Tuesday, November 30, 2021

Closing the Gap on the Learning Curve: Tips from a Language Teacher studying at the HNC

Some of you might remember Rebecca from our post introducing the banwei. This week, one of our resident banwei, and first-year SAIS-Bologna student, gives us tips on how to close the gap on the learning curve during our first semester at the HNC. 

Before starting my studies at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center, I was pursuing my first master’s in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESOL) at California State University, Los Angeles. As teacher-in-training, I spent the first year of my program learning about the English language in detail: from the finer points of its grammar to the many ways one can pronounce “t” (of which there are over seven just in North American English alone). In my second year I learned more about using language in academia, teaching practicums, and how to teach language virtually and online, completing my own practicum in an online-hybrid course on writing. 

With HNC classes online thanks to the pandemic, my peers and I have found ourselves in an interesting language environment that goes as far as our computer screens. While HNC classes are not language classes (rather, they are content classes held in the target language), I find that there are still many language-related tips I have from being both a language teacher and learner that have helped me in my first month of studies that I’d like to share below.

 

Target language course tips:

  • Keywords and Repetition

HNC teachers (intentionally or unintentionally) set up their syllabus in a way that they are often going over related topics at the same time. For you (the learner) this is great because repetition is one of the best ways for you to retain the specialized vocabulary used in the program.

 

  • Put aside a lot of time to read

In your first language you may be able to get away with skimming the course readings 5 minutes before class (we’ve all done it), but you’ll find that trying such in your second language will be a test in futility. This is largely because the biggest repetition skill of all is reading. You start reading your first language as early as 3 years old and you devour hundreds of thousands and millions of words before you get to the point where you can skim for main ideas. With your HNC readings, make sure to give yourself adequate time (at least a few hours) to complete your target language readings. 

 

  • Focus on listening to and interacting with the lecture rather than note taking

When you’re in lecture for the first time, you may find yourself running a marathon trying to take notes on everything that the professor is saying, and thereby be caught off guard when the professor calls on you to answer a question. Class time is one of the few times you get to interact with your materials outside of homework so, outside of the professor highlighting that something is important or bringing up something that was unclear in the readings, engage with lecture. This way you can practice talking about your topics, which is different than reading, writing, or listening to them, and in some ways the hardest of the four skills.