English-Medium Instruction in Chinese Universities ─ Perspectives, discourse and evaluation

This edited book is about the rationale, practice and classroom implementation of English-medium instruction courses in Chinese universities. It specifically focuses on classroom discourse analysis across different disciplines and settings. The main themes of this book are: describing the state educational policies toward English-medium instruction at the tertiary level; distinguishing English-medium instruction from mainstream foreign language learning; analyzing curricula and discourse at the classroom level and evaluating the learning effectiveness of these courses. This book covers the widespread implementation of English-medium courses in China across different disciplines, and it provides a window for researchers and practitioners from other parts of the world to see the curriculum design, lesson planning, discourse features and teacher-student interaction in English-medium classrooms in China. Contributors to this volume consists of a panel of highly respected researchers in the fields of bilingual education, English-medium instruction, classroom discourse analysis and language program evaluation.

Chapters include,

1. Balance of Content and Language in English-Medium Instruction Classrooms
2. English-Medium Instruction in a Math Classroom: An Observation Study of Classroom Discourse
3. Asking and answering questions in EMI classrooms: What is the Cognitive and Syntactic Complexity Level?

Jing Zhao is a Lecturer at Sun Yat-sen University, China and Visiting Research Scholar at Harvard Graduate School of Education, USA (2014-2015). She earned her doctoral degree in Curriculum and Instruction, specializing in English as a Second Language, from Texas A&M University. Dr. Zhao’s research interests include second language acquisition, effectiveness of various bilingual programs, and ESL/EFL teacher development. Her work appeared in Annals of Dyslexia, International Journal of Bilingualism and System.

L. Quentin Dixon is an Associate Professor in the Department of Teaching, Learning and Culture, Texas A&M University. Dr. Dixon's research interests focus on the language and literacy development of bilinguals, and in using rigorous quantitative research methods to study educational questions. Dr. Dixon has published in leading journals such as Review of Educational Research, Journal of Research in Reading, and Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology.