On November 3rd, 2017, “Professional English for Education”, one of the English courses of the 2017 “Fonian” Class in the Faculty of Education started. Prof. G. Williamson (Bill) McDiarmid, who comes from Education Department of the University of Carolina at Chapel Hill, lectured this course. Prof. McDiarmid has been awarded the Distinguished Research Prize of the American Educational Research Association (AERA). Before the class began, Director Yang Fuyi from the International Affairs Division of Faculty of Education introduced Prof. McDiarmid.
Prof. G. Williamson (Bill) McDiarmid, from the University of Carolina at Chapel Hill
Yang Fuyi while introducing Prof. McDiarmid.
Through the interaction with students, Prof. McDiarmid gained a basic understanding of students’ expectations towards this course. In order to improve students’ communication and cooperation skills, he divided 16 postgraduates from the 2017 “Fonian” Class into 4 study groups, in which each student acted as chairman, recorder, speaker and timekeeper in turn. By combining individual learning and group cooperation, students were led to define what was “Professional English” and analyze the targeted readers, topics, author’s intentions and emotions of an article. Prof. McDiarmid’s humorous delivery and authentic English pronunciation encouraged students’ participation.
The “Professional English” course aims to lay a good English foundation for students, improve their English writing ability and expand their international view. In the following classes, Prof. McDiarmid will instruct students how to select topics for papers and write literature reviews.
