An overview is presented of a three-year project aimed at helping Chinese language teachers in Taiwan refine ways that Chinese, an ideographic language that differs markedly from alphabetic English, is taught in primary schools. Guided by university staff in Taiwan, Hong Kong University and a Taiwanese non-government social enterprise, 20 experienced Taiwanese Chinese language teachers visited Hong Kong, observed literacy lessons, held in-depth discussions with principals and teachers, and engaged in seminars that helped them reflect on ways to modify practice in Taiwan. Back in Taiwan, they tried out techniques witnessed in Hong Kong, shared their experiences with colleagues in and beyond their own school, and evaluated their relevance for language teaching in Taiwan. Experiences were exchanged via practical demonstrations of techniques, video-recordings of lessons, accounts of new ways to teach Chinese, interviews and progress reports on an Internet forum. The outcomes are an example of positive teacher change.
[Copyright of Teacher Development is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13664530.2012.722439]

This article documents the authors' reflections on a teacher professional development programme conducted in 38 Hong Kong primary schools on the teaching of English through Process Drama. The authors draw upon the views of school principals, subject panel head teachers, English teachers, students and parents in focus group interviews to examine the learning and teaching experiences at the heart of the Programme. These reflections focus on how Process Drama can enhance second language acquisition by accommodating more affective factors in learning, by stressing creativity and by shifting the didactic discourse in the classroom to one that is more authentic and less threatening and which encourages increased amounts of student talk. The authors describe how, based on the focus group interview data, a piece of Verbatim Theatre was created and used as a stimulus to elicit deeper reflective responses to the Programme. They also reflect upon the level of understanding of Process Drama's complex pedagogy and artistry demonstrated by those teachers new to it and consider what further research might help the long-term implementation of drama in Hong Kong classrooms.
[Copyright of Roeper Review is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13569783.2011.617099]

This paper argues that, despite government support in financial and contractual matters, ongoing problems of retention of Native-speaking English Teachers (NETs) in Hong Kong stem, in part, from problems of cross-cultural adjustment. The paper reports a small-scale qualitative investigation into the experiences of NETS in Hong Kong and finds problems of cross-cultural adjustment of the NETs themselves, the host schools and the government's induction practices. The paper reports a diversity of problems in cross-cultural adjustment and a variety of ways in which NETs handled them. The argument is made for increased and differentiated attention to be given to the cross-cultural adjustment of NETs, for greater social networking and for reducing the isolation and cross-cultural stresses that they experience. It is suggested that this might attenuate the problem of high NET turnover in Hong Kong.
[Copyright of Roeper Review is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03055698.2010.539667]

This study uses discourse theory to explore the teaching identities of a group of mainland Chinese pre-service teachers of English in a teacher education institute in Hong Kong. Exploring how the teaching identities are discursively constructed, the study reaches two conclusions. First, that the pre-service teachers negotiate their own positions within multiple positionings from peers, students on the teaching practicum and the broader enterprise of professional language teaching in Hong Kong

Elements of popular culture, in particular the film and song genres, have already been integrated into the senior curriculum in Hong Kong. While academic researchers advocate the inclusion of online social networking and video gaming as curricular alternatives to connect learners to digital literacy practices, its reception by teachers has yet to be fully explored. This paper reports on an action research carried out by 34 Hong Kong English teachers on video gaming and social networking. Though the teachers believed their students frequently engaged in such popular activities, they had strong reservations concerning classroom application, in particular the values of online gaming and the dangers of online social networking. Through a survey, interviews, lived experience, online journal entries and responses and reflection, these teachers explored the two popular cultural practices for personal experience, pedagogical potential and professional development. The teachers' own private engagement with such popular cultural activities did not necessarily favour pedagogical consideration. The paper also discusses the pedagogical implications of seeking alternative popular cultural activities for language learning and teacher training.
[Copyright of Pedagogies: An International Journal is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1554480X.2011.554625]