worked with Learning Development 

to deliver a Wollongong subject to 

a different audience. The Learning 

Design group helped me as well, and 

the Library was fabulous. I found the 

university was very supportive of 

teaching offshore.” 

— Moira Williamson, School of 

Nursing, Faculty of Health & 

Behavioural Science 


HOW DOES CULTURE AFFECT SUBJECT MATERIALS? 


You can expect that your transnational students 

will have a basic knowledge of other countries, have 

heard of a few very famous international people, 

movements and brands, and will be aware of and 

have opinions on major global events. 


You can’t assume that students and teachers from 

another country share knowledge that is well-known 

in your country, whether of films/TV shows/books, 

social movements, brands, companies, historical 

events, ideas, technologies, politics, people or 

philosophies. 

Even in cases where knowledge is shared, it can’t 

be assumed that people from other countries 

conceptualise or interpret it in the same way. 

“The main difference is the experience 

and background. What I have with local 

teachers here is that we share the same 

cultural background and the same 

knowledge, so when we mention an 

example we are all ‘yes yes that’s the one’. 

But with the Wollongong teachers you have 

to try to figure out some really common 

examples so that we can share together. It 

is not just the example that is important – it 

is through this example that I get what we 

need students to learn”. 


MY SUBJECT IS GROUNDED IN SOME BASIC 

PHILOSOPHICAL OR THEORETICAL PRINCIPLES. HOW 

CAN I KNOW THAT THESE ARE SHARED BY STUDENTS 

FROM ANOTHER CULTURE? 

Sometimes you may be unsure of whether students 

hold the same basic philosophical or theoretical 

assumptions as those assumed in your subject. For 

example, in Australia some commonly held principles, 

many of which arguably underlie public policy, include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

the individual economic good should be 

balanced with the collective economic good 

individual human rights should be protected 

even against the powerful interests of 

governments 

religion is not a matter for the state 

people should not be discriminated against 

because of their gender, race, religion, 

sexuality, disability or marital status 

evolution describes the theory of origins best 

supported by science 

… and so on. 

None of these principles are universally accepted 

(even within Australia). Opposing views may be held in 

other countries as diverse as the United States, Saudi 

Arabia and China. These and other assumptions can 

profoundly impact on subject areas as diverse as law, 

arts, health, science and commerce. 

Rather than avoiding the issues, it can be beneficial 

to make any particular philosophical or theoretical 

principles that underlie your subject explicit to 

students. One approach is to spell out these principles 

in an early lecture, and open them up to discussion/ 

debate. Another approach is to try and find out about 

any areas of difference before teaching begins, so that 

points of difference can be clarified to students. 

Making your principles explicit and/or engaging in 

debate doesn’t necessarily mean you have to change 

the subject content or the position from which you 

teach. It may mean: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

spending more class time explaining 

principles 

acknowledging the different perspectives 

of students and remaining open to ongoing 

dialogue 

clarifying expectations and ground rules. 

This levels the playing field, so that students and 

teachers know where they stand, and can respectfully 

acknowledge differing positions. 


15

HOW DO TEACHERS WORK ACROSS LOCATIONS TO 

MODIFY SUBJECT MATERIAL? 

In many cases there will be two subject coordinators, 

one in each location. One may have developed 

the original material for Australia and the other 

may be modifying the subject for another country. 

Alternatively the subject may be undergoing review so 

that it is suitable for delivery in both countries. 

In either case, development of the modified subject 

will need to be shared and collegial. An initial meeting 

will need to be scheduled to discuss broad issues: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

the aims and learning outcomes of the subject 

the graduate qualities developed in the subject 

the learning capabilities and prior learning of 

the transnational students 

whether the subject content including 

examples and case studies is suitably pitched 

to transnational students 

whether the assessment tasks are suitably 

pitched to transnational students (for 

example, a large assessment of a type 

unfamiliar to transnational students may 

need to be broken into several smaller 

assessments to support students acquiring 

new skills) 

what learning support will need to be 

integrated into the teaching across session 

to help students meet the learning and 

assessment expectations. 

Further meetings may be needed, whether online 

using chat tools or Skype video, or through email 

exchanges, to agree on and refine: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

the suggested modifications to the subject 

modules for the transnational context 

if necessary, ways to slightly modify the 

assessment tasks so that they remain 

of equal weight, but meet the learning 

capabilities of the transnational cohort 

clear, specific marking criteria for the 

assessment tasks, to avoid possible student 

and tutor confusion. 

Both subject coordinators contribute to agreeing on 

the modifications needed. The subject coordinator 

located in Australia will usually be responsible for 

quality assurance. As Quality Assuror, they will provide 

comments and may require modifications to any new 

material. Both subject coordinators need to aware of 

and prepared for these roles and understand that their 

decisions need to be collaborative and negotiated. 

SHOULD WE REPLACE CULTURALLY-SPECIFIC 

EXAMPLES WITH EXAMPLES FROM THE STUDENTS’ 

OWN REGION? 

Yes, if they are illustrative examples — that is, those 

added to content to help students understand a point. 

Illustrative examples help students by connecting 

theory with their existing frame of reference. But 

if the example is outside their existing frame of 

reference, it won’t have the desired effect. It may even 

be confusing rather than helpful. 

In many cases examples were originally added to help 

the understanding of particular groups of students, 

and so are, to some degree, culturally based. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: An exam paper contained a 

scenario based on the Melbourne Cup, and a short 

explanation that it was a culturally significant 

horse race was added to the transnational version 

of the paper. Many transnational students didn’t 

fully understand what this scenario meant and 

struggled to answer the question effectively. 

No, if they are foundational examples — that is, 

those which show critical turning points in an area of 

study or practice, or are standard examples known 

internationally in the field. Additional explanation may 

help if these are from contexts unfamiliar to students. 

No, if they are deliberately intercultural — that 

is, they were designed specifically to build 

intercultural competence in students, for example 

involve culturally-specific areas such as Australian 

Indigenous studies, or Western legal systems. Part 

of the reason for studying a degree offered by an 

overseas university/campus is to gain cultural 

understanding. 

Possibly, if they are professional examples — that 

is, those which engage the students by showing how 

what they are learning relates to their chosen field. 

Graduate destinations and career prospects vary 

according to location, and some adjustments may be 

needed. 

“He actually gave a lot of local movies as examples 

and the students were all – ok here is a guy, an 

Australian guy, who has seen things in our films 

that we didn’t know about, and it is embarrassing 

to us, these are our movies! But we learnt about it 

through Australian eyes. It is a very good way of 

learning – getting to know yourself and your city 

through the eyes of someone else.” 

– Transnational student 


DOES THIS MEAN A DIFFERENT VERSION OF THE 

SUBJECT HAS TO BE OFFERED IN EVERY LOCATION? 

Not necessarily. Some academics choose to design 

the subject to contain a mixture of examples drawn 

from all of the countries where they are teaching. This 

mix of examples is then taught at each site, possibly 

with more attention to some aspects more than 

others, depending on location. 

“We are going over there to integrate our culture, 

not to impose our culture. If we don’t do that we will 

lose the students. Flying in and saying ‘here is my 

wisdom’ and then flying out again is not the way.” 

DOES SUBJECT CONTENT NEED BE EXACTLY THE SAME 

AT EACH CAMPUS, OR CAN IT BE VARIED? 

The core subject content is usually the same at every 

location, however: 

●● 

●● 

examples and case studies can vary across 

locations. Arguably, using examples and case 

studies originally designed to help Australian 

students may make the subject harder for 

others 

some content may have to be changed for 

other reasons, eg to meet local accreditation 

requirements. 

All variations must be approved by the faculty as part 

of quality assurance of subject outlines. 

WHERE CAN I SOURCE REGIONAL EXAMPLES AND CASE 

STUDIES? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

— Penney McFarlane, Degree Coordinator, 

Faculty of Informatics 

If some students already work in the field of 

study, they may be able to offer suggestions. 

Professional organisations in a region often 

have ideas for case studies that can also 

address concerns of local employers. 

Peers and co-teachers at the transnational 

location are an invaluable source of ideas. 

They may also be willing to read through your 

subject materials to give advice. 

Academic journal articles from the region can 

be useful. 

For simple examples, local or international 

newspapers and websites can be a good 

source. 



• Which subjects are appropriate for the 

program? What are the interests and 

professional aspirations of the students? 

What have they already studied? What 

accreditation arrangements will be 

sought? 

• How will UOW Graduate Qualities be 

incorporated into course design, so that 

they are explicitly linked to teaching and 

learning activities? 

• How will you convince new teachers in 

the program on the need for cultural 

modifications to materials from Australia? 

• How will you stay in communication with 

teachers and quality assurors as subjects 

are modified for delivery across sites? 

• Can you negotiate faculty resources, time 

or other support for coordinators to modify 

materials? 

ARE THERE DIFFERENT WAYS OF PRESENTING 

INFORMATION AND IDEAS? 

It has been suggested that a cultural difference can 

occur in how arguments are structured. A traditional 

Western discourse may present an assertion and then 

expand by providing evidence, examples etc. However 

in some East Asian countries the opposite style is 

often (but not always) preferred – first lay out related 

information, then explore its ramifications to build a 

picture or case, and finally finish with the assertion 

or conclusion. This is somewhat oversimplified; for 

example experiential learning in Western countries 

may also explore evidence before drawing out theory. 

We can be alert to cultural differences, and aware 

that people accustomed to one style may find the 

other style cumbersome. It may not be necessary to 

change your style, but it can be helpful to be aware of 

this as an area of possible cultural difference. 

“Chinese students expressed a strong preference 

for starting with the big picture ie the driving forces 

in the society and area before moving onto concrete 

examples. This has been found to have great 

importance for both the introduction of new topics 

as well as the consideration of actual examples and 

scenarios” (Bowering and Lock, 2007, p 3). 


17

HOW DOES LANGUAGE AFFECT LEARNING? 


You can expect that your transnational students will 

have passed an English proficiency test or equivalent 

to ensure they meet minimum standards in speaking, 

reading, writing and listening. 

You can expect that many of your transnational 

students will lack confidence in English. A common 

anxiety is that ‘I don’t speak/write English well 

enough to do well in the assessment tasks’. This fear 

may also make new students hesitate to answer or 

ask questions in class. 


You can’t assume that students possess 

the vocabulary of the discipline or that their 

conversational language skills are sufficient to 

immediately perform well in academic English. This 

does not mean that the students are not intelligent 

or capable of understanding the central themes 

or concepts, but it does mean that they may have 

difficulty communicating their understanding. 

The Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee report 

on transnational teaching found that pre-entry 

English language testing is not sufficient to the 

needs of students entering higher education either 

on or offshore. The report recommends that ongoing 

language and learning support should be planned by 

universities (AVCC, 2005a). 

IS IT MY RESPONSIBILITY TO ASSIST STUDENTS WITH 

LANGUAGE SUPPORT? 

Student learning and language support will need 

to planned by the course coordinator. Coordinators 

and lecturers will need to discuss and plan for this 

support across the program and within or parallel to 

subjects. 

When designing support, it is important not to give 

messages to the students that they are ‘in deficit’ 

or in need of ‘remedial’ assistance – they have been 

accepted into the program by UOW as meeting the 

entrance requirements of the course, after all, and 

may have done very well in their previous studies in 

other languages (Doherty & Singh, 2005, p 53). 

It is also important to realise that academic language 

and literacy is not something that can be simply ‘fixed’ 

in a generic bridging or pre-entry class or by one-off 

supplemental resources – it is context-specific and 

‘developed by degrees’ (Taylor et al, 1988 cited in 

AVCC, 2005a, p 5). 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO HELP STUDENTS 

UNDERSTAND THE LECTURES? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Provide lecture notes or copies of slides ahead 

of the class. Students who find lectures hard to 

follow or who can’t concentrate on discussion 

while taking notes will find this helpful. 

Explain how and when students can ask 

questions. For example, you could let students 

know that some class time will be put aside 

for questions and to check their understanding 

This will prepare them for the opportunity to 

engage with the lecture material. 

Speak clearly at a slower pace than usual. 

Speed of delivery is a major barrier to 

understanding. Slowing down takes effort and 

can be difficult for lecturers, who feel pressure 

to impart a lot of content in class time, but is 

key to ensuring student engagement. 

Clearly identify the structure and main 

concepts of each lecture, and signal subsidiary 

points and topic changes as they occur. 

Take a plain-English, conversational 

approach, rather than reading from formal 

notes as a script. Formal notes tend to be 

denser with more unfamiliar words and more 

difficult sentence structures. 

Avoid metaphors, or if they are important 

explain them. Second language students 

frequently misunderstand these, and 

misunderstandings can be a more serious 

problem than non-understandings. 

Use redundancy when explaining key concepts, 

by repeating points using different words 

List key points using PowerPoint or whiteboard 

Use visual aids, but remember that second 

language speakers may take longer to 

process both spoken and visual messages. 

Schedule changes in student activity to aid 

concentration and memory in longer classes. 

Summarise at the end of the lecture and 

explain context of the topic discussed – 

how it relates to the next topic and/or the 

assessment task, which readings are relevant. 

Find links between the readings and the 

lecture topics – giving students a strategic 

way of approaching the readings can help 

them process the information more effectively. 

(Flowerdew, 1994, Flowerdew and Miller, 1995, Huang, 

2005, Littlemore, 2001, Lynch, 1994, McKnight, 1994). 


WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO HELP STUDENTS 

LEARN FROM WRITTEN MATERIAL? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Check that subject guides are clearly written, 

and that the required and recommended 

reading lists are organised around topic or 

lecture areas. Consider selecting easier 

readings to start with so that students move 

from more accessible to more conceptually 

difficult texts. 

Limit the amount of reading. Keep in mind 

that it takes longer to read in a second 

language. A few dense paragraphs may take 

as long to read in a second language as an 

entire article in a first language. 

If the readings are very dense, consider 

highlighting key passages. It can be difficult 

for second-language speakers to determine 

the main points. 

When selecting articles and texts, consider 

the linguistic difficulty and complexity. If more 

than 5% of terms are unfamiliar to students, 

or the complexity is beyond their language 

ability, they are likely to give up or seek 

shortcuts (Macaro, 2003, pp 65, 130-131). 

Ask Learning Development to help with 

exercises to build vocabulary in the subject 

area. Cobb describes a paradox where, to 

understand what they are reading, students 

need to understand most of the words in a 

text, yet to understand most of the words in 

a text they need to understand what they are 

reading. It follows that reading alone won’t 

allow students to develop the vocabulary they 

need (Cobb, 2007). 

Design activities that help students come to 

an understanding of key texts. For instance, 

ease in with a comprehension reading activity 

which walks students through a text while 

asking questions that will help them identify 

the context, the topic under discussion, the 

author’s argument, and the evidence used to 

support that argument. 

Encourage students to discuss the readings 

with each other, eg in small groups. This 

activity could be in their own language with 

a report back to the rest of the class or the 

teacher in English. 

SHOULD I BE CONCERNED IF STUDENTS DON’T SPEAK 

ENGLISH IN TUTORIALS AND GROUP WORK? 

If the course is advertised as an English language 

degree: 

●● 

●● 



• What will be the language policy for 

tutorials (percentage of English to be 

spoken in class)? 

• How will you brief new transnational 

subject coordinators so they understand 

language issues (Learning Development 

can help)? 

• How will you evaluate the range of 

language levels in the student cohort? 

• How will academic English support will be 

made available to students? 

all tutorials should include English language 

learning and teaching 

all assessment tasks should be conducted 

entirely in English. 

Whether or not some use of the students’ own 

language is helpful is the subject of debate. Some 

teachers believe small group work in the students’ own 

language is very helpful to learning and encourages 

active engagement with the topic under discussion. 

Discussion of concepts in students’ first language may 

encourage deep learning (Skyrme, 2005). 

