Description

Apart from the general introdution of Humanities in the first week conducted by all activity teachers and Dean, plus a concluding lesson in the final week for students to present what they have learned in the subject and to understand various study pathways offered by the Faculty of Humanities, three main activities were assigned to students between Weeks 2-13 and all these activities were all inter-related to the subject objectives.

The following findings are summarised from the tailor-made SFQs (in collaboration with EDC) for individual activity:

Learning Activity 1: Global English and Global Chinese

In the SFQ statements for Part 2 a-i, over 50% and above students agreed that the activity had fulfilled the stated objectives. Students were positive about gaining a better understanding of the role of English as an international lingua france and also being able to learn things on their own.

Learning Activity 2: Appreciation of Chinese or Western Language Arts - Kunqu

In the SFQ statements for Part 2 a-i, over 50% and above students agreed and strongly agreed that the activity had fulfilled the stated objectives. Students were most positive about gaining an understanding about Chinese cultural values and identify, being able to learn things on their own, and participating activel in class.

Learning Activity 3: Confucius and Humanity

In the SFQ statements for Part a-n, over 50% and above students strongly agreed (except item k) that the activity had fulfilled the stated objectives. Students were positive about participating in class, thinking creatively, understanding more about how cultural institutions operate in real life, and understanding how cultural institutions bring Chinese culture to life.

Difficulties encountered

There were no major difficulties encountered. However, students were eager to learn more and to qacquire more in-depth knowledge in each themed activity.

Given the constrained class week distribution, activity teachers will review individual syllabus and workload in each activity before actual implementation in the first semester of 2012/13. The other challenge for the upcoming cofort will be the number of tutorials and its logistics arrangements for the subject because as out niche activities, we will continue to organise debate and Kunqu performance.

Although the validation panel concerned about the arrangement of Kunqu performance before the subject implementation in 2011/12, it is proven that the activity was strongly welcome by the majority of the class, as we can understand from the SFQs.

Self-evaluation

Judging from the experience of last year, the subject was delivered successfully. As shown in the overall student feedback, the majoirty of students found the subject useful and strongly agreed that the activities aligned with the subject objectives. The teaching team, in the meantime, will look into the workload issue addressed by the students.