Knowledge Transfer

Corpus linguistics has been identified as a strategic area to be focused on since the establishment of the LML department in 2012. Several colleagues have developed various corpora (http://corpus.eduhk.hk) in different languages (ie English, Chinese, Cantonese and Japanese), most of which being specialised corpora with a clear focus on certain specific language features. For example, the Chinese-English Parallel Corpora provide a good venue for examining literature translation from English to Chinese or vice versa; the English for Academic Purpose corpora (EAP) are used to improve students’ academic writing skills; the Spoken Corpora and Asian Corpus of English (ACE) can be used to improve students’ pronunciation; the Multilingual Parallel Corpora and Cantonese Movie Corpora provide learners with a multimodal approach to language learning. The research on these corpora has been fruitful and resulted in several projects and publications. Being aware of the good potential of the education values of these corpora, a number of colleagues from LML proposed a collective KTP in order to transfer the expertise and knowledge acquired by the department to school teachers in both Hong Kong and elsewhere (mainland China or other countries/regions). The project aims to achieve the following objectives:

1. To introduce corpus linguistic approach to school teachers as a framework for understanding learners' language;
2. To equip school teachers with skills and tools in developing their own corpus-based teaching/learning materials; and
3. To create corpus-based teaching & learning resources for school teachers.

The project focuses on encouraging EdUHK students’ integration into regional education communities by enriching their learning experience outside the Hong Kong context. A group of student teachers at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels will be given opportunities to apply their pedagogical learning to real practice. Their task is to develop resources for the teaching of readers, grammar, vocabulary and phonics. Selected materials will be tried out in Nanhai Experimental Primary School, Foshan. Another feature of the project is the inclusion of some past project team members, who are now school teachers in Hong Kong, as peer observers in Foshan. The professional dialogues between the school teachers of the two regions, student teachers, and academics of EdUHK will encourage the innovative and critical thinking of all the parties involved.

The project is a continuation of the Knowledge Transfer Project entitled “Grammar Teaching Resources for School Teachers”, conducted in 2014–15. In this second phase, a group of Year 4 BEd(EL) students will be given opportunities to apply their pedagogical learning to real practice. Their task is to evaluate how grammar is presented and practised in some contemporary grammar books. The project team will meet regularly to discuss how to adapt the textbook materials and design their own instructional materials, which will be uploaded on a website for public sharing. The project also aims to promote contemporary grammar teaching methods to teachers in neighbouring regions. A seminar will be conducted by the project team in Foshan, China, and lesson tryouts will be conducted in Sarasas Ektra School, Bangkok.

This KT project has the focused area on “Hong Kong cultural heritage”. It converts some of the findings of the PI's research project on the development of Cantonese into a “digital language museum” to highlight some interesting but unnoticeable linguistic changes of the Cantonese language over the past 60 years. The language items displayed in the digital museum include vocabulary and grammatical structures. Some of these features are displayed together with the selected video segments of the Cantonese movies. The language museum is an initiative to document the Cantonese language with authentic materials and also to introduce to the public the relevant socio-cultural issues of old Hong Kong.

The concern of this project is how to teach grammar in an effective way. It aims to develop a website which provides useful grammar teaching resources for primary and secondary school teachers. Another aim is to give BEd(EL) students opportunities to apply their pedagogical learning to real practice. The task of the participating student teachers is to evaluate the lesson plans and teaching materials collected from their classmates. Under the guidance of the project supervisor, the project team will meet regularly to discuss how to revise the original plans and the materials. Ongoing discussion with the project supervisor and other team members will allow the student teachers to have a better understanding of the pedagogical principles learnt, and to develop enhanced lesson planning and materials development skills. School tryouts will be conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the outcomes.

The KT project aims to:

1. Introduce and showcase the various linguistic corpora and relevant corpus linguistic tools developed at LML, and their potential values in text-based humanity research;
2. Introduce to the target participants the relevant methodology and challenges in undertaking corpus-based research, especially on the Chinese language; and
3. Enhance professional development of target participants by elevating their sensitiveness and awareness in using authentic and natural language materials in humanity research.

1. To enhance preservice teachers’ materials development skills, teaching skills and their abilities to discuss and evaluate reading materials through non-formal learning.
2. To increase the awareness of student teachers, children’s book writers and educators regarding how best to approach culture education to prepare learners for intercultural citizenship in the globalised world.
3. To heighten gender awareness among student teachers, children’s book writers and educators in an attempt to create a more gender-equal society.

To develop an interactive training package with the following goals:

1. To introduce knowledge of acoustic phonetics to practicing speech therapists in mainland China for handling Putonghua-speaking children with speech sound disorders.
2. To equip speech therapists with skills in using instrumental aids for acoustic analysis that will enhance their clinical judgement in performing speech sound disorder diagnoses and intervention plans in treating Putonghua-speaking children.