Innovative Pedagogy in Chinese Language Education

Dr. Zhan Fangqiong received her Ph.D. from Stanford University, USA, in Chinese linguistics, and her research interests include Chinese language acquisition and pedagogy, contrastive studies of English and Chinese and diachronic construction grammar. Dr. Zhan has been working on the application of cognitive linguistics to Chinese language teaching and learning, as well as on the application of the theoretical framework of diachronic construction grammar to the Chinese languages. Her research contributes a more detailed understanding of how Chinese languages evolve over time. Her publications, being the single or first author, occur in a few high-level peer-reviewed journals including the Journal of Pragmatics, Chinese Language and Discourse, Lingua, Diachronica, Journal of Historical Pragmatics, Studies in Language, Functions of Language, Language and Linguistics and Journal of Chinese Linguistics.

Associate Professor (A/P) Aw Guat Poh has taught at the Division of Chinese Language and Culture, Asian Languages and Cultures Academic Group, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, since 2000. She is currently the assistant head (Chinese) for the academic group. She specialized in the teaching and learning of Chinese as a second language, teachers' professional development, children literature as well as Singapore Chinese Women's literature. A/P Aw is an active practitioner in Singapore who works together with teachers from preschools, primary and secondary schools in the teaching and research of Chinese language. She collaborates with the Singapore Ministry of Education and stakeholders and acts as consultant for many professional organizations locally and internationally. Her contribution has been well-recognized, both locally and overseas. Besides teaching and research, A/P Aw is also a Chinese writer who writes short stories, prose and children's literature.