The Learner-centered Glocalization and Evidence-based Educational Decision-making on Glocalization: Two Issues on the Global Development of Chinese Language Teaching

Abstract

In the twentieth century, Chinese teachers and researchers in China primarily viewed Chinese language teaching as teaching the language to foreigners, specifically those learning Chinese within China. In the twenty-first century, with the rapid increase in the number of global Chinese language learners, Chinese teachers and researchers have begun to focus on global Chinese language learners, and to support and meet the needs of them. There are two critical issues in the global development of Chinese Language Teaching (CLT): the learner-centered glocalization and the evidence-based educational decision-making on how to glocalize. Learner-centered glocalization reflects the humanism of caring about learners all over the world, and educational decisions on how to glocalize need to be based on scientific evidence to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of teaching and education. In terms of the current state of the field, there is a growing consensus of common sense on the glocalization of Chinese language teaching materials and paradigm, and the training and education of local teachers, but the scientific educational decision-making based on evidence such as findings from neuroscience is more difficult to achieve, rarely even discussed. However, the latter is the key to scientific glocalization of this area in the future.