Pedagogy in Teaching through English Medium Instruction—Academics’ Cases in a Chinese University

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The submitted paper will be considered for a special issue of the journal at the discretion of the editor. The submitted paper meets the general expectations. I recommend publication of the paper with the following changes.

1. Content

I recommend that the author consider and communicate methodological and content/professional limitations in the paper.

In several cases the author uses literature that is 10 or more years old to support his claims. This is not a problem in itself, but it is essential that the revised version reflects recent (last 1-3 years) scientific advances in the field.

A search of three well-known scientific databases quickly identified relevant studies in reputable journals (Q1-Q3) on the subject, which the author does not discuss. I searched using the keywords "dialogue pedagogy", "social justice", "intellectual equity" and other keywords related to the topic of the study.

I recommend that the author read up on the latest findings and incorporate them into his work. 

2. Spelling

There are a number of (significant) grammatical and comma errors in the text. Some examples:

„some resesrchers argue, Whilst such lived, issues and concerns when L1 and L2 is the instructional language, transmission-oreinted, excellent Englisih proficiency, data signalling, For Freire, the central tenat of, promoting intellecual, in first language (Macaro,et al., 2018).”

The corrected version should be checked. I recommend proofreading and native language proofreading of the text.

3. References

References within the text are inconsistent. Sometimes there is a full stop before the page number, sometimes not. Sometimes there is a space, sometimes not.

There are formal errors in the references. For example, "Aguilar, M., and R. Rodríguez. 2012." does not have the year in brackets.

The title is sometimes in quotation marks and sometimes not. The format of the quotation marks also varies.

Several references do not include the DOI identifier. Where it is present, it is incorrect in several cases. Tutor-student interaction in seminar teaching: implications for professional development.         Active Learning in Higher Education, 17, 63-76. https://doi-org.libproxy.york.ac.uk/10.1177/1469787415616728    

In the corrected version, it is recommended that the reference list is either created manually without errors, or that a reference editor is used, in the format expected by the journal!

see above

Author Response

point 1: 

I recommend that the author consider and communicate methodological and content/professional limitations in the paper.

response 1:

Limitations of this study have been addressed. The section has been highlighted on page 16.

A key limitation of this research is that students’ learning styles or needs were not addressed when the EMI pedagogy was couched in a transmission-oriented approach. This facet of EMI pedagogical development is yet to be researched and reported in the field. The other limitation is that only a small number of lecturers participated in this research due to the screening nature. Future researchers may consider including data through focus group discussions from EMI students and expand such research to multiple universities’ cases.

point 2:

In several cases the author uses literature that is 10 or more years old to support his claims. This is not a problem in itself, but it is essential that the revised version reflects recent (last 1-3 years) scientific advances in the field.

A search of three well-known scientific databases quickly identified relevant studies in reputable journals (Q1-Q3) on the subject, which the author does not discuss. I searched using the keywords "dialogue pedagogy", "social justice", "intellectual equity" and other keywords related to the topic of the study.

I recommend that the author read up on the latest findings and incorporate them into his work.  

response2:

The most recent findings have been thoroughly reviewed and integrated into the work. The newly included literature is specifically highlighted in the references on pages 16 to 20.

e.g.

Doiz, A., & Lasagabaster, D. Analysing EMI Teachers’ and Students’ Talk About Language and Language Use. In D. Lasagabaster & A. Doiz (Eds.), Language Use in English-Medium Instruction at University: International Perspectives on Teacher Practice. New York: Routledge, 2021, 34–55.

Dang, T. K. A., Bonar, G. & Yao, J. Professional Learning for Educators Teaching in English-Medium-Instruction in Higher Education: A Systematic Review. Teaching in Higher Education. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1080/13562517 .2020.1863350.

Ismailov, M., Chiu, T., Dearden, J., Yamamoto, Y., & Djalilova, N. Challenges to interna- tionalisation of university programmes: A systematic thematic synthesis of qualitative research on learner-centred English Medium Instruction (EMI) pedagogy. Sustainability, 2021,13, 12642. https://doi.org/10.3390/su132212642

Wilkinson, R., & Gabriëls, R.(Eds.)  The Englishization of higher education in Europe. Amsterdam University Press. 2021. https://doi.org/10.5117/9789463727358

Sahan, K., Mikoljewska, A., Rose, H., et al. Global Mapping of English as a Medium of Instruction in Higher Education: 2020 and Beyond. London: British Council. 2021.

Sánchez-García, D. Mapping Lecture Questions and Their Pedagogical Goals in Spanish- and English-Medium Instruction. Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education, 2020,8(1), 28–52.https://doi.org/10.1075/jicb.18016.san

Laird-Gentle, A., Larkin, K., Kanasa, H. et al. Systematic quantitative literature review of the dialogic pedagogy literature. AJLL ,2023,46, 29–51. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44020-022-00029-9

point 3:

There are a number of (significant) grammatical and comma errors in the text. Some examples:

„some resesrchers argue, Whilst such lived, issues and concerns when L1 and L2 is the instructional language, transmission-oreinted, excellent Englisih proficiency, data signalling, For Freire, the central tenat of, promoting intellecual, in first language (Macaro,et al., 2018).”

The corrected version should be checked. I recommend proofreading and native language proofreading of the text.

response 3:

All the errors pointed out by the reviewer have been corrected.

