Journal Articles

Resistance and creativity in English reading lessons in Hong Kong

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Title:
Resistance and creativity in English reading lessons in Hong Kong
Authors:
- Lin, Angel Mei Yi Dept. of English, City University of Hong Kong
Source:
Language, Culture and Curriculum, 12(3), 285-296, 1999
Publisher:
Routledge
Year Published:
1999
Education Categories:
Keywords:
Cantonese Creativity Discourse Analysis English (Second Language) Foreign Countries Grade 8 Language of Instruction Reading Instruction Teacher Student Relationship
Region:
- Hong Kong
Period:
- 1997.7 onwards
Level:
- Secondary Education
Abstract:
In this paper, I analyse pupil-teacher dialogue, in a mixture of English and Cantonese, from a segment of a Form 2(Grade 8, 13-14yrs) English reading lesson. The lesson was video taped in a working-class school in Hong Kong, and the excerpt is taken from a larger corpus of similar lesson data videotaped in the class over three consecutive weeks. The analysis shows how these Cantonese children, with limited English, succeeded in subverting the reading lesson, which was based entirely on information extraction tasks.Instead, they negotiated their own preferred comic-style narratives by cleverly making use of the response slots of the IRF (Initiation-Response-Feedback) discourse format used in the lesson. Thus they achieved genuinely creative responses, in spite of the curriculum. The implications for teaching are discussed.
[Copyright of Language, Culture and Curriculum is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07908319908666585]
Language:
- English
Document Type:
Journal Articles
ISSN:
- 07908318
DOI:
- 10.1080/07908319908666585
Permalink:
https://bibliography.lib.eduhk.hk/en/bibs/085f0d9a
Entry Date:
2010-11-24