Others disagree, suggesting that discussion of 

concepts in students’ second language requires the 

effort of translation in two directions and is not always 

successful as concepts may not align and arguments 

may not be equally convincing in both languages 

(Smith and Smith, 1999). Skyrme suggests resolving 

this dilemma by accepting some use of first language 

as a natural stage of learning, which students ideally 

move past as they gain expertise (Skyrme, 2005). 

“I don’t mind what language students use in group work. I just think it’s great 

that they’re engaging, and getting involved in the topic. Afterwards, I get them 

to report back to the class in English.” 

— Moira Williamson, Subject Coordinator, Faculty of Health & 

Behavioural Sciences 


19

SHOULD I BE CONCERNED IF STUDENTS DON’T SPEAK 

ENGLISH IN TUTORIALS AND GROUP WORK? continued 

In practice, a local subject coordinator or co-teacher 

may be faced with the need to engage students with 

difficult subject material and a class of students who 

resist speaking in English. Insisting on all-English 

tutorials under these pressures may be unrealistic 

and undermine both the teacher’s and students’ 

commitment to the classroom language policy. A lot 

depends on the ability of a local subject coordinator 

or co-teacher to keep to the agreed language in the 

face of classroom pressures. It may be more realistic 

to require an agreed section of the tutorial to be 

conducted in English. 

“I designed a role play, and allowed students to do it 

in their own language. The freedom to discuss in their 

own language was liberating for them.” 

— Peter McLean, Subject Coordinator, 

Faculty of Commerce 

If some students are from different language 

backgrounds to the majority then for equity reasons 

whole-class interactions should be conducted entirely 

in English. It might not be immediately obvious that 

students have a different language background – for 

instance, mainland Chinese students will generally 

speak Mandarin while Hong Kong students will talk to 

each other in Cantonese. 

It can be difficult to monitor the language of teaching 

and learning. However, in an English-language 

degree it is essential to provide regular opportunities 

to interact in English throughout the session. This 

expectation needs to be openly discussed with local 

subject coordinators, co-teachers and students. 

CAN I PASS STUDENTS WHERE THE LEVEL OF ENGLISH 

EXPRESSION IS VERY POOR? 

If explicit marking criteria were distributed to 

students in the subject outline and these indicated 

marks for correct use of language, marks could be 

deducted. 

Usually students wouldn’t fail on English expression 

alone, as the marks given to other areas such as 

adequate research, credible data, structure and 

critical reasoning would be more significant. 

If individual students are having problems with 

written English, consider referring them to language 

or grammar support services available through either 

their campus or Wollongong. If expecting students to 

use resources on the UOW web site, provide direct 

links to pages as students with language difficulties 

may not be able to navigate to locate this support 

themselves. Be aware that expecting these resources 

to dramatically improve language proficiency is 

unrealistic – in many cases the most effective 

immediate option will be individual consultations 

around an assessment task. 

If a number of members of the group are struggling, 

a more systemic approach may be needed. Learning 

Development may be able to offer support delivered 

in class time, supplementary seminars or an online 

resource. 

AM I EXPECTED TO MARK UP PAPERS FOR INCORRECT 

LANGUAGE USE? 

Academics are not expected to mark up every 

grammatical error or spelling mistake, particularly if 

these are numerous. It will help the students if you 

mark up a few indicative paragraphs and list the key 

recurring problems. 

WHO CAN HELP MY STUDENTS TO DEVELOP ACADEMIC 

LANGUAGE SKILLS? 

Learning Development can help subject coordinators 

to integrate language skills into subject design. 

They can offer practical ideas for building students’ 

competence in academic English and discipline 

vocabulary as they work on tutorial tasks and 

assessments. 

Support is subject to availability of person and 

resources. Contacting Learning Development well 

ahead of when the support is required will help. 

Separate funding may need to be organised if support 

is to involve travel by Learning Developers from 

Wollongong to other locations, or if online support is 

to be delivered across the session. 

“We saw the problems students 

were having, and organised Learning 

Development interventions. Learning 

Development worked successfully 

with the students and our teachers. 

We kept our expectations and 

standards high. My advice is to 

involve Learning Development from 

the start.” 

— Philip Kitley, Course Coordinator, 

Faculty of Arts 


INTEGRATING ACADEMIC SKILLS – A FEW IDEAS 


You can expect that your students will learn best by 

doing rather than being told – and hands-on activities 

can break up an otherwise exhausting intensive 

teaching period. 


You can’t assume that students will have the same 

access to learning support as students on the 

Australian campuses where students can organise 

one-on-one consultations with academic writing and 

English language advisors, or can attend a series 

of academic skills workshops. These services may 

not be available to transnational students to the 

same level that they are available at Wollongong, 

so it is important to factor in an equitable amount of 

academic skills development for your transnational 

students. 

WHY SHOULD ACADEMIC SKILLS BE INTEGRATED INTO 

SUBJECTS? 

Learning skills are most effectively developed within 

a specific context rather than just as generic activities 

(Taylor, 2008). Relying on ‘bolt-on’ study skills 

resources is “remedial, not inclusive and divorced 

from subject knowledge” (Wingate, 2006, p 458). 

Making this kind of instruction discipline- or subjectspecific 

means that you can do three things at the 

same time: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

check on students’ progress with the content 

develop their academic skills and graduate 

qualities 

prepare students for their assessment tasks. 

CAN I AFFORD TO SPEND TIME ON DEVELOPING 

STUDENTS’ SKILLS? 

Academic skills instruction doesn’t necessarily involve 

more individual feedback. You can plan for whole 

class feedback, or organise for peer or self-review of 

tasks. 

Some teachers set up activities for students to do in 

the first few days of the teaching period. For instance, 

students could be asked by email to pre-prepare 

work around a particular reading, which is then used 

or presented in class during the first week. This 

encourages students to be more active in the first 

classes, and guarantees that at least some of the 

reading will be done. 



• Who will provide leadership and/ 

or organise briefings of the subject 

coordinators about the strategies needed 

to develop academic skills? 

• Have you mapped the development of 

academic skills across the entire study 

program? 

• Can you approach the faculty or university 

for resources to support subject 

coordinators who need time or other 

assistance to develop assessments and 

activities? 

• Has Learning Development been 

contacted for academic literacy and 

language support? 

• Is learning support available at the host 

institution? 

WHAT ASSISTANCE IS AVAILABLE? 

UOW Learning Development may already have 

designed learning activities and resources in your 

discipline for on campus or distance delivery. They 

can also help develop subject-specific activities or 

give advice on what might need to be developed 

by you to ensure that the students are given the 

best opportunity to build up their reading, research 

and writing skills to meet your subject’s academic 

expectations. 

“Being a transnational student is a good way to 

practice English because when the teacher is not 

from here we cannot speak our language to them. 

But language is also a problem because English 

is not our native tongue and we cannot use it very 

good, especially in our essays.” 

— Transnational student 


21

IDEAS FOR IMPROVING STUDENTS’ READING SKILLS 

Unlike writing, reading is an invisible activity that is 

seldom if ever assessed directly. Reading in academic 

language may be intimidating to new students. 

Additionally, an expectation that students will read 

critically might be unfamiliar to some students, 

although it is highly valued in Western education. 

You can help students develop their reading skills by: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

preparing a comprehension sheet for the first 

readings, with questions to guide students 

through the material. After this modelling, 

students are more likely to feel confident 

tackling other readings independently 

starting with easier or shorter readings, that 

incrementally get more difficult 

providing key words or terms for the students 

to look for, that match the lecture topic and 

that will help then focus their reading 

making a point of discussing readings in class: 

students will be more motivated to do the 

readings if they see that you care and that 

they are expected to contribute to discussion 

encouraging students to compare readings 

and discuss the authors’ intentions or 

perspectives, rather than just focusing on 

information-gathering. 

SAMPLE ACTIVITY: READING COMPREHENSION 

This is a sample reading activity from a UOW subject. 

A similar sheet was prepared for each of the key 

readings in the first half of the program. The subject 

began by focusing on referencing skills and gradually 

developed a more critical analysis of the readings. 

1. Write a reference for the Goubin Yang article, 

using the Harvard citation system. 

2. In your own words, write what you think this 

article is about based on the title. 

3. What kind of writing is this? Is it academic or nonacademic? 

How can you tell? 

4. Do you think the author has a particular authority 

to write about this subject? Why? 

5. Now identify a sentence in the introduction that 

you think explains the central argument or point 

of the article. 

6. The author outlines his research methodology on 

p 471. Will this methodology be the same one that 

you will use in your report assessment task? How 

will your data collection be the same/different? 

What implications will this have for your report 

findings? 

SAMPLE ACTIVITY: CRITICAL THINKING STRATEGIES 

Before you do this week’s reading, review last week’s 

notes. What do you think the following terms mean? 

• Macdonaldisation 

• dehumanisation 

• impersonal 

Now read the highlighted passage of the reading 

found on pp 41-42. Write a paragraph (5 to 8 

sentences) about your own experience of higher 

education. Find a way to link your ideas with those 

expressed by Ritzer. Use appropriate referencing: ____ 

______________________________________________ 

______________________________________________ 

______________________________________________ 

______________________________________________ 

______________________________________________ 

IDEAS FOR MODELLING WRITING EXPECTATIONS 

Providing models of the types of writing expected 

IDEAS FOR ENCOURAGING CRITICAL THINKING 

Students are told that they are expected to develop 

high order critical thinking and analysis skills. 

However, often students don’t know what this means. 

Plan to factor in some small ongoing tasks. 

Strategies to develop competencies in critical thinking 

include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

model effective reading and critical thinking 

strategies by demonstrating them in class 

give students a short text extract from a 

core reading with guided questions that elicit 

critical thinking (for examples, see the sample 

activities on this page). Then give them 

constructive feedback that highlights their 

evaluation of key ideas, and their expression 

of an argument or a critical opinion 

give students two short text extracts and ask 

them to ‘compare and contrast’. 

IDEAS FOR HELPING STUDENTS WITH ACADEMIC 

LANGUAGE 

Your students may struggle with both English 

language expression and disciplinary academic 

language. If the expectations for formal and complex 

language are too high, then the student anxiety and 

temptation to copy better writing increases. 


SAMPLE ACTIVITY: VOCABULARY DEVELOPMENT 

Verb 

Nouns 

Adjective/ 

adverb 

analyse analysis analytic 

Sample sentence 

It is important to critically analyse research 

articles 

diversity 

theoretical 

practice 

Quick vocabulary quizzes are a good way to get 

students more confident in their writing, develop their 

language skills and reinforce key terms and phrases. 

You could do this as an in-class or online activity. 

Ask students to use keywords appropriately in 

different grammatical contexts (as a noun, as a verb, 

as an adjective). Then ask them to write a sentence 

using one of these forms correctly (see sample 

activity above). 

Paraphrasing the ideas of others in their own 

words is also a daunting task for many students. 

Encourage students to start processing the readings 

and their own research by getting them to do quick 

paraphrasing activities in class (see example below). 

Include good referencing techniques within the 

activity. 

SAMPLE ACTIVITY: PARAPHRASING 

Paraphrasing 

A paraphrase is where you re-write a text in your own words, without 

changing the meaning and without copying the original words. This 

is an important skill as it shows your understanding and helps you to 

avoid plagiarism. Start by reading the text. Then rewrite each sentence 

using words and phrases that have similar meanings. You can change 

the sentence structure, by breaking up long sentences into short ones. 

You can change the order of ideas and expression. 

Original source: [full extract of passage] 

Sentence 1: “As a result of the use of computer technologies to 

support the management of health care information, it is essential 

that all health care professionals have a solid grounding in health 

informatics or information technology (IT) 

In your words: ______________________________________________ 

____________________________________________________________ 

____________________________________________________________ 

____________________________________________________________ 

IDEAS FOR MODELLING WRITING EXPECTATIONS 

Providing models of the types of writing expected 

is an excellent way to clarify task instruction and 

academic expectations. Of course, you would not wish 

to hand over a complete essay or report on a similar 

topic, as students may overly rely on it for their own 

assignments. Instead, you might: 

●● 

●● 

show samples of sections or models on a 

PowerPoint during class time 

provide samples of similar types of work but 

from a different assignment question. 

Another strategy is to give students a chance to see 

examples of good and poor work – or even better, 

showing them examples from their peers’ successful 

writing in an early assessment task. This gives 

them an opportunity to process explicit advice into 

something that makes sense. 

Using models of students’ own 

writing – rather than generic 

examples – can be very powerful, 

particularly when discussing issues 

such as avoiding plagiarism or 

developing critical analysis skills. 

An effective class activity might be 

to give students examples of poor 

student writing, and ask them to: 

●● 

●● 

identify what is going wrong 

(eg it is not answering 

the question, there is 

little evaluation of source 

material, uses poor 

referencing techniques etc) 

discuss strategies for 

improving it. 


23

PREPARING FOR INTENSIVE TRANSNATIONAL TEACHING 

THIS SECTION APPLIES ONLY TO SUBJECTS TAUGHT 

USING THE INTENSIVE MODE. 


You can expect that your students will be attentive, 

as they will want to make the most of the time you 

spend with them. 

You can expect that your students may become 

very tired, as they are likely to have work and family 

commitments, and it might be an additional strain to 

keep up with the intensive delivery of the subject in 

English. 

You can expect to become tired yourself as the 

intensive teaching progresses and you find yourself 

working at night re-designing tomorrow’s activities in 

light of the day’s teaching. 


You can’t assume that students will be able to absorb 

the same amount of knowledge as they would if 

the same contact hours were spread over an entire 

session. 

If students are working as well as studying, you can’t 

assume they will be fresh or that they will have time 

during the intensive teaching week to do a lot of work 

on research or assignments. 

You can’t assume that your teaching responsibilities 

will finish after the intensive teaching week. In 

fact, your preparations should focus on not just the 

face-to-face teaching, but on the distance teaching 

obligations that will extend across the session. This 

will need to be factored into the management of your 

workload. 

“The majority of students really work hard to try 

and meet the standards we set.” 

— Joanne Joyce-McCoach, Course Coordinator, 

School of Nursing, Midwifery 

& Indigenous Health, Faculty of Health & 


HOW MANY HOURS OF FACE-TO-FACE TEACHING? 

A typical format is 20+ contact hours with students 

spread over five to ten days per session, either at the 

very beginning or halfway through. Most Australian 

universities follow versions of this model, although 

there is a trend towards the more collaborative 

relationships between affiliated universities, with 

shared responsibility for a teaching program. 

Ideally, intensive teaching weeks should be broken 

by a weekend so that both learners and teacher can 

renew their energies. 

UOW teachers should be aware that transnational 

teaching can be quite exhausting and time intensive. 

Consultation with partner institutions, student issues, 

meeting with co-teachers and last minute adaptations 

of subject material in response to student feedback 

– let alone frustrations that can arise sorting out 

intercultural miscommunication – are not always 

anticipated. Make sure you consider the workload 

implications carefully, and how you will manage them. 

WHEN SHOULD THE INTENSIVE TEACHING WEEK 

BE HELD? 

Most faculties will book your intensive teaching week 

at the transnational campus into the first few weeks 

of session. There are good reasons for having it early: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

lecturers can clarify expectations and lay 

ground rules 

students gain confidence from being taught 

by the lecturer 

students can gain a sense of the direction of 

the subject, and ask questions about subject 

structure and assessments 

planning meetings can be held with coteachers 

during the teaching visit 

online communication, which will be 

important during session, is more likely to be 

used by students if they have previously met 

staff face-to-face (Hussin, 2007). 

Sometimes, there may be a case for holding the 

teaching week later in the semester. For example, 

where the latter part of a subject is very difficult and 

the lecturer wants to lead this themselves. Advise 

your faculty six months ahead if you want to hold 

the intensive week at a later stage, as there are 

considerable logistical and administrative difficulties 

in aligning two institutions with different timetables. 


WHAT SHOULD THE INTENSIVE TEACHING WEEK 

COVER? 

It is virtually impossible to effectively cover an 

entire session’s lecture materials during the 

intensive teaching week. Without time to absorb and 

consolidate, students will find it difficult to retain 

information. A focus on content delivery alone is not 

conducive to student learning. 

