-- Highlights of Online Teaching by College English No.2 Teaching and Research Office

(Correspondent Xue Jvhua, Zhang Yunxia) Upon receiving the notification of making sure effective learning among students while staying at home from the university, faculties from the 2nd Division of the College English Department devoted themselves to online teaching preparation immediately. Owing to a host of teaching tasks for the 2nd Division of the College English Department this semester, like Cross-Cultural Communication, Practical English Writing, Academic English Reading and Practical Style Translation for 2018 class A&B and College English 4 for class C, Advanced English Reading for School of Economics and Management and courses for special classes such as experimental classes of School of Earth Sciences and School of Earth Resources, ethnic classes and ESS, teachers felt unprecedented pressure, partly owing to their lack of experience of online teaching as well.

Since February 1st, joint efforts were made my all relevant teachers under the guidance and organization of Prof. Xue Jvhua, the head of the Division. Targeted preparations for each course to be taught online were thus kicked off, with effective online discussion in each QQ teaching group.

Developing online teaching plan came as the first item on the agenda of online teaching. After discussing with teachers on QQ platform, the teaching pattern integrating online teaching, self-learning, assignment completion and answering questions online was adopted. Online teaching platform to be utilized are diversified, including QQ group, Rain Class and Superstar; lecturing online provide all form of related resources, including audio, video, text, PPT and MOOC courses are also recommended. Assignment correcting and answering were conducted through QQ or iwrite system.

Online teaching technology learning is also a priority. According to the notification released by the Office of Division of Academic affairs of CUG, “Superstar”--based online training was organized timely and effectively by the Department. Moreover, teachers also shared their experience of operating Apps Rain Classroom, Tencent Conference, Ding Talk and screen sharing via QQ and so forth. The moment of seeing each other's smiling faces on the screen throughout the online discussion, teachers found themselves much relieved. Teachers were encouraged and motived because of their whole-hearted devotion in this process,

After that, course outline and organization pattern were soon settled through discussion in the QQ teaching group. Joint preparation of teaching plan and course slides formulation were carried out effectively. Moreover, teachers searched and selected MOOC courses as supplements to different courses taught online. The reading teaching group formulated the teaching proposal for their first online lecture and shared it with the other groups.

In order to make sure the successful implementation of online teaching plan, the teachers checked teaching schedules, platforms and tools repeatedly.

With t joint efforts from everyone, teaching tasks of the 2^nd Division of the College English Department were carried out in an orderly fashion and had been subject to supervision by CUG. During the past few weeks, several teachers have noticed the participation of supervisors in their class, .Teachers on one hand, were worried about a possible technical problem during the course ; on the other hand, teachers hope our work can stand the test and be recognized by supervisors. In the end, the supervisors’ positive response proved that they did a great job!

In March 11st, 5 unexpected “students” showed up on teacher Zhang Yunxia’s online class, including Prof. Lai Xvlong, the Vice President of CUG at Wuhan; Prof. Liu Shiyong, Secretary of School of Marxism, Mr. Zhang Jianhe, the Deputy Division Chief, Mr. Zhang Fan, Section Chief of the Office of Academic affairs of CUG, and Prof. Yang Hongyan, the Deputy Dean of School of Foreign Languages. Teacher Zhang Yunxia started with her lecture on Translation of Practical Texts, and she focused on news translation with an air of composure.

Firstly, Miss Zhang selected two latest news from China Daily and VOA : President Xi Visits Hospital In Wuhan and Wuhan expects to close all makeshift hospitals around March 10 as the lead-in. Such inspiring news brought confidence for students to coming back to Wuhan and to CUG. New selected are not only highly relevant with the subject of this lecture but also demonstrates the timeliness nature of news material. Through the explanation of the new words, acronyms, proper nouns and rhetorical devices from two news samples, Teacher Zhang naturally led to the focus of this lecture: the characteristics of news vocabulary and translation methods.

When explaining the methods and techniques of news translation, the practice examples of short sentences designed by Teacher Zhang, for instance, glossary of the novel coronavirus and CUG Jurassic BBS, very close to students' daily life, so that the examples can arouse resonance and inspire students' interests and enthusiasm in translation study. In the process of article translation practices, the news she selected was “Wuhan Founds the First Mountaineering University”, of which everyone in CUG is proud. Through guidance, questioning and answering, analysis and discussion, combined with relevant strategies, methods and techniques of practical style translation taught in earlier classes, Teacher Zhang explained key points of this news article and had students practiced. Although face-to-face communication was unavailable at that stage, effective interaction between Miss Zhang and students was realized and students showed great interests and enthusiasm for this course.

By applying theory to practice, the class was well prepared and very informative. Teachere Zhang Yunxia highlighted style-related features and practicability, and strengthened knowledge learning via translation practice. The class won applause from the five special guests. Vice President Lai highly praised the lecture during the class: “Great job! Interaction has been smooth, and active students are doing a good great!”

When the news that Teacher Zhang’s lecture won the recognition from university leaders, all the faculty members were encouraged, who gave thumbs up for Teacher Zhang Yunxia. The whole department will, as always, be fully devoted to online teaching organization and epidemic-fighting campaign. Grasses are changing into green and trees are sprouting, which sends the message that spring is around the corner. We believe that we will win the battle against the epidemic and meet our students in the campus and classrooms soon!