The challenge of academic writing for Chinese students within ...

this problem and reduce the gap between expectations and actualities, academic staff might
want to make their roles and responsibilities explicit to Chinese students; to avoid
disappointment and ensure positive experiences for the students, academic staff should have a
clear knowledge of support provision available at the institutional or departmental level, and
be ready to refer students to other support services. It is advisable that academic staff set
limits to the extent of their involvement and make referrals once they feel the further
involvement would be beyond their management (Ho, 2001).
Awareness of different learning and teaching styles
Having considered some major needs of Chinese students and how appropriate practices can
be developed to address these needs, developing awareness of Chinese education styles and
students‘ learning styles is discussed in this section. As with the needs of Chinese students,
many issues related to Chinese students‘ learning and teaching styles are culturally
conditioned, so to facilitate the understanding of their way of learning, and development of
culturally sensitive pedagogy, staff training on Chinese cultural values and traditions is
necessary. There is a need for professional academics to ‗recognise the limitations of their
own culturally conditioned responses and to engage with students from [other] cultural
background, to negotiate meanings and classroom norms which make learning accessible to
all‘ (Fischer, 2008, p.17).
The challenge of classroom interaction was one of the major issues emerging from the data
analysis. The participants said that they tended to shy away from participating in seminar and
tutorial discussions. Recognising language problems as one affecting factor, the participants
stressed the influence of their prior learning experiences. In China lecturers dominate
classroom activities with minimal questioning or discussions by students (Chan, 1999); in
contrast, the UK HE promotes active classroom interaction. In Chinese classroom the
teacher-centred approach predominates, and students are mainly taught in a didactic way,
unlike in the UK where a more student-centred classroom atmosphere prevails with the
intention of encouraging independent learning. The participants pointed out they were
accustomed to the learning setting where teachers do the talking and students listening. From
the cultural perspective, the Chinese tradition respects the hierarchical relations in the formal
class situation (Ho, 2001), in which teachers are the authority and students are seldom
encouraged to question and challenge teachers.
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