Selection is therefore necessary. Some options are: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

cover the core concepts thoroughly, and leave 

the detail or subsidiary topics 

cover the most difficult concepts – those that 

students tend to struggle with 

choose a selection of topics that will allow 

you to engage students in the method of 

enquiry and analysis that you will expect 

throughout the subject 

if the subject is highly structured and cannot 

be delivered out of sequence, cover the early 

material 

enthuse students in the subject and 

encourage them to actively participate in their 

learning experience. 



• How many face-to-face contact hours will 

be involved in the program? 

• Will these contact hours be comparable 

to the hours in competing courses, so 

students don’t feel shortchanged when 

comparing their face-to-face hours with 

those of others? 

• Will the contact hours be adequate for the 

material to be covered? 

• Are your staff aware of the challenges 

involved in aligning timetables of two 

universities with different sessions? Are 

staff planning well ahead so as to avoid 

undue pressure on other teaching and 

administrative staff including those in the 

partner university? 

• What workload model will be used for the 

subject coordinator role(s)? 

The remaining material can then be covered 

during session – whether by tutors/co-teachers in 

class, or using modules in eLearning, workbooks, 

videoconferencing or other tools. 

“You have to take one or two areas and drill 

down, find ways to keep it interesting for them.” 

— Subject Coordinator, 

Faculty of Health & Behavioural Sciences 

As you prepare the material you will teach in the 

intensive teaching period, be aware that unexpected 

events or distractions in the classroom may interrupt 

your planned flow. It can be helpful to map out the 

central or key points that you must cover during the 

intensive weeks, what could be covered later by coteachers 

or by distance delivery, and what you might 

need to adapt or elaborate on the spot. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: Students were enrolled in 

a subject that they felt excited about studying. 

The lecturer delivered the entire session’s 

lecture materials over five evenings. There was 

a short exercise mid-way through each evening. 

Afterwards, students commented that they felt 

they had absorbed a fair amount during the first 

two evenings, but by the final two evenings were 

so overloaded that they remembered almost 

nothing. At the end of the week, students’ initial 

enthusiasm had gone, and was replaced by a 

sense of oppression at the density of the material. 

Most were exhausted. Even top students who had 

been very attentive were surprised to find how 

little they remembered of the last two evenings 

when revising a few weeks later. 


25

WHICH TEACHING APPROACHES ARE RECOMMENDED? 

Variety is critical to keep people learning during 

intensive teaching (Scott, 2003). Variety alleviates the 

exhaustion and loss of focus that may occur during 

intensive teaching. Lectures need to be balanced 

with class activities and opportunities for students to 

engage with the material. 

The following factors are also important in intensive 

teaching: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

planning and preparation, including 

distributing materials to students ahead of 

time 

teacher enthusiasm and expertise 

a relaxed and comfortable learning 

environment 

a collegial atmosphere with student input into 

class discussions 

active student involvement 

breaks or changes in activities 

creative group work 

depth rather than breadth 

motivating students’ ongoing engagement 

with the course 

(Leask, 2008; Wlodkowski, 2003; Scott, 2003; Carroll, 

2005; Bell et al, 2008; Abdullah et al, 2008). 

It is notable that this list largely describes the existing 

teaching approaches and expertise of many UOW 

academics. 

While these factors aren’t specific to intensive 

transnational teaching, they can be more critical in 

that environment (Scott, 2003). 

Finally, a willingness to respect and learn about other 

cultures, together with teaching expertise, can be 

more important than reworking subject materials 

(Bowering and Lock, 2007, p 11). Ultimately the 

approaches you use may depend on the nature of your 

subject, your personal style and the student group. 

INVOLVING CO-TEACHERS 

Consider how to teach collaboratively with the coteacher 

who will be working with the students during 

session. Involving the co-teacher during the intensive 

teaching week will encourage students to see them 

as an integral part of the teaching team: 

●● 

before classes start, you might consider 

consulting with your co-teachers about the 

subject content and appropriate local casestudies 

or examples 

●● 

●● 

ask co-teachers to prepare to teach a section 

of this class – either on their own or with you. 

This will help them and your students feel 

comfortable and engaged with the teaching 

team 

invite co-teachers to the first class. Always 

meet beforehand, even if this is just for a few 

minutes, to avoid a situation where you may 

not recognise your co-teachers or may meet 

them for the first time in front of the students 

●● 

if possible, arrive at the classroom together – 

this identifies that you are a team 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

If your intensive teaching week is at the start 

of the session, formally introduce each coteacher 

to the students and emphasise their 

qualifications and experience. If the teaching 

week starts half way through the session, ask 

the co-teacher to formally introduce you, and 

make sure that they have some details about 

your background ahead of time 

refer to the co-teachers during classes, eg 

“Zhou and I will be expecting a very high 

standard of research in Assessment 2 ...” 

This will emphasise that you and the other 

teachers are a team, with a shared approach 

and common expectations of students 

defer to co-teachers on some points if 

possible, eg ‘How many minutes are you 

expecting from students for their oral 

presentations? What will you look for when 

you mark the oral presentations?’ This will 

help to establish co-teachers’ authority and 

credibility 

factor in opportunities for discussion with coteachers 

during the intensive teaching week. 

As well as discussing the subject, this is also 

an opportunity to indicate your willingness to 

receive and give feedback about teaching and 

learning process. You can also discuss how 

you will communicate during session (phone, 

email, Skype etc) 

consider that the intensive teaching week 

may offer opportunities for peer-review of 

teaching – your own and your co-teachers’ 

teaching performance. This can be a valuable 

exercise for all, and can help develop 

documentation needed for promotion. Contact 

the Academic Development Unit for more 

information and resources on peer review, 

and plan ahead. A useful booklet on peer 

observation is Bell, 2012. 


CARRYING OUT QUALITY ASSURANCE 


You can expect quality assurance to be helpful in 

making improvements to a subject or course. 

You can expect it to be a collegial process, in which 

peers offers suggestions and the coordinator has 

opportunities for discussion and refinement. 


You can’t assume that peers will just rubber-stamp 

your subject outline or exam paper. Allow time for 

them to read and comment. 

WHY IS QUALITY ASSURANCE IMPORTANT? 

Quality assurance is carried out in all UOW programs 

to: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

maintain standards across UOW courses and 

subjects 

ensure that courses, subjects and 

assessments are aligned to learning 

outcomes and UOW Graduate Qualities 

verify that assessment tasks are clear, welldesigned 

and fair to students 

ensure subjects are well-structured and form 

part of a cohesive, well-structured course 

encourage continuous improvement through 

reflection and feedback 

foster ongoing dialogue about student 

learning and teaching. 

Teaching at UOW is increasingly seen as a 

shared, collegial endeavour. This is different to 

a ‘traditionalist’ approach where each academic 

operates independently. 

SHOULD THE QUALITY ASSUROR AND 

TRANSNATIONAL SUBJECT COORDINATOR/TEACHER 

COMMUNICATE DIRECTLY WITH EACH OTHER? 

Yes, this is strongly encouraged. Communication 

should commence before session begins, during 

session and after session finishes. Teaching ideas, 

insights into student learning at particular locations, 

discussions of assessment design, identification 

of suitable case studies and examples, sharing of 

problems and issues, debriefs at the end of session, 

are all helpful to build a shared understanding of the 

subject and its students. 



• Are you and your staff familiar with QA 

requirements and in particular the “Quality 

Assurance of Transnational Education 

(Offshore) and UOWD Teaching and 

Learning Procedure”. See https://intranet. 

uow.edu.au/international/overview/policies/ 

index.html#Transnational 

• Are any additional quality assurance 

processes needed, eg to comply 

with accreditation processes at the 

transnational location? 

• Have quality assuror responsibilities and 

timelines been identified? 

• How will you encourage dialogue and 

thoughtful engagement with quality 

assurance, rather than a “tick-the-box” 

approach? For example, how will you 

encourage discussion of learning outcomes 

and UOW Graduate Qualities as part of 

subject outline checking? 

WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE QUALITY 

ASSUROR AND THE TRANSNATIONAL SUBJECT 

COORDINATOR/TEACHER? 

Quality Assurors are not ‘markers’. When assisting a 

colleague with quality assurance at any location, the 

sensitivities of your colleague and a tactful approach 

and openness to discussion is recommended. 

Academics at different locations are seen as peers, 

each with particular strengths to bring to the teaching 

of UOW programs. A collegial relationship of mutual 

respect is strongly encouraged. 

POLICY LINK 

All UOW subject coordinators need to be very 

familiar with the UOW Code of Practice – Teaching 

and Assessment. See 

http://www.uow.edu.au/about/policy/learning/ . 


27

WHAT FORMS OF QUALITY ASSURANCE ARE USED AT UOW? 

Quality assurance at UOW operates at a number 

of levels. Those affecting subject coordinators are 

marked in bold and described in more detail: 

●● 

●● 

Course approval processes. 

Subject approval processes – new subjects 

are checked for the topics to be covered, their 

contribution to the course, learning outcomes, 

teaching strategies, assessment methods and 

their alignment to UOW Graduate Qualities. 

●● 

Quality assurance of subject outlines – 

UOW has procedures to ensure that subject 

outlines are checked for: alignment to the 

subject learning outcomes of the subject; 

design of assessment tasks; and a variety of 

other information which is vital for students. 

In transnational programs, this process must 

include review by the UOW Quality Assuror. 

●● 

●● 

Quality assurance of examinations and 

tests – every faculty must ensure that all 

examinations and tests are: aligned to the 

subject learning outcomes of the subject; 

at an appropriate level; clear and free from 

error; and a reasonable length. 

Moderation of marking within teaching 

teams – every subject coordinator is 

responsible for ensuring consistency of 

assessment across the subject. Subject 

coordinators achieve this using a variety of 

practices which may include, for example: 

holding teaching team meetings to clarify 

approaches to teaching and marking; 

providing written guidance eg marking rubrics 

to markers; providing sample marked papers 

or model answers to markers; preparing 

feedback templates for all markers to use; 

conducting cross-marking within the team 

(including across sites) and/or check-marking 

by the coordinator; sharing marking across 

sites so that all tutors are marking all 

students. 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Moderation of marking across sites – in 

transnational programs, this usually means 

that a Quality Assuror (usually the subject 

coordinator located at Wollongong) will 

check some of the marking. This may include 

comparing student papers and marks across 

locations, recommending scaling of marks 

to align standards across sites, or making 

other recommendations. The Quality Assuror 

provides a report to the Dean, and a copy 

is sent to the transnational coordinator for 

comment. 

Review of subject outcomes (student 

marks and grades) by Faculty Assessment 

Committees – all subject coordinators 

submit their marks and a written report 

on any variations/problems to the Faculty 

Assessment Committee for review. All marks 

for all sites are considered. Anomalies are 

identified, whether across years or across 

sites. Appropriate action is taken, for example 

the subject coordinator is invited to comment/ 

explain. Occasionally, this review will result in 

an adjustment of marks or other action. 

Annual review of all transnational programs 

takes place at each partner location 

which includes an analysis of assessment, 

moderation, student results, progression and 

comparability with students at other UOW 

teaching locations. 

Approval processes for amendments to 

subjects – changes to the subject must be 

approved by the Faculty, for example changes 

to textbooks, subject content, assumed 

knowledge or prerequisites 

Major course review (every three years). 


DURING THE TEACHING SESSION 

HOW DOES CULTURE AFFECT CLASSROOM INTERACTION? 


You can expect that your teaching expertise is valuable 

in any context. Students in all locations will respond 

to enthusiasm for the subject, interesting examples 

and other strategies you have developed. They will 

have opinions and questions, and the ability to think of 

examples and critique theories. They will respond to 

your clear explanations of what you require from them 

and why you want them to engage in particular ways. 

You can expect that your students have chosen UOW 

because of their perceptions of the value of the type 

of education that we offer. 

If you are from a different culture to your students, 

you can expect that your own and your students’ 

cultural assumptions will be challenged and that you 

and your students may alter your perspectives. 


You can’t assume that students have had experience 

with the teaching methods you usually use, or that 

they will easily be able to switch into a different way 

of being a student. For example, students’ readiness 

to express opinions or work on unstructured tasks 

may not be the same as in your home country. 

If you are teaching in a Western university for the 

first time, you can’t assume that your usual teaching 

methods are those expected in the course. Close 

communication with the coordinator will be helpful. 

You can’t assume that the perspective of your culture 

is the only perspective or the correct perspective. As 

Carroll (2005, p 27) points out, some teachers do not 

see themselves as carriers of culture – they assign 

this role only to others. It is easy to take for granted 

that there is a correct way to structure an essay, use 

research or interact in class. You can help students by 

reflecting on your own academic cultural expectations 

– this will allow you to offer explicit help to students 

who find it hard to pick up the cues about how to 

adapt as learners to Western academic culture. 

Nor is it safe to assume that all students in your 

class will be from one homogenous culture. As Kate 

Chanock stresses, ‘whenever we generalise about 

culture, we are likely to find ourselves on swampy 

ground. Certainly it is useful to learn what we can 

about the cultures of students, but what we learn 

must serve as a dynamic and shifting background 

rather than as stereotypes which guide our practice’ 

(2003, p 5). 


WHY IS CLASSROOM INTERACTION A TRANSNATIONAL 

ISSUE? 

The classroom is the primary site where cultures 

intersect and where cultural as well as academic 

engagement occurs. Some areas to consider are: 

SOCIAL RELATIONS 

Cultural norms can impact on communication 

between students and teachers. Students in one 

south-east Asian program have expressed surprise 

at how the Australian lecturers kept their distance 

professionally, with prescribed contact hours. Their 

local teachers often interacted with them socially, 

and they expected more out-of-class contact. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: At the end of a week of 

intensive teaching the lecturer was physically 

and emotionally spent, but a line of students kept 

forming. She couldn’t understand why, as she’d 

already addressed most of the questions they 

were asking. Then she realised they just wanted 

to interact individually with her. Next time, she 

plans to try to factor in some structured one-toone 

or small group interactions with her students. 

In some East Asian and Middle-Eastern countries, 

questions of ‘face’ may arise. “The desire to gain 

face, to avoid losing face, and to save face when it 

is threatened is the powerful social motive” (Ho, 

1976, p 883). In Chinese social relations face refers 

to both the confidence of society in a person’s moral 

character (lian), and the social perceptions of a 

person’s prestige (mianzi). A loss of confidence in a 

person’s moral character would result in a loss of 

trust within a social network, while a loss of the social 

perceptions of a person’s prestige would likely result 

in a loss of authority. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: A number of students in a 

class in East Asia were talking among themselves 

as the lecture began. The lecturer addressed a 

particular student by name, and asked him to 

stop talking during the lecture. The student was 

humiliated and angry at being singled out and 

named. His loss of face was so high that he didn’t 

attend the remaining lectures. 

29

PARTICIPATION 

Educational practices vary. In some countries 

teaching is said to encourage passive learning, so that 

students may not be accustomed to giving opinions 

or participating in student discussion. By contrast, 

American-style education is said to favour “student 

participation over teacher control” (Slethaug, 2007, p 

6). Australian education may sit somewhere between 

these models. Of course, these are very generalised 

statements and not true of all teachers and students. 

Some Australian students, for example, are very shy 

or self-conscious, and may be very fearful of speaking 

up before a group. Educational policy and practice 

also changes, for example Singapore now seeks the 

development of an education system that graduates 

students who are critical thinkers (Ng, 2001). 

“A challenge to me is that the students are used 

to didactic face-to-face teaching. I don’t do that. I 

use an interactive teaching style. It’s a challenge 

but one that I enjoy. I was told not to joke but I’ve 

never had a problem with the odd joke.” 

Australian lecturers sometimes comment on 

transnational students being very quiet in class and 

not answering questions. However, they noted that in 

some countries students would queue up to talk to 

them afterwards. The students preferred not to answer 

a question in class, to avoid the embarrassment of 

a wrong answer, but they were still eager to talk to 

teachers. They were disappointed if interaction in class 

time was the only place they could talk to the lecturer. 

