Knowledge Transfer Project ‘Grammar Teaching in Language Education’ Made an Impact on Grammar Teaching from Local to Global

Traditional grammar teaching through habit formation is prevalent in many Hong Kong classrooms.  A number of school teachers still present learners with drills and uncontextualised isolated words and sentences.  Learners are asked to repeat and use forms in a ‘mechanical’ and ‘monotonous’ way.  The Knowledge Transfer (KT) Project ‘Grammar Teaching in Language Education’ led by Dr Lee Fung King Jackie from the Department of Linguistics and Modern Language Studies sought to provide useful grammar teaching resources for school teachers.  The project was concerned with how to conduct grammar teaching in a more effective way.  Apart from project leaders and project members composed by academic staff, six Year 4 Bachelor of Education (English Language) students also joined the team as student teachers.

Internet sharing generates international impacts
A total of 20 lesson plans on nine grammar topics, including phrasal verbs, articles, imperatives, gerunds and infinitives, reported speech, passive voice, etc., were developed for primary and secondary learners.  The materials have been uploaded onto the internet (http://corpus.eduhk.hk/) for public access. 　‘The project has made an impact on grammar teaching locally as well as internationally,’ said Dr Lee Fung King Jackie, Project Leader of this KT Project.  ‘Around 14,000 visits have been recorded so far.  The visitors are from different regions, including Hong Kong, Mainland China, Nigeria, South Africa, Belgium, Turkey, Fiji Island, Morocco, Chile, Spain, among others.’  

Visits to Thailand and Guangdong
Further, Dr Lee conducted a site visit of Sarasas Ektra School in Bangkok.  Selected lesson plans and materials developed by the project team were tried out.  Feedback from students and the participating Thai teachers was collected for further materials modification.  A sharing session was finally held in Hong Kong to disseminate the outcomes of the project to school teachers as well as to EdUHK staff and students. 

The project also helped promote contemporary grammar teaching approaches to teachers in Guangdong Province.  The project team, collaborating with the Department of Education of Guangdong, organised a 3-day visit in Foshan in April 2017.  ‘During the 3-day visit in Foshan, we gave talks on grammar teaching issues and shared our project outcomes with over 300 Guangdong teachers.  The team also visited two primary schools and had meetings with their English teaching teams to exchange pedagogical ideas and address their questions,’ said Dr Lee.  ‘We believe these meetings not only deepened mainland teachers’ understanding of contemporary English teaching but also broadened our student teachers' understanding of EFL development in Mainland China.’ 

The project team gives talks on grammar teaching issues and shares project outcomes with over 300 Guangdong teachers.

The project team visits Foshan Experimental School and Foshan Concordia International School, holding meetings with their English teaching teams.