Teachers’ metacognitive understanding of teaching science in English as a medium of instruction classes

Abstract

Despite the increasing use of English as a medium of instruction (EMI), teachers who teach at EMI schools encounter significant challenges, such as difficulties in teaching content-subjects in English and students’ limited understanding of content presented in English. To examine the extent of these challenges, six early–full and 14 late–partial EMI science teachers from eight schools in Hong Kong were invited to participate in semi-structured interviews on the challenges they faced as teachers of EMI science subjects. A biographic approach was used to analyse the interviews, and the results showed that despite the metacognitive overlap between the two groups of teachers, there were noticeable differences in their pedagogical strategies. These findings suggest that the implementation of EMI instruction influences teachers’ metacognition and pedagogical practices. Teachers’ frequent use of Cantonese (L1) further suggest that English language skills are not as prioritised compared to the subject content. Further research is needed to investigate the complex and diverse factors that influence teachers’ metacognition under EMI contexts.

ABSTRACT IN CHINESE

儘管以英語作為教學媒介語(EMI)的課堂模式愈增, 但EMI學校的教師仍面臨重大挑戰, 例如教師難以用英文講解學科內容, 學生難以用英文理解學科內容。為深入探索EMI教師遇到的挑戰, 本研究針對香港八所EMI學校的六位“早期-全”和十四位 “晚期-半”EMI模式的科學教師, 採用半結構式訪談的方法了解其教學挑戰。使用傳記式方法分析採訪數據的結果表明, 兩組教師在元認知層面有相似之處, 但教學策略存在顯著差異。研究發現表明, “早期-全”和“晚期-半”的EMI教學模式都對教師的元認知和教學實踐造成了影響。教師在課堂上頻繁使用廣東話（L1）可表明相對於英語技能的培養, 其更重視學科內容的傳授。這些發現體現了教師的能動性, 並說明需要更多研究分析影響EMI教師元認知的復雜且多樣的因素。

English as a medium of instruction (EMI) means using English to teach content subjects, such as mathematics, history, and science, in contexts where English is widely used outside school such as Hong Kong. Previous studies suggested that EMI teachers may face many language-related challenges, including the lack of English classroom communicative skills and awareness of students’ English needs. This is especially the case for science subject teachers partly due to the complex science language (e.g. technical terms and passive voice). Meanwhile, different challenges, coping strategies, and classroom language practice were found between early-full and late-partial EMI secondary science teachers. To better understand their decision-making process during teaching, we looked into their teachers’ metacognition (i.e. how teachers understand, control, and monitor their thinking), which has been shown to influence the quality of teaching practice. After interviewing 20 teachers, we identified different metacognitive praxis in two types of EMI programs that emerged from the interaction of teachers’ knowledge of students, class tasks, and teaching strategies. Further EMI professional training can thus incorporate the framework of task knowledge, person knowledge, and strategy knowledge to help EMI teachers reflect on their pedagogical moves, especially the use of Cantonese.

Keywords:

• Metacognition
• EMI
• English-language education
• Hong Kong
• teaching strategies

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Source: Education Bureau, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Figures and Statistics on Secondary Education, http://www.edb.gov.hk/tc/about-edb/publications-stat/figures/sec.html.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jack Pun

Dr. Jack Pun is Assistant professor in the Department of English at the City University of Hong Kong. He completed his DPhil at the University of Oxford, which explored the teaching and learning process in EMI science classrooms, with a special focus on classroom interactions, use of codeswitching, and teachers’ and students’ views of EMI. His research interests lie in EMI and health communication. His research has been published in journals such as ELT Journal, Language Teaching, RELC Journa, Journal of English for Academic Purposes and International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism. He is associate editor of Journal of Research in Science & Technological Education, and published two books in EMI: Teaching and Learning in English Medium Instruction: An Introduction (with Jack C. Richards) and Research Methods in English Medium Instruction (with Samantha Curle) by Routledge.

Xuesong Gao

Xuesong Gao has a Phd and his affiliation is School of Education, University of New South Wales.