HOW CAN I ESTABLISH CLEAR EXPECTATIONS FOR 

CLASS PARTICIPATION? 

Because cultural habits might be at odds with how 

students are expected to participate in a UOW class, 

it is important to clearly communicate expectations to 

students from the beginning. Take time to discuss: 

●● 

●● 

— Moira Williamson, Health & 


your students’ previous classroom 

interactions 

how classroom interactions might be 

informed by cultural values and traditions 

● ● what kind of participation will be valued and 

encouraged in your classroom. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: Insisting on particular 

behaviour patterns without explanation may just 

make students uncomfortable and shut down 

participation even more. 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO ENCOURAGE 

INTERACTION DURING FACE-TO-FACE TEACHING? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Remind students from time to time both of 

your expectations and your reasons. 

Factor in class question/discussion time 

Create an environment where students feel 

‘safe’ in participating. For example, begin by 

exploring questions for which there is no 

wrong answer. One way is to ask about their 

experiences, for example by moving from ‘show 

of hands’ questions to specific examples: ‘Who 

uses an internet marketplace?’ ‘Which internet 

marketplace do you use?’ 

To draw students further into a discussion, 

move from the particular to the general. That 

is, begin by asking questions with concrete 

answers and lead to more open ended 

questions: ‘Have you ever sold anything 

online?’ ‘What did you sell?’ ‘Did you have any 

problems?’ ‘What other problems can sellers 

have?’ 

For harder or more contentious questions, 

ask students to discuss in pairs or small 

groups, before reporting back to the class. 

The opinions reported are then those of the 

group rather than the individual. This will help 

with ‘face’ issues in Asian countries, and with 

self-conscious or shy students in Australia and 

elsewhere. 

One way to encourage participation is to ask 

students to jot down their questions on pieces 

of paper, which the lecturer then collects and 

selects those they will deal with. Another is 

to ask students to write their responses on 

pieces of paper, collect them and read them 

out or distribute to students to read out. 

“When you come here you will 

discover that our students have many 

strengths in their learning style, a high 

level of perseverance and patience. 

The biggest thing is highly developed 

skills in collaboration, cooperation 

and liaison in group work and I think 

that it an enormous thing for us. The 

students work very well on group 

projects without a lot of the conflicts 

and personality problems that can 

occur in Western contexts.” 



CAUTIONARY TALE A lecturer who was initially 

unsuccessful in facilitating class discussion, 

responded by eliminating the discussion part of 

classes altogether. The students were attentive 

throughout, but they didn’t ask questions. Their 

lecturer never gained a sense of connection 

with the class and could not tell whether the 

students were following the argument. When 

the essays were submitted, it became clear 

that most of the group hadn’t grasped several 

important core concepts. The majority failed the 

essay. 

I’M TEACHING INTENSIVELY. HOW IMPORTANT IS IT 

THAT I RETAIN THE CLASS ACTIVITIES? 

When teaching intensively, you may think that there 

is not enough class time to offer the usual class 

activities. 

However educational research shows that higher 

cognitive learning occurs when students are 

actively engaged, regardless of culture (Biggs, 

2003; Ramsden, 2003; Laurillard). In addition, 

UOW is committed to developing graduates with 

UOW Graduate Qualities, including the abilities to 

communicate across cultures, work collaboratively 

and convey ideas effectively. 

“Students, employers and governments are 

wanting an English language degree which 

is recognised internationally. UOW courses 

offer ways of thinking and graduate qualities 

that are useful to both local industry and 

national development. That’s why we are asked 

to operate there. While we can make some 

modifications, we do need to engage students in 

the UOW style of learning and teaching.” 

— Rob Castle, DV-C(A)) 

Classroom activities don’t have to be identical to 

those in your home country; they can be modified to 

allow for the different educational culture. You might 

seek advice from the course coordinator or other 

colleagues who have worked with that cohort, or work 

with a local peer or co-teacher, to find ways to engage 

students in unfamiliar activities. 

On their part, students can also be expected to adjust 

to new styles of learning. Explain to students what 

the process is that you expect, and why you expect 

them to be actively involved in learning. 



• Is it possible to organise training or briefings 

for new transnational teachers? 

• Will there be opportunities for teachers 

experienced with the cohort to offer 

teaching strategies and advice to new 

transnational teachers? 

• Are the teaching team aware of the 

expectations around class participation and 

engagement? 

ONGOING ACTIVITIES 

Although most of your attention might be on planning 

class activities for the early part of the teaching 

cycle, it is also important to plan interactive activities 

across the session. This could mean working with or 

providing a co-teacher with a bank of suggested class 

activities and tasks that follow on from the approach 

you’ve already introduced to the students. Or it could 

mean taking advantage of eLearning tools to develop 

online tasks, activities or even assessment tasks. 

Examples of interactive assessment tasks might 

be: group discussion threads on a specific topic 

(eg critically reviewing weekly readings), or even 

collaborative group writing tasks that you might have 

started students working on in the early weeks of 

session. 

UOW Learning Design and UOW Learning 

Development can help you develop and support these 

activities. It is important to check the kind of access 

students will have to suitable technology students 

across the session, as the advantages of online 

communication will be outweighed by frustration 

if the local system can’t easily support UOW’s 

eLearning system. 

DO CARTOONS AND JOKES WORK? 

Students enjoy mild humour which is relevant to the 

topic and does not humiliate or denigrate particular 

people or groups. However, some cartoons and 

jokes may not work as intended — humour is often 

very culturally specific. Talk to your peers and coteachers 

in each country about your sense of what is 

humorous. 


31

HOW DOES CULTURE AFFECT STUDENT ENGAGEMENT WITH 

ASSESSMENT? 


You can expect that your students in all locations will 

put a lot of effort and many hours of study into your 

subject and try to do well in their assessment tasks. 

You can expect that the core purposes of assessment 

will be the same in all UOW locations: that is, to: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

support student learning, 

judge students’ achievement, and 

maintain the standards of a profession or 

discipline (Joughin, 2009). 


You can’t assume that students have had much 

previous experience with the types of assessment 

expected, or that they will immediately see the value 

of a new approach, or that they will easily be able to 

switch into using a new approach. 

Even where the tasks appear similar to those 

students are familiar with, the expectations of 

teachers and the ‘self-judgment’ skills the students 

have learned to evaluate their work may differ. For 

example, in one educational environment students 

may be expected to base oral presentations mainly on 

skilfully encapsulating ideas culled from the textbook; 

in another, research and multiple sources may be 

expected; in a third, reflecting on personal experience 

or convincingly expressing an opinion may be more 

important. 

WHAT ARE THE TRANSNATIONAL DIMENSIONS OF 

ASSESSMENT? 

In any location, teachers need to understand students’ 

preexisting expectations and attitudes to assessment 

(Joughin, 2009, p 9). If the students and teacher, or 

the teacher and marker, are from different educational 

backgrounds, there can be a mismatch of expectations 

between the student and the university. Unfortunately, 

mismatches will often crystallise in assessment tasks. 

Subject coordinators need information about students’ 

previous experiences of assessment. New students 

(regardless of level of study) will need support with 

transition to an unfamiliar assessment regime. 

Transnational teachers will need information about 

the expectations of program coordinators. This 

can best be achieved by good communication and 

discussion before the session begins. 

When marking it is also relevant that students have 

come from different educational backgrounds. For the 

students, the ‘rules of the game’ may have changed 

significantly. Their previous experiences of how to 

succeed in assessments may not hold true. Explicit 

marking criteria and feedback become even more 

important than usual. 

Maintaining standards of the profession or discipline 

may also need additional thought. It is tempting to 

assume that students will work in a profession that 

is essentially global and similar in every location. 

However expectations of local employers, professional 

bodies or academic programs may need to be 

considered during curriculum and assessment design. 

SHOULD THE ASSESSMENT BE DIFFERENT IN 

DIFFERENT LOCATIONS? 

“Marking criteria are important. I provide these to 

make my expectations explicit. I also give students 

examples of assignments from previous years. They 

really need a visual to understand what you want.” 

— Moira Williamson, School of Nursing & Indigenous 

Health, Faculty of Health & Behavioural Sciences 

Assessment tasks would usually be aligned across 

locations. However, examples used in questions may 

differ, and tasks may be broken into several smaller 

tasks where this would help students. 

Sometimes a quite different assessment task may 

be justified. An example is where professional bodies 

have differing expectations in different countries. Any 

substantive differences would have to be approved by 

your Faculty’s Education Committee. 

Very minor changes to individual assessment tasks 

can be undertaken with approval from your Head. 


HOW CAN I DESIGN ASSESSMENTS FOR LEARNING? 

Regardless of location, the design of assessment tasks 

for learning at UOW relies on the same principles: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

assessment involves intense student effort 

and engages their emotions and motivations. 

It needs to be primarily about learning rather 

than grading, and should offer a holistic rather 

than a fragmented experience (Boud, 2009) 

students learn more from tasks that engage 

them in creating responses, rather than 

replicating answers (Joughin, 2009) 

for students to succeed, they need to develop 

a capacity to judge their work which is similar 

to that of their teacher – feedback and 

opportunities to evaluate samples of work are 

critical (Sadler, 2009) 

encountering unfamiliar assessment tasks 

can be a demotivating experience if the stakes 

are too high (Dochy, 2007) 

authentic, real-life problems help students 

transform learning into practice and underpin 

their transition into professions (Boud, 2009) 

students need to be active agents in their 

own learning. For example, by finding ways to 

allow them to initiate aspects of tasks rather 

than merely responding to instructions and 

prompts (Boud, 2009). 

HOW CAN I SUPPORT TRANSNATIONAL STUDENTS TO 

SUCCEED WITH UNFAMILIAR ASSESSMENTS? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

If a member of the teaching team is new to 

UOW, ensure there are opportunities for them 

to discuss each assessment with experienced 

UOW teachers. A shared understanding of 

expectations is needed so that all teachers 

can give good advice to students. 

Encourage discussion and give students the 

opportunity to ask questions. 

If the type of task is new to your transnational 

students, offer a more detailed explanation 

and clearly explain each part of the task. 

Explain why the assessment task is designed 

as it is, how it will help students learn and 

what they can gain from putting effort into 

the task. This might be a good opportunity 

to link the skills learnt to their professional 

development and/or UOW Graduate Qualities. 

Consider breaking the task into smaller 

tasks, or asking students to show you their 

work as they progress. This will help you and 

the students to establish whether they are 

meeting expectations. 



●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

• What are students’ prior experiences of 

assessment, and how might these differ 

from UOW expectations? 

• Will the assessments be designed by a 

subject coordinator located in Australia 

or by a subject coordinator at the 

transnational location? Will this be the 

same for every subject? 

• How will the other institution then have 

input into assessment design, for example, 

through quality assurance, sign-offs, 

discussions? 

• How will you find out about local employer 

expectations of graduate qualities? 

• Will assessment tasks be exactly the 

same for all student cohorts regardless of 

location, or different at different locations? 

• How will assessment be moderated across 

locations (for example cross-marking)? 

• If there are extra stages involved in 

assessment design due to multiple 

institutions being involved (for example, 

exam paper sign-off), how will this affect 

timelines? 

• Are subject coordinators aware of both the 

UOW faculty’s and transnational partner’s 

processes for approving any major changes 

to assessment? 

Discuss the marking criteria. This can help 

students see that they are not being judged 

solely on the ‘right answer’, but on other 

dimensions such as problem definition, 

research, and critical or creative thinking. 

Design tutorial exercises to help students 

prepare. 

Maintain an online discussion group for 

each new assessment task, and encourage 

students and the co-teacher to participate. 

Provide examples which show the structure, 

writing style and/or depth of analysis 

expected. These examples need not relate to 

the actual topic or question. 


33

WHAT ABOUT ACADEMIC STANDARDS? 

THE SAME ACADEMIC STANDARDS SHOULD APPLY, 

REGARDLESS OF LOCATION. 

You have every right to expect that students in every 

location will be marked on their ability to successfully 

produce substantial pieces of assessable work that 

reflect their level of study. 

Sometimes a course will prove more demanding for 

students in a particular location, perhaps because of 

their previous educational experience. For example, 

Australian school leavers may be less prepared in 

mathematics than Chinese school leavers. Additional 

support may then be needed to help students reach 

the required standard (see the ideas listed earlier), but 

the standard itself should not be compromised. 

WHY ARE STUDENTS ASKING SO MANY QUESTIONS 

ABOUT THE ASSESSMENT REQUIREMENTS? 

When an assessment is unfamiliar students may 

tend to worry that they may be interpreting the 

requirements wrongly, so they keep asking questions. 

If there are multiple similar enquiries then you can 

be sure that other students are having difficulties 

understanding the requirements too. 

This indicates a need to clarify the task (rather than 

simply referring students back to the subject outline). 

Even if this seems repetitive to you, repeating the 

same information in different ways will help the 

students understand the assignment instructions and 

produce better work. 

One effective strategy to resolve confusion is to give 

students models or exemplars. Another strategy 

is to design very explicit marking criteria for each 

individual assignment, that clearly matches the 

instructions. 

Whether you are located in Australia or you are a 

subject coordinator within a partner institution, allow 

plenty of time for feedback from your peers at the 

other location. If possible, also involve your tutors/coteachers 

in writing or commenting on assessments 

and exams. 

Tips for writing across cultures: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Plain English is important. In particular, avoid 

overly complex sentence structures with 

numerous clauses as these are more likely to 

be misinterpreted. 

Plain English isn’t necessarily about using 

short words. Verbal phrases such as ‘put 

up with’, ‘call it off’ and ‘back him up’ can 

be much more confusing to non-English 

speaking background students than ‘tolerate’, 

‘discontinue’ and ‘support’. Students may 

enjoy colloquialisms if they are explained, 

but looking these words up one by one in a 

dictionary won’t help them 

Students may not recognise colloquial terms 

such as ‘the dole’, ‘in the ball park’, ‘a fair go’, 

‘a level playing field’ and the dictionary may 

not help them. They may not know about 

activities such as the Melbourne Cup or 

companies such as BHP. 

Avoid inconsistent terminology as it can 

confuse. A ‘representative’ shouldn’t turn into 

a ‘spokesperson’ half way through a question. 

Diagrams may invoke different conventions 

that affect how they are read in different 

cultures, for example if they are to be 

read from the left or from the right, and 

the meaning of symbols. Use arrows or 

numbers if reading order is important, or 

text equivalents for symbols if their meaning 

hasn’t been covered during the course. 

Tips for verbal explanations across cultures: 

ARE THERE ANY CULTURAL ISSUES IN PREPARING 

ASSESSMENT TASKS? 

UOW courses are organised so that they are 

moderated across sites, and, as part of this 

moderation, a great deal of care is taken to ensure 

questions are clearly written and that assessment 

tasks are aligned to learning outcomes and Graduate 

Qualities. 

●● 

Do write/project any critical points on 

the board, and repeat any critical advice. 

Transnational students may have much 

higher written English ability than oral 

English listening skills, particularly if they are 

still acclimatising to the teacher’s accent. 


WHAT SORT OF FEEDBACK SHOULD I GIVE TO STUDENTS? 


You can expect that students in all locations will be 

eagerly awaiting the return of their work, and that 

they will value your feedback. 

If you are located in a different country to your 

students, you can expect that your feedback becomes 

even more important. Students who feel isolated by 

distance can place a lot of store on individual written 

feedback. 


Even with written feedback, you can’t assume that 

all students who have received a low grade will 

understand the reasons. Some may have worked hard 

on the assessment and may need guidance on how 

they can translate that effort into better outcomes in 

the future. 


FOR COURSE 

COORDINATORS 

• Has time for written feedback been 

factored into staff workloads? 

• If you are working across multiple sites, 

are there logistical issues around the 

return of marked work to students? Eg 

do you need to liaise with the partner 

institution for a process to return hard 

copies, or establish web markup tools? 

