Chinese Language Teachers’ Beliefs and Experiences in Denmark

Book excerpt: This book presents recent advances in foreign language education as well as recent work on Chinese language education and CFL teacher development in international contexts. It also reports the results of three qualitative studies on the experiences and beliefs of teachers of the Chinese language in in Denmark. There are rising concerns over quality issues in both Chinese language education and teacher development in Scandinavian countries and worldwide, broadly due to China’s rapid growth and the increasing worldwide popularity of Chinese. What CFL (Chinese as a Foreign Language) teachers believe in teaching and experience in the intercultural context have proposed new questions and issues. The book addresses issues and topics such as teacher beliefs about Chinese language teaching, factors shaping teacher beliefs, the teaching of Chinese by both native and non-native teachers, Chinese language and culture teaching, intercultural encounters and challenges, etc. It provides both macro- and micro-level insights into the key issues and challenges in the development of Chinese language teachers in Denmark and the Scandinavian region. Taking the perspectives of Chinese language teachers’ beliefs and experiences, this book reveals teachers’ beliefs about their roles, objectives, and ways of teaching at the micro level. It also discusses the macro-level factors that promote or impede the adaptation of native-speaking teachers of Chinese and the development of Chinese-language education in this Nordic country. It will be of interest to teachers, teacher educators, administrators of Chinese as a foreign language, and researchers concerned with foreign language education in an intercultural context.