For example,

Some researchers argue…(p.3)

Whilst such lived experiences are valuable, (p.2)

Issues and concerns when L1 and L2 are the instructional language, (p.3)

Transmission-oriented ,(p.4)

Excellent English proficiency, (p.4)

Data, signaling…(p.4)

The central tenet of…(p.5)

Promoting intellectual…(p.5)

In the first language…(p.4)

Furthermore, the entire article has been thoroughly re-edited for improvements. Please refer to the attachment.

point 4:

References within the text are inconsistent. Sometimes there is a full stop before the page number, sometimes not. Sometimes there is a space, sometimes not. 

There are formal errors in the references. For example, "Aguilar, M., and R. Rodríguez. 2012." does not have the year in brackets.

The title is sometimes in quotation marks and sometimes not. The format of the quotation marks also varies.

Several references do not include the DOI identifier. Where it is present, it is incorrect in several cases. Tutor-student interaction in seminar teaching: implications for professional development.         Active Learning in Higher Education, 17, 63-76. https://doi-org.libproxy.york.ac.uk/10.1177/1469787415616728    

In the corrected version, it is recommended that the reference list is either created manually without errors, or that a reference editor is used, in the format expected by the journal!

response 4:

Both the references in the text and in the list have been recreated manually. The references have been reformatted according to the journal's citation style. Please refer to the attachment.

Reviewer 2 Report

The research methods are presented in full and detailed so that it is very easy to understand.

The discussion of qualitative data needs to be clarified and deepened. Researchers also need to link the analysis and synthesis of their opinions with other relevant theories or research findings to make the findings of this study stronger and more convincing. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

point1:

The research methods are presented in full and detailed so that it is very easy to understand.

The discussion of qualitative data needs to be clarified and deepened. Researchers also need to link the analysis and synthesis of their opinions with other relevant theories or research findings to make the findings of this study stronger and more convincing. 

response2:

To link analysis with other relevant research findings is an insightful suggestion for this study. The discussion section has been refined as follows:

In this research, it is found all the lecturers, when using CMI, tended to be more monologic. This indicates that when language is not a barrier, the lecturers tended to dominate the classroom discourse more. This finding challenged Pun and Macaro [12], who suggested that teachers in EMI schools with a higher frequency of L1 usage tended to adopt more interactive teaching approaches.

In this research, the academic lecturers demonstrated little effort to engage students in both of their EMI and CMI classes. …. This finding contradicted the research conducted by Lo and Macaro [13],who claimed a notable reduction in the frequency of questioning when the language of instruction changed from Chinese to English.

This research, however, found that most of the lecturers’ questions were for classroom management and/or fact-checking instead of stimulating high-order thinking. The finding supported the research conducted by Sánchez-García [40], which suggested that there was a significantly higher number of questions related to classroom management and organization in the EMI class compared to the L1(Spanish) class.

To look into specific changes, please refer to the attachment on page 14.

Reviewer 3 Report

I am very glad to have read such a nice written manuscript that reports a study  that adopted methods including observations of EMI practice from the 92 researcher’s perspective and a stimulated recall interview with participants based on the filtering the issues elicited from the observational data. The aims of the research are clearly targeted, namely, to address the three main research gaps. The research was well conceptualised, with a very solid theoretical framework within which the collected data were analysed. I have really no issue with any part of the paper except for several minor typos that I am confident that the authors will be able to fix when they are given a chance to revise to resubmit it. For example, Line 94, 'when L1 and L2 is [are] the instructional language[languages]';  Dialogic pedagogy, or dialogic teaching, can be further clarified in the section when the relevant literature is reviewed. Does dialogic pedagogy or dialogic teaching show any advantage in the existing empirical literature? Currently, the authors only explained it with reference to how Alaxander expounds it as a theoretically grounded approach. It will be much better if more empirical studies were reviewed as a valid argument for the significance of this study.

Author Response

point1:

I am very glad to have read such a nice written manuscript that reports a study  that adopted methods including observations of EMI practice from the 92 researcher’s perspective and a stimulated recall interview with participants based on the filtering the issues elicited from the observational data. The aims of the research are clearly targeted, namely, to address the three main research gaps. The research was well conceptualised, with a very solid theoretical framework within which the collected data were analysed. I have really no issue with any part of the paper except for several minor typos that I am confident that the authors will be able to fix when they are given a chance to revise to resubmit it. For example, Line 94, 'when L1 and L2 is [are] the instructional language[languages]';  Dialogic pedagogy, or dialogic teaching, can be further clarified in the section when the relevant literature is reviewed. Does dialogic pedagogy or dialogic teaching show any advantage in the existing empirical literature? Currently, the authors only explained it with reference to how Alaxander expounds it as a theoretically grounded approach. It will be much better if more empirical studies were reviewed as a valid argument for the significance of this study.

response1:

This is a valuable suggestion as there is a scarcity of empirical studies focusing on dialogic pedagogy in EMI settings. This emphasizes the significance of the current study. The review has been incorporated in the following manner:

Recent studies exploring various applications of dialogic pedagogy have been limited in number. Jones and Chen [56] focused on how dialogic teaching principles can enhance the teaching of grammar. Adie et al. [57] analyzed teacher and student interactions in feedback conversations, while Nelson [58] emphasized the utilization of Educational Technology (EdTech) to create a deeper and broader dialogic space, thereby supporting students' development of their dialogic skills. It can be concluded that research specifically addressing dialogic pedagogy in education literature is relatively scarce [59], and even more so in the context of EMI settings.

To look into specific changes, please refer to the attachment on page 6.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

accept the amendments, recommend the publication of the study