• Have subject coordinators and markers 

been encouraged to consult with UOW 

Learning Design about giving feedback to 

students online or from a distance? 

WHY IS FEEDBACK SO IMPORTANT IN TRANSNATIONAL 

EDUCATION? 

In transnational education, feedback on assignments 

is the main means for students to: 

●● 

●● 

judge how well they are progressing and 

make adjustments to their learning if needed 

(Gibbs and Simpson, 2004-5), and 

gain a sense of interaction with their teacher. 

The provision of feedback plays another important 

role in transnational or distance learning as it allows 

instructors to increase their students’ sense of 

participation in the program (Moore and Kearsley, 

2005 cited in Miliszewska, 2009). 

CAUTIONARY TALE: A lecturer marked the 

student essays but gave no written feedback 

other than the marks. Students had been waiting 

anxiously for their work to come back and were 

anticipating comments, as this was one of 

their few interactions with a lecturer located in 

Australia. When this didn’t occur, there was a 

high level of despondency among students and 

feelings of being peripheral and unvalued. This 

contributed to falling student motivation and 

rising attrition rates. 

WHAT IS FEEDBACK? 

Feedback is a core aspect of the teaching and learning 

experience. Nicol and McFarlane-Dick (2006, p 205) 

define feedback as ‘anything that might strengthen 

the student’s capacity to self-regulate their 

performance’. Explicit and timely feedback therefore 

acknowledges students’ efforts and guides them to a 

more acceptable performance. 

Feedback should be focused around a subject’s 

learning outcomes to help students incrementally 

develop academic skills and achieve in their 

discipline. Boud emphasises the need for ‘sustainable 

assessment’ where students learn to self-assess as a 

transferable skill required for lifelong learning (2000). 

SUMMATIVE FEEDBACK 

Summative feedback is given at the end of an 

assessment task, by providing marks and comments 

that let students know what they have achieved. 

Students like to get and compare marks, to measure 

their success and to motivate their performance. 

However, feedback on assessments is only one kind of 

feedback. 


35

GOOD PRACTICE 

One subject early in the program had allocated a 

lot of marks for a long independent research essay, 

which the transnational students in Hong Kong did 

not yet have the academic skills to successfully 

complete. The subject coordinator, with permission 

from their Head of School, adapted this assignment 

so that for the same marks, the students completed 

a preliminary literature review, got feedback, and 

then went on to write a shorter essay. In this way the 

students developed and used their academic skills, 

and did equivalent work to the main campus UOW 

students studying the same subject. 

— Guy Davidson, Subject Coordinator, Faculty of Arts 

“I always give some immediate feedback during 

the intensive teaching week. This will be based 

on a learning activity or formative task during the 

week. I find it very helpful in assessing the students’ 

understanding of what has been covered so far, and 

their capacity to work towards the assessment task 

requirements. It does mean I am working in my hotel, 

but it is worth it in terms of the positive outcomes for 

students.” 

— Ruth Walker, Learning Development 

FORMATIVE FEEDBACK 

This kind of feedback is given early in the session and 

helps students to work out where they are in their 

learning, where they need to go, and how to get there. 

It is important for students to receive feedback on 

their first assignments before they start their next, so 

that they can ‘feed forward’ (Taylor, 2008) their skill 

and knowledge. 

STRATEGIES FOR GIVING FEEDBACK 

Because giving feedback can be time consuming, 

many subject coordinators become very strategic. 

For instance, they might: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

give detailed individual feedback for the first 

assessment task that will help students get 

ready for the next assignment, but less for 

their final task 

rather than marking up each assignment, 

instead collect together examples of common 

problems and good work, and give detailed 

feedback about these out to the whole group 

use individual assessment criteria sheets 

with scaled indications of performance (from 

excellent to unsatisfactory). This works best 

with detailed criteria that are very specific to 

the assessment task. If the criteria are taken 

from a standardised pro-forma, the risk is that 

they may be too generic to make sense to 

students and help them to understand what 

they are doing well or where they need to 

improve 

a more sophisticated version involves 

entering common problems and strengths 

on a database, and then cutting and pasting 

comments relevant to individual students. 

Each student then receives an individualised 

printout. This is popular with students and 

fast to use once set up. However set up time 

makes it more suited to larger classes of 

60 students or more or to subjects where a 

similar assessment will run for several years. 

Whichever approach is used, it is useful to explain 

to your students what you plan to do and how they 

should interpret the feedback they get. If you plan 

to give marks but no other individual feedback for 

your students’ final assessment task, make sure that 

you reinforce the need for them to refer back to the 

formative feedback on earlier tasks to improve their 

performance, 

36 36 University of Wollongong

MARGINAL NOTES 

For written feedback to be useful, clear guidance 

is needed on where students went wrong and what 

needs to be improved – remembering that most 

people (students or academics!) tend to believe that 

what they have written is correct and clear. 

Marginal notes sometimes identify problems 

in language that is too general for students to 

understand. Examples: 

● ● 

‘Confusing’ 

What is confusing? More needed, eg 

‘confusing – unclear whether you mean 

companies or customers’ 

● ● ‘Reference’ 

Students who reference poorly usually need 

more guidance than this; eg is this ‘reference 

– where did you get this data from?’ or ‘you 

need to reference each point in this section, 

not just at the end of the section’ etc 

● ● 

● ● 

● ● 

● ● 

‘Argument?’ 

It may be unclear whether this means ‘where 

is the argument to support this conclusion?’ 

or ‘what are you arguing here?’ 

‘What about the reading last week?’ 

Tutorial or lecture? Which reading and which 

point? 

‘Your own words?’ 

A student who thought it was acceptable 

to include quotes would be left wondering 

why this particular quote was a problem. 

More needed, eg ‘you need to introduce 

your quotations by first summarising the 

main point in your own words’ or ‘Too many 

quotations, not enough of your own writing’. 

‘Paragraph structure’ 

What was wrong with their paragraph 

structure? Was it too long, too short or too 

uneven? Why is this a problem? 

Explicit feedback gives constructive suggestions and 

reinforces positive approaches. Examples: 

● ● 

● ● 

● ● 

‘Put the main idea first then provide examples 

of how the idea would work in practice’ 

‘Move from describing the situation to 

evaluating whether it was a good outcome or 

not’ 

‘If you are going to use somebody else’s exact 

words, you should have put them in quotation 

marks and given a reference to show that 

they are not your own and show me where 

they came from’ (Carroll, 2005). 

THE ROLE OF TECHNOLOGY 

Giving feedback to students electronically doesn’t 

have to compromise the quality of feedback that will 

be helpful to students who want to improve their 

performance. Some approaches include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Because many students have the same 

recurring problems in early assessment 

tasks, you might consider setting up a bank 

of common feedback comments in Word, that 

you can cut and paste into individual essays 

or export into a report. This will save time 

when delivering necessary but repetitive 

commentary, and allow you to concentrate on 

more individualised feedback where needed. 

If students are performing calculations or 

other technical tasks, they could be asked 

to submit their work in an Excel template or 

other software which allows you to build in 

some automated checking of their results. 

Specialist software is available to allow 

individualised feedback from markers to 

be inserted and reviewed electronically 

by subject coordinators prior to release to 

students. This isn’t likely to save you time, 

but it can provide a way to allocate questions 

among markers at different sites, and it offers 

a retrievable record of feedback if needed. 

In some disciplines, there may be online 

modules available from third party providers 

which have assessment tasks built in (for 

example virtual dissections). 

If students are asked to publish their work 

online, this can encourage high expectations 

and facilitate peer assessment through 

posted comments. 

UOW Learning Design Unit can assist with 

other ideas for assessment design using 

technology. 

Remember that advances in technology do not 

necessarily mean better transnational or distance 

courses: “Educational technology is a significant 

supplement, but it does not replace the human 

element and the qualitative role of the teacher. In all 

our programs, there must be a human presence at the 

end of the line” (Macdonald, 2000). 


37

HOW EXPLICIT SHOULD I MAKE THE ASSESSMENT CRITERIA? 


You can expect that tensions between the need for 

measurement/standards and the need to develop and 

engage student learning will occur in transnational 

programs. Taylor argues that it is important to strike a 

balance between assessment for learning (formative) 

and assessment of learning (summative) (Taylor, 

2008). 


You can’t assume that students will immediately 

understand unfamiliar or generic assessment criteria. 

If you are working with the intensive model (lectures 

from UOW staff followed by weekly classes with 

local co-teachers): You can’t expect co-teachers to 

give students good advice on how to prepare for the 

assessment unless they receive the criteria ahead 

of the submission date and/or have an opportunity 

to discuss the assessment task with the subject 

coordinator. 

In any model: You can’t assume that all teachers will 

mark in a consistent way without guidance. If others 

are marking some of the ongoing assessment tasks 

across the session, make sure that there are explicit 

marking criteria for them to work with, and factor in 

components that will link that assignment to the next. 

tasks (Brown and Joughlin, 2007). 

These misconceptions can be culturally located, so it 

is important in transnational programs to make sure 

that all teachers involved in a program are very clear 

about expectations. 

Be aware that the local teachers may also have 

graduated from the same or a similar educational 

institution as their transnational students, so would 

have similar experiences studying at university. 

Without a thorough discussion of the desired learning 

outcomes and the expectations for each assessment, 

they might not be able to easily clarify the UOW 

academic expectations to students. 

It is particularly confusing for teachers and students 

if on the surface the assessment tasks seem familiar. 

Something as seemingly recognisable as an essay can 

have very different flavours (eg descriptive, discursive, 

polemical). While critical analysis of research is highly 

prized in Australian education, it might not be an 

explicit expectation in some other academic cultures. 

“In the two weeks they are here it is ok, we use 

critical analysis, but if we don’t have the same in 

the rest of the session we forget.” 


WHY ARE CLEAR ASSESSMENT CRITERIA SO 

IMPORTANT IN TRANSNATIONAL PROGRAMS? 

In any course the instructions you give for assessment 

tasks are very important, as they are the way that 

students will interpret and make sense of what they 

are supposed to do with a subject. 

“For most students, assessment requirements literally 

define the curriculum. Assessment is a potent strategic 

tool for educators with which to spell out the learning 

that will be rewarded and to guide students into 

effective approaches to study”(James et al, 2002, p 7). 

Additional issues arise in transnational programs. It 

is often assumed by academics, administrators and 

students that assessment systems are universal. 

However, there can be significant variations in 

different educational cultures, and problems arise 

when instructors make assumptions both about 

students’ understandings of assessment task 

expectations, and their capacity to perform those 

HOW MAY ASSESSMENT CRITERIA SUPPORT STUDENT 

LEARNING? 

As well as rewarding understanding of a subject area, 

assessment criteria can also be used to help students 

to develop academic skills, or to focus on a particular 

academic skill. For instance, an early assessment 

task might have a focus on language use, referencing 

techniques and some preliminary evaluation of 

research, with students awarded higher marks under 

these criteria. 

Once students have mastered basic skills, you can 

then give emphasis to more advanced academic 

skills. For example, in a later assessment task you 

might give more marks for critical analysis and the 

development of an argument, and less to referencing. 


WHAT KIND OF EXPLICIT CRITERIA ARE HELPFUL? 

Although a Faculty/School may have a standard 

assessment criteria sheet, you might plan to expand 

on these to develop more explicit criteria for your 

individual assessment tasks. 

Students usually welcome explicit instruction on: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

the length of submission (explain that longer 

is not necessarily better) 

the format (what type of writing it is, the 

structure expected and the difference between 

a report, an essay, a literature review etc) 

what is being assessed (especially the 

percentage of the mark allocated to English 

language proficiency) 

which aspects of the assessment are 

compulsory (eg students must use four 

academic journal articles) and which are 

guidelines or suggestions (eg students might 

also draw on their own experiences or nonscholarly 

online material) 

what the assessment criteria mean and how 

they are applied. 

If there are explicit instructions for an assessment, 

make sure these are reflected in the criteria. For 

example, ‘compare and contrast three journal articles’ 

in the instructions, and ‘successfully compared/ 

contrasted three journal articles’ in the assessment 

criteria. If there isn’t a clear match, students will 

be confused about how they are being awarded 

marks in response to a specific assessment task’s 

requirements. 

HOW CAN I WRITE ASSESSMENT CRITERIA THAT ARE 

CLEAR TO TRANSNATIONAL STUDENTS? 

Even a statement that seems explicit like ‘ensure your 

essay draws on a wide range of sources to support 

your argument’ may still leave students baffled 

(Carroll, 2005, p 31), as it includes tacit and shared 

knowledge. For instance, it assumes that students 

understand what an ‘argument’ is, how it works in an 

essay, and what might constitute a ‘wide range’. 

Strategies for ensuring your criteria are clear include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

asking the co-teacher to read and comment 

on the marking criteria before finalising and 

distributing to the transnational students 

showing the criteria to a peer who is 

experienced in teaching the same cohort 

testing the criteria with a student from the 

same culture, for example by asking them 

to paraphrase what they think each criterion 

means. 


FOR COURSE 

COORDINATORS 

• Do your subject coordinators need 

assistance or training on how to develop 

marking rubrics? 

• Will there be a process of checking that 

tasks are explicit and explained clearly 

and that assessment criteria are clearly 

written? 

• Will subject coordinators be required 

to meet transnational teachers and 

students (eg through Skype) before major 

assessments, to address any questions 

and clarify expectations? 

MARKING FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY 

Lecturers often worry about whether they should be 

marking the level of English language expression of 

their transnational students. 

Most assessment criteria will have a specific 

criterion for good English grammar and expression. 

However, lecturers might have different approaches 

to assessing their students’ work. Some will deduct 

marks for poor English, and others say that they think 

this is unfair on a transnational cohort who don’t have 

the opportunities to develop their English expression, 

and so will award marks if they thought the student 

had understood the issues and could communicate 

them, despite their imperfect grammar. 

Because this is an important issue, it is best to 

deal with it directly. Discuss your expectations for 

language proficiency with your teaching colleagues 

and your students, and make sure that you are 

marking consistently across the same program at 

all UOW teaching locations. 


39

HOW CAN I HELP MY STUDENTS AVOID PLAGIARISM? 


You can expect that some new students may need 

help in learning how to reference, or may take time to 

appreciate the importance of meeting their teacher’s 

expectations in this area. It might take some trial 

and error before they get it right, as their previous 

experience with acknowledging sources might have 

been very different. 

You can expect that once students have understood 

the philosophy and mastered the practice of good 

referencing, they will try to meet high standards of 

academic integrity. 


You can’t assume that students have a prior 

understanding of the UOW policy on referencing or 

the reasons why avoiding plagiarism is important. 

Even where a faculty offers a thorough induction or 

orientation, some may miss that program through 

illness or late enrolment. 

You can’t assume that once students have been told 

about the rules, this will automatically change their 

research and writing practices. Some may think 

paraphrasing and referencing is done ‘for a more 

scholarly approach’ or ‘for a better mark’ rather than 

understanding the principles of academic integrity. 

WHY DO STUDENTS PLAGIARISE? 

Students, whether in Australia or elsewhere, may 

not have learned much about referencing in school. 

In parts of Asia, some students’ previous learning 

experiences at university and school may have been 

mainly exam-based, with a focus on memorisation 

rather than on commentary with references (Hayes 

and Introna, 2005). 

“In high school we were not allowed to change 

the words from the textbooks … Our teachers 

always wanted us to use exactly the same words 

as [the ones] in textbooks.” 


The internet has made plagiarism relatively easy. A 

study of students in United States universities found 

Internet plagiarism has increased, with 40% admitting 

to weaving together sentences from different Internet 

sources without citation (McCabe, 2005, cited in 

Slethaug, 2007). 

