Scrutiny of Global Citizenship in Chinese Elementary School English Textbooks and Teachers’ Practices during COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Problems associated with globalisation have been exacerbated with the COVID-19 pandemic, which made us more aware of the interconnected nature of the world. Global pandemic requires global solutions, and the educational system should look beyond the confines of national borders to advocate for Global Citizenship Education (GCE) to provide such solutions. However, it is still underexplored that to what extent Chinese elementary school English textbooks reflect the notion of GCE and how they guide teachers’ practices particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. To address the gap, a mixed-method study was conducted to scrutinize two versions of Chinese elementary school English textbooks and explore teachers’ practices, so as to contribute to China’s context-specific GCE endeavours through English language teaching (ELT). The findings demonstrate that the themes of GCE are embedded in two versions of textbooks to varying degrees and with unbalanced distribution. Some elements that do not comply with the proposition of GCE and the excluded themes may impede the full realisation of global citizenship values. Interview results show that teacher training is urgently needed to integrate GCE into interdisciplinary subjects and raise teachers’ critical awareness to challenge the prevailing routines in ELT. The findings could also provide some pedagogical enlightenment for teachers’ practices during the COVID-19 pandemic.