In parts of Asia, cultural values may affect students’ 

commitment to referencing (Keenan and Jemmeson, 

2006). For example, some students may believe 

that copying directly from course notes is a more 

respectful approach. Other students may disagree 

with Western beliefs about ownership of ideas. In 

an Indian context, it has been claimed that ‘lack of 

academic integrity’ applies to cheating and has little 

to do with referencing, as ideas and words of wellknown 

writers are considered as part of the collective 

bank of knowledge and learners are supposed 

to make use of these to learn and develop new 

knowledge (Handa and Power, 2005). 

Writing using a variety of sources involves high-level 

critical thinking and English language skills. Correct 

referencing requires good research habits and 

practice. Where students have not fully developed 

these capabilities, time pressures and lack of 

confidence in English can tempt them into failing to 

use research sources correctly (Hayes and Introna, 

2005). 

It follows that developing students’ appreciation for 

academic integrity requires more than simply pointing 

to a plagiarism policy or relying on a referencing 

workshop. It is equally important to develop students 

critical reading, note-taking, paraphrasing and 

summarising skills so that they can learn to use their 

research material appropriately in their writing. 

WHY DO STUDENTS NEED TO BE SUPPORTED IN 

AVOIDING PLAGIARISING? 

●● 

●● 

Many students, including first-language 

English speakers, experience ‘information 

overload’ at the beginning of their course. 

They may not absorb all the critical 

information given in orientations and will need 

follow-up instruction. 

Information may contradict students’ previous 

experiences. Most people find adjustment 

to a new educational culture or new ways 

of working difficult and, if they have been 

successful in their previous studies, might 

resist adapting to new rules. 


●● 

●● 

●● 

To some students, referencing may seem a 

bit like formatting or using illustrations – nice 

if you have time to do it but not critical. They 

may not understand how seriously a lack of 

referencing is viewed by their teachers. 

Understanding a theory can be very different 

to putting it into practice. Working under 

pressure for an assessment, students 

who have not have translated the theory 

of referencing into new practices (such as 

collecting all relevant citations and marking 

out quoted passages correctly) may realise 

this too late. 

Some students seriously underestimate the 

time required for accurate referencing. 

Talk with the course coordinator about how this issue 

has been addressed previously. 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO ENCOURAGE 

STUDENTS TO QUOTE AND REFERENCE CORRECTLY? 

Provide clear information about what is expected, 

reinforced by a written handout and examples (see 

http://www.uow.edu.au/about/policy/UOW058648. 

html). 

Explain the underlying reasons for referencing, for 

example: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

to mark student papers fairly, the teacher 

needs to know which parts are the students’ 

own work 

intellectual honesty requires that we 

acknowledge our debt to the original authors 

incorrect or incomplete referencing may give 

the impression that students can’t tell the 

difference between their own thoughts and 

those of others. 

Other strategies include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

lead a student discussion on plagiarism and 

ethical research and writing issues 

model good referencing yourself, in all of 

teaching materials (including PowerPoints) 

organise opportunities for students to 

practice good referencing habits, eg in 

tutorials. 

ask students to evaluate good and bad 

examples of referencing 

give students a realistic idea of the effort and 

time that referencing can be expected to take. 

use an early assessment task to identify 

inadequate referencing, and include correct 

referencing in the assessment criteria. 

Allocate a mark that will be significant if 



●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

• How will new students be inducted into 

correct referencing, UOW plagiarism policy 

and academic integrity? 

• Are staff aware that students can’t be 

penalised for plagiarism if they have not 

been taught the appropriate conventions, 

and do they understand the importance of 

teaching these conventions (rather than 

assuming this knowledge)? 

• How will policies on academic integrity be 

communicated to co-teachers/tutors? 

• Who will induct transnational students 

on the Library’s StartSmart research and 

writing modules? 

lost but won’t make it impossible for most 

students to pass the subject 

construct assessment tasks to discourage 

plagiarism. For example, ask students to work 

with a case study, evaluate a specific initiative 

or resource or write about highly specific or 

very recent topics. Change the case studies 

and topics each year 

tell students where they can get help 

with written work if they need it, eg useful 

resources, or learning support staff available 

for the course 

require students to produce evidence 

of progress at different stages, such as 

literature searches, outlines or drafts 

issue a reminder before the due date of 

assessment tasks 

be explicit. Brief notes such as ‘must 

acknowledge sources’ may result in students 

just adding a few more author names without 

understanding correct practices 

make sure your co-teachers and tutors are 

fully aware of UOW’s referencing conventions 

and understand the plagiarism policy, and are 

prepared to remind their students of these at 

opportune moments. 

(some of the above ideas are drawn from Hussin, 

2007; Lim and See, 2001; Carroll, 2007) 


41

TURNITIN 

CAUTIONARY TALE 

A lecturer put information on plagiarism in the 

subject outline and referred students to this in 

her first lecture. The first assessment was worth 

30% and picked up a large number of instances of 

plagiarism and over half the students received zero 

marks. Most were later found to have not read the 

relevant section of the subject guide, understood the 

requirements, or been directly instructed at any stage 

about correct referencing. After a long and timeconsuming 

series of complaints, meetings with tutors, 

partner institution managers and the sub-dean, those 

students had to be given an alternative assessment 

so they could have a chance to pass the subject. Both 

students and the lecturer were very distressed and 

it affected student motivation and learning in the 

course. 

In recent years, online text-matching software has 

become popular as a tool for combating plagiarism. 

UOW has a licence for Turnitin, an online tool that 

compares student work to web sites, databases and 

previously submitted work. Turnitin can provide a 

report showing the percentage of a student’s work 

that appears to be identical to the material of others. 

Some UOW teachers use Turnitin, in its simplest 

function, to require students to submit their work to 

the program where they will receive a scaled report 

about the percentage of their essay or report that 

matches or has been copied from other publicly 

accessible online sources. 

For more information about using Turnitin at UOW, 

see: http://staff.uow.edu.au/eteaching/turnitin/ 

If you do plan to use it, be aware that as subject 

coordinator you must set up the parameters of 

student use (giving them an access code, determining 

whether they can submit their essay once only or 

a number of times to self-assess their own use of 

research). 

It is important to remember that Turnitin alone is not 

‘a magic bullet’ (Carroll, 2003 cited in Bretag and 

Mahmud, 2009) for preventing student plagiarism, 

particularly if it is used as a punitive rather than a 

preventative or educative measure. If you use it, plan 

to: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

model Turnitin in classes to show how easy 

it is to match student work to copied online 

material 

give students the opportunity to submit their 

own work and self-assess their level of copied 

material, and re-write where necessary 

don’t rely on Turnitin’s ‘originality report’ 

percentages alone to assess the quality 

of work: as Bretag and Mahmud point out, 

assessing potential plagiarism also requires 

nuanced academic judgement based on a 

range of subjective criteria, including the 

context – both academic and personal – 

within which the student is writing (Bretag 

and Mahmud, 2009). 


PREPARING AND INDUCTING TUTORS AND CO-TEACHERS 

THIS SECTION IS PRIMARILY FOR SUBJECTS TAUGHT IN 

THE ‘INTENSIVES + TUTORIALS’ MODE 

The role of co-teachers or tutors is often to conduct 

most of the face-to-face teaching during the session. 

Co-teachers often are positioned to fill the role of 

“cultural translator and mediator” (Leask, 2004), 

between UOW’s expectations and the students’ 

understanding. They are expected to offer appropriate 

local examples to illustrate principles to help 

students succeed in mastering the curriculum. 


You can expect that every effort will be made to 

recruit skilled and knowledgeable co-teachers for 

your subjects. UOW has the same expectations of 

minimum academic qualifications and experience for 

teachers at all locations. 

You can expect that co-teachers will be conscientious 

in fulfilling their roles. 

You can expect that many co-teachers will have 

excellent knowledge of student abilities and learning 

styles within the cohort, and can be an invaluable 

source of advice for your subject design and teaching. 


Whether in Australia or any other location, despite 

everyone’s best efforts you can’t assume that a coteacher’s 

or tutor’s expertise will always exactly 

match your requirements. 

You can’t assume that UOW’s expectations will be 

immediately understood by co-teachers. They may 

have experience teaching or studying at universities 

with quite different expectations. 

You can’t assume that co-teachers will be familiar 

with UOW policies, such as academic consideration or 

appeals about marking. Occasionally, tutors may even 

have a different understanding of plagiarism. 



• Will you and your subject co-ordinators 

participate in selecting tutors and coteachers 

(for example through CVs 

submitted for approval by the partner 

university)? 

• How will policies such as privacy and OH&S 

be communicated to co-teachers/tutors? 

• How will procedures such as academic 

consideration and appeals be communicated 

to co-teachers/tutors? 

• How will a shared understanding of 

expectations be developed across sites – eg 

roles and responsibilities of co-teachers/ 

tutors as opposed to subject coordinators, 

what is expected of teachers in the 

classroom and for student support? 

• How can ongoing communication be 

encouraged between subject coordinators 

and co-teachers? 

• Is there funding for co-teachers and 

tutors to attend meetings with subject 

coordinators, including initial face-to-face 

meetings if possible (whether in person or 

via web-cam or videoconference)? 

• Who is responsible for explaining the policy 

on teacher evaluations to co-teachers and 

tutors? 

“Our tutors were good appointments. We worked very closely with them and they 

gained an understanding of our expectations of the role. Many taught more than 

one subject. It’s best to involve them at every step. Try to budget for meetings 

and additional time as their contracts are very lean. Give them an expectation of 

reappointment subject to performance. We appreciate our tutors a lot.” 

— Philip Kitley, Course Coordinator, Faculty of Arts 


43

WHAT STRATEGIES SHOULD I USE IN WORKING WITH 

CO-TEACHERS? 

Investing time in mentoring co-teachers can help you 

in future years. You are more likely to retain staff, and 

you will have more confidence that the transnational 

classroom is running smoothly and according to your 

teaching approach and UOW policy. 

●● 

●● 

Make sure that co-teachers have all the 

relevant information they need to prepare. 

The timing of transnational programs very 

rarely exactly matches the UOW session 

schedule. This has implications for the 

development and approval of subject guides, 

eReading lists, and eLearning sites. Coteachers 

would prefer to have the draft of the 

subject guide and reading lists to work with 

before teaching commences, so that they 

can feel confident about what the subject is 

about, can contribute to discussions and ask 

questions to clarify teaching activities and 

assessments. 

Co-teachers are often willing to contribute 

by developing examples and case studies, or 

suggesting relevant local readings. However, 

be aware that their work contract might 

not allow them to design more substantive 

material, and it will be your responsibility 

as subject coordinator to provide them 

with relevant teaching resources. In some 

cases these may include lecture notes 

and PowerPoints as well as handouts and 

activities for use in tutorial time. 

●● 

If you are a Wollongong academic who 

delivers intensive teaching face-to-face to 

the students, find an opportunity during 

the intensive teaching week to introduce 

the co-teacher to the students, or to teach 

collaboratively with them. This will reinforce 

the impression that they are a valued part of 

the UOW teaching team. (Be aware that not 

all co-teachers will be available to attend 

classes in the intensive teaching week. They 

may have prior commitments or limited work 

contracts.) 

WHAT TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT IS AVAILABLE 

FOR TUTORS AND CO-TEACHERS? 

Faculties are responsible for inducting tutors into 

UOW policies and procedures and into teaching in 

the faculty. Check with your course coordinator as to 

what induction is offered. 

Subject coordinators are responsible for leading 

teaching teams, including communicating 

expectations about teaching and assessment and 

offering advice and mentoring when needed. 

STAFF DEVELOPMENT AVAILABLE TO TEACHERS 

LOCATED OUTSIDE AUSTRALIA 

The University Learning and Teaching program (ULT) 

can be completed through FlexiULT modules and self 

study DVDs. For more information, contact UOW’s 

Academic Development Unit or see http://www.uow. 

edu.au/asd/ULT/ 

Tips for Tutors or other teaching workshops may also 

be available – check with your course coordinator 

and/or the Academic Development Unit. If funding 

is available, consider engaging the UOW Academic 

Development Unit to run workshops on location. 

OTHER RESOURCES 

“We have a tutor induction in 

Singapore every year, to give new 

tutors knowledge of UOW.” 

A UOW web site for sessional teachers is availabe at: 

http://focusonteaching.uow.edu.au/sessionalteachers/ 

— Willy Susilo, Course 

Coordinator, Faculty of Informatics 


COMMUNICATING WITH TUTORS AND CO-TEACHERS 




You can expect your co-teachers to follow the subject 

and assessment guides carefully, and ask questions 

where needed. 

You can expect that more proactive co-teachers will 

keep you informed about students’ progress and any 

problems that arise. 



• Will meetings between subject 

coordinators and co-teachers (face-to-face 

or Skype) be expected as a normal part of 

subject management? 

• Will co-teachers be paid for attending 

meetings? 


You can’t assume that you will always receive timely 

information about student issues. In any location, 

some co-teachers may feel hesitant about raising 

issues; they might think that these issues might 

reflect badly on their own teaching performance, or 

that they need to assume full responsibility rather 

than sharing problems which are more properly 

resolved by the subject coordinator. 

You can’t assume that by staying in touch with coteachers 

mainly by email you will always have a 

good picture of class progress or class issues. In 

programs operating in transnational locations, coteachers 

cannot easily drop in to the faculty to check 

on points that are unclear or to share experiences 

with academic colleagues. They might seek advice 

from other co-teachers or administrators, who may 

inadvertently reinforce confusion about academic 

expectations and processes. 

You can’t assume that co-teachers are familiar 

with the standard of student work expected in your 

course. Assessments and expectations will need to be 

covered thoroughly well ahead of due dates. To give 

good advice to students, co-teachers also need clear 

marking criteria ahead of the submission date. 

“In transnational teaching, you are likely 

to encounter a few hurdles. It works if you 

can be proactive, provide inductions, stay in 

communication with tutors, think about likely 

learning problems such as plagiarism ahead of 

time and involve tutors in monitoring student 

progress. Don’t wait until students are failing.” 

— Ruth Walker, Learning Development 

WHY IS MAINTAINING COMMUNICATION IMPORTANT? 

Some co-teachers will find it difficult to let the subject 

coordinator know of any difficulties. If asked how 

things are going they may just say ‘fine’. Conversely, 

some subject coordinators may be very busy and 

may not make much contact with their teaching team 

during session. 

These communication difficulties can occur in any 

subject in any location. However, in transnational 

programs the risks of serious outcomes are higher: 

●● 

●● 

Transnational co-teachers are embedded in a 

different academic culture. They may develop 

shared misconceptions with the students 

around assessment expectations, plagiarism 

policies or core subject concepts, resulting in 

increased failure rates and grievances. 

Transnational co-teachers may feel caught 

between the expectations of the university 

and the struggles of students to meet these 

expectations. Without regular discussions 

with the subject coordinator, they may not be 

able to help students bridge the gap. 

For a transnational program to succeed, information 

sharing between subject coordinators and their 

teaching team is essential throughout the session. 

Establish regular communication, whether this is 

in person, by email or phone or within an online 

discussion group. Encourage co-teachers to discuss 

the weekly topic, the students’ engagement and their 

progress in preparation for assessment tasks. 


45

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO COMMUNICATE WITH 

CO-TEACHERS? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

If you are located in a different country, 

try and arrange at least one face-to-face 

interaction before session begins, whether in 

person or using Skype. This helps establish 

trust and rapport for the entire session. 

If you are a Wollongong coordinator who flies 

to the transnational location for an intensive 

teaching week, make efforts to get to know 

your co-teachers and establish rapport. Try to 

include some social time. 

Schedule meetings for the co-teachers 

to discuss teaching and assessment with 

you (preferably face-to-face eg via Skype 

or alternatively by phone) at critical points 

during the session. 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Encourage information sharing. Co-teachers 

can have invaluable knowledge of their 

students’ learning styles and/or cultural 

knowledge that can help with choosing case 

studies and designing assessments. On your 

part, you can share approaches to teaching 

and the theory underlying the subject design. 

During session, regularly email or post 

questions on student progress to co-teachers. 

Even if there is no funding for formal 

meetings, maintain contact as much as 

possible. 

Consider establishing a co-teachers’ 

discussion area within eLearning. 

When members of your teaching team use 

email, be aware that a terse reply could 

discourage further contact. Include a friendly 

greeting in your email and acknowledge/ 

thank them for their contribution. 

“Everything depends very much on email 

communication. Of course one of the issues with 

email communication is that we maybe do not 

get to know each other as well. And sometimes 

a problem is that we have mistaken each other, 

say, or take things too seriously. It is hard to 

understand the register – perhaps I am joking, 

perhaps he is joking. We need to have face to 

face communication, as it takes a longer time 

by email for us to understand each other well 

in order to work it out more easily. It is easier to 

talk, frankly.” 


“Some people tell you that transnational 

teaching is just a week out of your life. It’s 

not – or if it is, it isn’t quality. There’s a lot of 

work involved in communicating with students, 

answering emails and providing feedback. You 

can’t see transnational teaching as something 

you do on the side. Transnational teaching also 

involves revisiting our teaching theory. How do 

you engage adults who are working full-time 

and motivate them to learn? You need to think 

about it, realise that transmission isn’t enough 

and work out how to approach this model of 

learning, even more than at Wollongong.” 

— Peter McLean, Subject Coordinator, 

Faculty of Commerce 


COMMUNICATING WITH STUDENTS 




You can expect that some students will be pro-active 

and will contact you with their questions. 

You can expect that most students will leave it to you 

to communicate expectations about the assessments 

and other requirements. 


You can’t assume that your students will have similar 

responses to students you have taught previously. It is 

likely that issues may arise that you didn’t anticipate. 

You can’t assume that you will always receive 

timely information about student issues either from 

Wollongong or a transnational campus, or that by 

staying in touch with co-teachers/tutors mainly by 

email you will always have a good picture of class 

progress. 

You can’t assume that students will articulate their 

difficulties to you. 

WHY DOES COMMUNICATION MATTER? 

Regular interaction between students and teachers 

keeps the students motivated and on task and 

prompts them to maintain their study as a high 

priority among competing obligations. Additionally it 

is a factor in completion rates (Morgan and McKenzie 

2003). 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO COMMUNICATE WITH 

STUDENTS? 

Any student difficulties will usually be first identified 

by the tutor/co-teacher. It follows that good 

communication with the tutor is essential (see 

page 45). To faciliate good communication between 

you, the co-teacher and the students, you might: 

●● 

●● 

offer clear and detailed handouts, 

assessment guides, marking criteria and 

sample formats 

encourage use of online discussion forums, 

and participate in these yourself 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 



• How will you ensure that students 

have access to the equivalent of staff 

consultation time? 

• How will teachers in all locations keep 

you informed of student issues they have 

identified (particularly important in new 

programs, where issues can emerge that 

affect the viability of the program if not 

addressed)? 

email the students from time to time, making 

it clear that you are interested in students’ 

progress and that they can ask questions. 

In many cultures, the teacher-student 

relationship is much closer to a mentoring 

relationship than it is in Australia 

offer an online equivalent of a consultation 

time when you are available to students 

consider visiting (or video-conferencing) each 

tutorial two or three weeks before the due 

date of major assessments. Alternatively, 

you might schedule time when you will be 

available online to discuss assessment tasks 

(eg using a meeting tool or online chat tool) 

if you are coordinating from another site, 

consider installing a web-cam in your office 

and notifying students of consultation times. 

This would need the partner institution to 

provide students with access to a computer 

and web-cam at their location. 

“I’ve found it’s important to keep encouraging 

students to communicate with me. Students 

need to feel there is a place to ask questions and 

contribute their experience.” 

— Subject Coordinator, Faculty of Health & 



47

WHAT ABOUT STUDENT SUPPORT? 


You can expect that your students will have access to 

a library and computers at their campus. 

In most UOW transnational programs, support is 

provided through a teacher located at the partner 

campus. This may be a subject coordinator/ lecturer 

or a co-teacher/tutor. 

In addition, you can expect that there will be a 

manager or course coordinator on the transnational 

campus who can also help students with problems or 

questions about the course. 


You can’t assume that UOW students will have access 

to all services offered by the partner university, such as 

learning development or English language support. In 

some cases, the contract limits UOW student access. 

You can’t assume that the services offered in the 

partner university will be equivalent to those offered 

in Australia. For example, not all universities have the 

same level of assistance for students with disabilities. 

WHAT SUPPORT IS AVAILABLE TO MY STUDENTS? 

UOW aims to offer an equivalent level of support 

to students at all locations. Academic advice and 

support from teachers to students should be 

equivalent to that offered in Wollongong. Sometimes 

this support may be online instead of face-to-face. 

Some student services such as Library and eLearning 

are provided by UOW across all locations, whether 

within Australia or elsewhere. Other services such as 

accommodation and counselling are more typically 

made available through a partner institution. 

HOW DO I FIND OUT ABOUT THE SUPPLEMENTARY 

SUPPORT AVAILABLE TO MY STUDENTS? 

Academic Program Coordinators/Directors at UOW 

will be able answer most of your questions, such as: 

●● 

the extensiveness of the partner’s library 

collection for the discipline 



●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

• Are support services available to students, 

or do you need to negotiate to make these 

available? 

• If the cohort includes students arriving 

from other countries, does student support 

include accommodation and other arrival 

services? 

• Have you assessed the collection at the 

on-site library? Will your UOW students 

have access to that library, or can this be 

negotiated? 

• Who will conduct student orientations to: 

- the library, computer labs and other 

facilities at their home campus? 

- UOW Library databases, eLearning, SOLS 

and UOW email? 

• How will students and staff be informed of 

how students can access academic advice, 

support services, grievance procedures etc? 

• Who will monitor students who are 

struggling and how will further support be 

provided if needed? 

• What career activities will be offered, and 

how will these be built into the course? 

how to request books for purchase and place 

books on reserve in the partner’s library 

whether the partner institution offers 

academic skills support to UOW’s 

transnational students, such as essay-writing, 

critical thinking and academic English 

what computers, Internet and other 

technology available on site to UOW students 

whether the partner institution offers 

counselling, disability or careers services to 

UOW students. 

WHAT ABOUT PEER SUPPORT? 

“Our program works well because we include 

high levels of ongoing student counselling. We 

talk to those who fail, we find out their problems 

and we advise how they can improve their result.” 

— Willy Susilo, Course Coordinator, 

Faculty of Informatics 

Students gain from working together, and might form 

study groups with or without encouragement. This 

can have positive effects. To encourage interaction 

amongst transnational students, ongoing group 

activities might be structured into assessment tasks. 

When setting assessments, explain to students 

which parts of the task must be carried out entirely 

independently and which parts (if any) can be 

discussed or worked on with others. 


LEARNING AND TEACHING USING TECHNOLOGY 


You can expect that UOW administration will organise 

logins so that transnational students and co-teachers 

can access eLearning and library resources. 

You can expect that the partner institution will do 

their best to provide any specific technology you need 

for teaching. 


You can’t assume that the computers for students use 

at the partner university will offer as fast or reliable 

Internet connections as at the UOW main campus. 

In some locations, connections may be slow and 

unreliable. (In others, the networks may be faster 

than in Australia.) It may sometimes be necessary to 

supplement online resources with CDs. 

You can’t assume that students will have access to 

the Internet from home or work. 

You can’t assume that face-to-face teaching can be 

fully replaced by other strategies (Marginson, 2004). 

However, face-to-face contact can be supplemented 

or facilitated using technology. 

THINGS TO CHECK OR ORGANISE: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

how easy is it for students to access a 

computer at their institution? 

are their Internet connections good enough 

(speed and stability) for use of online tools? 

will all of your students be able to access the 

Internet during session, or are some based in 

regions with very poor access? 

have students had any training or induction on 

using the UOW online systems? 

have tutors/co-teachers been introduced 

to the UOW systems? Do they have current 

logins? If they have let their login lapse, do 

they know how to obtain a new password? 

if students need access to specific software 

or technologies, how/where will these be 

made available? 

if you are travelling with technology – laptop, 

mobile phone, etc – do you have a power 

supply of the correct voltage/amperage for 

your destination country? Is the plug on your 

power cord the correct one? Do you need an 

adaptor and/or surge protector? 

IDEAS FOR TEACHING WITH TECHNOLOGY 

Online learning can be a way of fostering your 

students’ sense of community with their main campus 

peers and the university (Hobson, 2009), and will help 

to break the psychological distance they might be 

feeling. It is also important for students to develop 

digital literacies. Some ideas include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

technology could be used to record your 

lecture series, and the recordings used as 

resources for your transnational students 

and/or co-teachers. This is helpful where the 

students’ first language isn’t English. They 

may want to listen to the lecture a second 

time or work through it at their own pace 

where there are distance issues, web cams or 

video-conferences can be used to offer faceto-face 

contact between subject coordinators 

and/or between teachers and students 

online discussion forums, video-conferences 

or chat tools could bring together cohorts 

from different countries and enhance 

students’ sense of being part of UOW 

it may be interesting to incorporate web sites 

and online tools popular in the students’ 

countries into activities and assessments 

if you are coordinating from a distance, you 

might require your students to complete 

an ongoing assessment group task online, 

where you can jump in and comment or offer 

feedback across the session 

some UOW teachers have been experimenting 

with group assessments with parallel cohorts 

of Australian campus and transnational 

students. This can be time consuming to 

establish, and relies on careful timing and 

negotiation, but can have very positive 

outcomes. 

“I had an onshore group and an offshore 

group, and set up an online chat 

where all the students discussed their 

assignment together. Had I been braver I 

could have had group projects across the 

two campuses. We have to integrate our 

communities.” 

– Penney McFarlane, Degree 



49

INSTEAD OF FACE-TO-FACE LECTURES, COULDN’T WE 

JUST GIVE THE STUDENTS RECORDED LECTURES? 

This works well with some mature-aged 

professionals, but is not the usual approach. 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Most UOW transnational teaching programs 

use blended learning – that, is using both 

face-to-face and technology. 

Our agreement with the partner institution 

will usually specify face-to-face teaching as 

an obligation under the contract. 

The students to whom we are marketing 

courses have chosen us based on this 

approach. In many countries the face-toface 

component is a strong element of the 

perceived value of the course. Anything less 

than 20-22 hours may be perceived to be of 

lesser value, especially when compared with 

our competitors. 

“For most (though not all) students online education 

does not substitute for face-to-face programs. 

Regardless of their specific interest in ICTs most 

students want to interact with teachers and each 

other face-to-face. Exceptions are some categories 

of working students, some students with young 

children, and some in locations too remote to allow 

them to attend classes … For most students in the 

Asia-Pacific, an online degree accessed from home is 

a less attractive form of cross-border education than 

a degree acquired in the foreign nation, or in a branch 

campus of a foreign university in the student’s own 

country.” (Marginson, 2004, p 100) 



• What level of computer and Internet access 

is available to students in the program? 

• Who will induct students and tutors into 

UOW online systems (eLearning, eReadings, 

Library databases, SOLS, email)? 

• Are there identified people on both 

campuses who will be the point of contact 

for technical issues? 

• Will there be a web site for the course, to 

give the students a sense of identity and 

save them having to negotiate the entire 

UOW site? 

• Do you need to negotiate for any additional 

technologies to enhance communication (eg 

webcams for tutors, videoconferencing for 

selected classes, community tools for the 

students? (The Learning Design Unit or LIFT 

unit can help.) 

CAUTIONARY TALE 

A number of surveys of exiting students have 

found a high percentage of exiting transnational 

students were disappointed at the lack of 

interaction with the Australian campus and 

Australian students. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: Due to a personal emergency, 

a teacher was unable to fly into a particular country 

to teach. Instead, he offered a combination of videorecordings 

and audio-recordings. 

The students went as a body to the program 

manager to protest, an unusually strong response in 

their culture. It emerged that the audio recordings in 

particular were not valued as the students wanted 

to interact personally with the lecturer. 

The faculty now sends a substitute teacher if a 

lecturer is unable to travel. 


CONNECTING AND NETWORKING 

UOW strives to be equally inclusive of students and 

staff regardless of their location. 

As in most transnational universities, geographical 

separation, size differences and structures can 

sometimes make this difficult. 

It follows that those involved in transnational 

programs need to actively work to achieve a sense of 

belonging in students and staff at all UOW locations. 


You can expect that students and staff at the 

transnational location will want to feel part of UOW. 

They will be keen to become more engaged with the 

broader university, and will see you as the subject 

coordinator (regardless of your location) as an 

important point of engagement. 

You can expect that your transnational colleagues will 

be friendly and helpful. You can expect that someone 

in the partner university will be a point of contact 

and have responsibility for helping you orientate to 

the new environment. This applies whether you are 

located in a transnational location and orientating to 

UOW, or whether you are flying in from Wollongong to 

teach in a transnational location. 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO MAKE MY STUDENTS 

FEEL THEY ARE PART OF THE BROADER UOW? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Talk about your other classes during your 

lectures or tutorials. 

Use online discussions that can operate 

across locations and cohorts. 

Design assessment tasks using online 

community tools (for example blogs, wikis or 

a discussion forum) to bring classes together. 

If using eduStream or other digital 

technologies, it is essential to interact with all 

locations in your introduction and conclusion, 

and also during questions and activities within 

the lecture. For example, in the introduction 

a simple ‘Hello to students in Wollongong, 

Hong Kong and Bega’ is very effective. 

Ask students at each centre ‘hands-up’ style 

questions such as, How many of you are from 

…? How many of you have been to Australia? 

To Hong Kong? 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO MAKE MY CO- 

TEACHERS FEEL THEY ARE PART OF THE BROADER 

UOW? 


You can’t assume that it is someone else’s job to be 

the face of the broader UOW. Opportunities for your 

students and co-teachers in transnational locations 

to interact with Wollongong may be limited. While you 

are the academic on location, you are the face of UOW. 

You can’t assume that opportunities to interact with 

your transnational colleagues will be organised 

for you. Sometimes it may not happen unless you 

are proactive. If you are located transnationally, 

you yourself may need to organise phone or Skype 

meetings with your Wollongong counterparts. If 

you are flying into a transnational location from 

Wollongong, you may need to organise your own 

social opportunities or introductions. If you are a 

visiting academic and your classes are at night in 

particular, there may be very little contact organised. 

You can’t assume that the way your culture or campus 

does things is better. In all locations, it is important to 

convey mutual respect. To complicate things further, 

you can’t expect that attitudes such as respect or 

friendliness are conveyed in the same way in another 

culture as in your own. 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Include co-teachers/tutors from all locations 

in online ‘tutors’ rooms’ within eLearning 

(discussion groups marked as ‘hidden’ to 

students but which are accessible to teaching 

staff) 

Take an interest in your co-teachers/tutors’ 

research or studies, if applicable 

Help them make connections to Wollongong 

academics with similar interests. 

“Our transnational students want 

to know what’s happening with the 

Wollongong campus and Wollongong 

students. Their whole culture is about 

community – once they have taken the 

step to join our community they want to 

feel like they are part of it.” 

— Penney McFarlane, Degree 



51

WHY DOES NETWORKING MATTER? 

Academics who spend time interacting with their 

international colleagues gain many personal benefits 

from the transnational experience. These benefits can 

include: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

enhanced intercultural skills and confidence 

useful advice on transnational teaching 

better relationships, to assist future 

communications 

becoming known to those who advise 

postgraduate students who are looking for 

supervisors in their country 

developing a network of possible future 

research partnerships 

new friendships, and overall, a more 

enjoyable transnational experience. 

In some countries, there is a strong cultural 

expectation that people will take part in social 

interactions. Other teachers in the program will gain a 

positive impression of UOW academics who make the 

extra effort to involve themselves socially with their 

colleagues. 

Good communication is essential to the success of 

transnational partnerships. Everyone who makes an 

effort to develop good connections and rapport while 

representing UOW in any location helps ensure a 

successful program for other staff and students. 

“We have created community connections that 

have really helped our program. For example, 

we held an open seminar and invited people 

from the Polytechnic and started talking to 

them. Then we were invited to the Polytechnic 

to talk, and from there I became a judge on 

one of their competitions. Following these 

connections, I was asked to help in commenting 

on their subjects. Then after a while we were 

invited onto an Education Advisory Board. 

These connections have been really helpful 

in understanding the local environment and 

finding the right sort of educational and 

industry partners for teaching and research.” 

— Willy Susilo, Senior Academic Program 

Director, Faculty of Informatics 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO CREATE NETWORKING 

OPPORTUNITIES? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

A warm, friendly approach and a readiness 

to introduce yourself to others will go a 

long way, even where there are language 

difficulties, where you have just arrived 

in an unfamiliar culture, or where you are 

communicating from a distance. 

When visiting another UOW location, tell your 

point of contact that you would like to meet 

some of their colleagues, and ask if they 

would be free to meet over lunch or dinner 

Look through the research interests of 

academics at the other location, and contact 

those with similar interests to your own 

When visiting another UOW location, email 

organisations relevant to your teaching or 

research, and organise a meeting. 

CAUTIONARY TALE: Several Australians visiting 

an offshore program were tired from their trip, 

and so declined an invitation to meet socially. 

This was misinterpreted by the transnational 

partners as arrogance and lack of interest in the 

partner’s contribution to the program. 

HOW CAN I AVOID SOCIAL ERRORS? 

Most people will understand that you are unfamiliar 

with local social mores, and will allow for this. If you 

aren’t sure what is appropriate, it is usually fine to ask. 

The internet is a rich source of social tips for any 

country you may visit (although also of misleading 

stereotypes). It can also be interesting to read social 

tips for your own country. The types of interaction 

that others find strange are very revealing of cultural 

difference, as in this passage: 

“Australian rules of social etiquette are a little 

different from most countries around the world. The 

rules do not relate to how a fork should be held, or 

who should be served first at a dinner table. Instead, 

most of Australia’s rules relate to expressing equality. 

Basically, as long as you appreciate that Australians 

want to be treated as equal irrespective of their social, 

racial or financial background, anything is acceptable.” 

“Displays of wealth may be seen as signs of superiority 

and frowned upon. Likewise, acceptance of generosity 

may be seen as a sign of bludging or inferiority. 

Likewise, it may be frowned upon. … because 

Australians see people as equal, they frequently 

offend international visitors who feel a more respectful 

attitude is warranted.” (Allo’ Expat Australia, 2010) 


CAN I DISCUSS LOCAL POLITICS? 

Asking questions about or commenting on 

controversial political issues within the host country 

can lead to awkwardness. 

If you are asked about politics while visiting another 

country but don’t feel comfortable or competent in 

answering, neutral answers such as ‘Yes, I’ve heard a 

lot about this, but I am not fully informed’ or ‘This is a 

controversial issue, it seems to be generating a lot of 

discussion’ are useful. 

However, you may decide to discuss political topics 

where people want to talk about them or you 

know the people well. Keep in mind any diplomatic 

sensitivities that relate to your position and those 

of your colleagues. You may want to make it clear 

that you are speaking as an individual rather than as 

a representative of the university when discussing 

politically sensitive issues. 

ARE THERE LANGUAGE CLASSES TO HELP WITH BASIC 

GREETINGS AND PHRASES? 

Wollongong academics teaching overseas for the 

first time will find it helpful to know a few phrases of 

a local language, enough to say hello and thank you, 

or to ask for help. Many people travel with a small 

phrase book. 

There is no expectation that UOW academics should 

learn local languages, however it can be rewarding 

and will be appreciated by students and colleagues. 

Learning a second language also helps build 

intercultural understanding (Olsen and Kroeger, 2001. 

If you are interested in learning a language: 

Self-study: UOW Wollongong Library resources 

include introductory audio CDs in Mandarin, 

Indonesian and other languages. Abbey’s Bookshop 

http://www.abbeys.com.au sells self-study resources 

across for a wider range of languages including 

Cantonese and Malay. The Internet has many free 

resources. 

Classes: WEA Illawarra offers courses in numerous 

languages including Indonesian, Mandarin and Thai. 

UOW offers introductory one-session subjects in 

Mandarin and Indonesian through the Language 

Centre at Wollongong campus. 



• How will you lead ongoing communication 

and relationship-building with partner 

institutions? 

• Do you and your staff understand social 

mores and how trust and rapport are 

developed in the partner culture? Where 

can you get advice or training if needed? 

• Are there ways of including transnational 

students in the broader UOW, through 

strategies such as: 

- encouraging subject coordinators to 

facilitate student communication across 

cohorts/locations? 

- offering students options to study for a 

session in Australia? 

• Are there ways to include transnational 

tutors in the broader UOW, through 

strategies such as: 

- adding them to research group email 

lists? 

- video-conferencing or podcasting selected 

events or development opportunities (eg 

Tips for Tutors workshops)? 

• How will you actively work against any 

tendency in your area to see the other 

institution or its students as peripheral? 


53

UOW LEARNING-TEACHING-RESEARCH NEXUS 

The learning-teaching-research nexus has many 

aspects. It can include research-led teaching; sharing 

your own discipline research with students; finding 

ways to include students in your research activities; 

supporting students to develop the skills to carry out 

their research; encouraging students in higher degree 

studies; carrying out research into your teaching; 

applying research about student learning to your 

teaching practice. 


You can anticipate that some of your tutors and 

co-teachers will be research students or early 

career academics with research interests. These 

interests may include research into teaching in the 

discipline area. 

You can expect that some of your students may be 

interested in hearing about your research, having 

a research experience and/or carrying out original 

research themselves. 

You can expect that most of your prior research and 

reading about teaching in higher education will be 

applicable to your transnational cohort. There is also 

a large body of literature on transnational teaching in 

higher education: see Bibliography on p 59. 

Depending on your research interests, you may 

look forward to research linkages or transnational 

research opportunities in your field. Ideally, the 

partnership between the two institutions will 

have been developed partly to encourage these 

connections. 


You can’t assume that researching your transnational 

teaching will involve the same processes as it 

might at UOW. Seek advice from colleagues at the 

transnational location about issues such as ethics, 

survey questions, data storage and other aspects of 

research involving students at that location. 

You can’t assume that offers to forge research links in 

your field will be immediately taken up. Time may be 

needed for each group to develop trust in the other’s 

commitment, as well as an understanding of the 

partner’s capacity and intent. 


FOR COURSE 

COORDINATORS 

• How will you build both research and 

teaching connections across institutions.? 

It is possible that teaching links alone may 

not give the depth of experience that the 

faculty and/or its partner institution is 

seeking from the transnational program. 

What capacities are your faculty and 

the partner institution seeking to build 

through this partnership? 

• How will you include transnational 

tutors within the research culture of the 

faculty? Have you made staff aware that 

the lack of connection between teaching 

and research for transnational staff has 

been a criticism by AUQA of transnational 

programs? 

• How will you incorporate the UOW 

Learning-Teaching-Research Nexus into 

course design? 

• Who will provide timely information about 

further study at UOW for students wishing 

to continue on to higher degrees? 

POLICY LINK: Do you know about the UOW 

Learning-Teaching Research Nexus? It contains a 

number of practical ideas. See 

http://www.uow.edu.au/cedir/nexus/ 


HOW CAN I CARRY OUT RESEARCH INTO MY 

TRANSNATIONAL TEACHING? 

WHAT ARE SOME STRATEGIES FOR BUILDING 

RESEARCH LINKS ACROSS INSTITUTIONS? 

There are many different and interesting 

approaches to researching learning and teaching 

in a transnational context. The UOW Academic 

Development Unit can offer advice. You can also 

count a research project towards the University 

Learning and Teaching Course (ULT) Unit 3. 

Transnational learning is a critical area for higher 

education providers. With much work still to be 

done and strong interest from academics looking to 

improve their cross-cultural success, there are also 

good opportunities for publishing. 

HOW CAN I INVOLVE TRANSNATIONAL STUDENTS IN MY 

RESEARCH? 

For ideas, see the Undergraduate Research web site 

at http://mq.edu.au/ltc/altc/ug_research/ 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Make contact with people with interests 

similar to your own. Find out which UOW 

research groups you can join and encourage 

others to join. 

Plan research-related meetings before 

visiting other UOW locations, so that there is 

time scheduled. 

Explore linkage grants schemes (contact the 

Research Services Office for details). 

Take an interest in co-teacher’s/tutors’ 

research; for example you could mentor them 

to understand the research culture and help 

them make connections with UOW research 

groups. 

“We are finding the program works better now that we are combining research 

into our program. We have a good name in Singapore because of the research, 

and we’ve achieved I 2 R recognition. Our research has helped us form a good 

relationship with the local university and we are achieving greater industry 

awareness. It’s also easier to get tutors now than in the early days. Ten of our PhD 

students are our local tutors.” 

— Willy Susilo, Course Coordinator, School of Computer Science and Software 

Engineering, Faculty of Informatics 


55

APPROACHES TO EVALUATION 


You can anticipate that a teaching survey will be 

available, wherever you are teaching, and that your 

tutors/co-teachers will be interested in evaluating 

their teaching approach. 

You can expect that your course coordinator will be 

available to comment on ideas for teaching strategies 

and give advice to help you solve problems or improve 

the subject, or will be prepared to point you in the 

right direction for appropriate support. 


You can’t assume that your teaching survey results 

from UOW partner institutions will be automatically 

provided to you. If surveys are conducted, ask for a 

copy of survey results. 

EVALUATING TRANSNATIONAL SUBJECTS 

Evaluation involves collecting information to reflect 

on and use to improve teaching or subjects for the 

future. It often involves teaching and subject surveys, 

but can include other sources of information, such as: 

●● 

how well the students have understood the 

core concepts of the subject 

●● 

comparisons of student work and marks – 

across cohorts and over time 

●● 

●● 

●● 

tutor and co-teacher feedback based on their 

classroom observations and interactions with 

students 

peer comments on subject design and 

curriculum, for example comments you seek 

out from the course coordinators, experienced 

colleagues, co-teachers and tutors 

feedback from students, including One Minute 

Feedback sheets, emailed comments, formal 

or informal discussions with the class etc. 

All of these sources of information can be tracked over 

time to observe improvements or emerging issues. 

Your educational teaching philosophy or model is 

invaluable when using feedback for reflection and 

improvement, and provides a conceptual framework to: 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

describe and analyse the learning and 

teaching experience 

develop a response to identified areas for 

improvement 

implement change, and 

carry out further evaluation. 



• Do you have multiple ways to ‘take the 

pulse’ of the program, such as maintaining 

communication with the partner course 

coordinator/manager, monitoring grades, 

communicating with subject coordinators 

and teachers at all loations, conducting exit 

surveys (sample survey is available from 

the Transnational Programs Unit)? 

• What protocols will be established for 

teachers to carry out teacher evaluations 

and to receive their results? 

Keeping the feedback data and documentation of your 

reflections can provide useful evidence for a future 

probation/ promotion application or a teaching award. 

Please contact the UOW Academic Development Unit 

for advice if needed. 

CAN I ORDER A UOW TEACHER EVALUATION OR UOW 

SUBJECT SURVEY? 

Yes. UOW Teacher Evaluations can be ordered for 

any location by any UOW teacher. Requests are 

made to the UOW Centre for Academic Systems and 

Resources (CASR). Be aware that they take a certain 

amount of time to prepare, so be sure to request the 

evaluation forms in advance. 

UOW Subject Evaluations are also usually available 

for any location by making a request to the Faculty 

Education Committee Chair. 

It is important to avoid over-surveying, so first ask 

your Program Coordinator/Director if the partner 

institution will also surveying. If so, you can request 

access to results and/or wait until the next semester 

to implement a UOW survey. 

CAN I ASK A TUTOR/CO-TEACHER TO SEND ME THEIR 

TEACHER SURVEY RESULTS? 

If you are the subject coordinator and you want to 

access a tutor’s survey results, you would need to 

first check with the Academic Program Coordinator/ 

Director and ask whether this is appropriate. At 

Wollongong, for example, UOW Teacher Evaluation 

results are confidential to the teacher surveyed 

and are only released to others with that teacher’s 

consent. 


DISCUSSING AND SHARING EXPERIENCES 


You can expect that many of your colleagues who 

teach transnationally will have had experiences and 

anxieties similar to yours. 

You can expect that some of your colleagues will be 

confident and positive about transnational teaching. 

They will see their students as wonderful students, 

they will believe their experience to be successful and 

they will be happy to share their teaching strategies 

with others. Conversely, some colleagues may be 

negative about the experience. 


You can’t assume that your first transnational 

experience will be a perfect one. People interviewed 

for this booklet have remarked that “the only 

way to learn to teach transnationally is to do it”. 

This implies a learning process with a gradually 

increasing understanding of the culture and learning 

environment. 

WHAT STRATEGIES CAN I USE TO CREATE GOOD 

PRACTICE SHARING OPPORTUNITIES? 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Subject or course coordinators can organise 

briefings, planning meetings, debriefings or 

staff development sessions. These usually 

include open discussion of issues, practice 

sharing and creative problem solving. 

Any interested teacher can also organise 

an informal discussion with colleagues who 

are teaching transnationally. Include the 

coordinator and administrator if possible – 

they can answer questions or take things 

further if needed. 

Practice-sharing between countries can 

greatly improve intercultural understanding. If 

time permits, arrange discussions of teaching 

and learning with transnational colleagues, or 

ask to observe their teaching during visits. 

Informal mentoring from experienced teachers is 

valuable, as it enables specific issues to be addressed 

and accommodates the diversity and rapidly changing 

circumstances that characterise transational 

education settings. In contrast, training workshops 

can seem ‘overly rudimentary and generalised’ 

(Gribble and Ziguras, 2003, p 209). 



• How will you arrange debriefing 

meetings or round tables for your subject 

coordinators, and others such as course 

administrators involved in the program? 

• Is it possible to set mentoring 

arrangements in place, where experienced 

transnational teachers support 

inexperienced colleagues? 

WHAT FORM OF DE-BRIEFING IS BEST TO HELP 

ACADEMICS SHARE EXPERIENCES? 

Debriefings can be an effective form of staff 

development for people teaching transnationally 

(Seah and Edwards, 2006, pp 303-4). 

●● 

Include time for everyone to speak and to 

share success stories – things that worked in 

the classroom, ways of involving co-teachers, 

assessment design and positive feedback. 

●● 

Include time for people to share anxieties – 

awkward situations, frustrations, moments of 

confusion and doubt. 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

●● 

Stay positive. Don’t be too hard on yourself or 

others if not everything went to plan. 

Avoid blame – whether of the administrators, 

the course coordinator, the program partner 

or the students. Focus on how to improve 

things. 

Invite people from other areas who might 

help with solutions. For example, the 

Transnational Education & Alliances Unit, 

Learning Development, or another faculty. 

It is about you. It’s your workload. Be clear 

about what you can and can’t do. 

It’s about the students. They are expecting 

to have a positive experience, and to succeed 

if they work hard. You can raise issues that 

affect them, including issues about course 

structures. Even if some questions may be 

outside your jurisdiction, concerns can be 

passed to the course coordinator for the next 

formal review. 


57

GOOD PRACTICE – FACULTY 

OF ARTS 

Debriefings were held each session of the 

transnational program in Hong Kong. All staff who 

were teaching transnationally were invited, as well as 

the Learning Developer supporting the program. The 

debriefings were led by the course coordinator, and 

people had opportunities to comment on program 

design, share experiences and raise questions and 

issues. 

GOOD PRACTICE – FACULTY 

OF HEALTH & BEHAVIOURAL 

SCIENCES 

An afternoon workshop is held each year for 

Wollongong academics and others who are working in 

the transnational program. Experienced transnational 

teachers are invited to give presentations, and 

there is plenty of time for questions and supportive 

discussion. New transnational teachers are 

particularly encouraged to attend. 


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Transnational Teaching at UOW

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