Academic Experience of Malaysian Students in a Cross-national Tertiary Program in Malaysia:

Language Immersion amid the Sciences

Yusuke SAKURAI (櫻井 勇介 )

Japanese Associate Degree Program, UNISEL, Malaysia

Cairo University, Egypt

OUTLINE

• Background• Review of previous studies - Framework • Scope of the study• Methodology• Main claims - findings• Conclusion

BACKGROUND

BACKGROUNDJapanese Associate Degree Program (JAD)

Science & engineering

courses

PREVIOUS STUDIES

• International students studying in English speaking countrieso Novera (2004)No Hellstén and Prescotte (2004)Ho Alazzi & Chiodo (2006)Ao Leki (2007)L

• International students studying in Japano Nagano & Mine (2005)No Sekiguchi (2007)S

PREVIOUS STUDIES

• Issues in science & engineering courses – Malaysia and Japano Kitahama (1995, 1996)Ko Karino (2006)K

CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

1.Deviations from norms2.Noted/unnoted3.Evaluation4.Adjustment strategies5.Repetition

Fan (1994), Marriott (2004, 2005), Nemoto (2002), Neustupný (1985, 1994), Yamada (2003)(

THE STUDY

SCOPES OF THE STUDY

• What kind of difficulties did Malaysian students in the JAD perceive at the early stage of their academic study in Japanese?

• What adjustment strategies did the students employ to overcome their problems?

METHODOLOGY

• Students' diary entries

• Semi-structured interviews o Students (referring to their diary entries)o Science & engineering lecturers

PARTICIPANTS

• Five female (F1-F5) & Three males (M1-M3)

• University freshman level (Year 2)

• Japanese language proficiency – Intermediate (level3)

Main Claims - Findings

Main claims - Findings

• Lectures• Assigned worksheets• Experiments and

experiment report papers

• Textbooks and other reading resources

• Peer collaboration (in class & out of class)c

• web resources (e.g., Wikipedia, online chatting)c

• Lecturers & TAs in class

• Dictionaries

Need for extensive kanji learning

• Students gave up reading textbooks• Dictionaries – technical terminologies• No strong emphasis on student’s kanji acquisition

in JAD • Effects of struggles in kanji on academic study

have not been fully examined

漢字

Need for sufficient feedback

• No chance to note their linguistic deviations• Experiment report papers – every week• Little feedback (linguistic & sociolinguistic

deviations)d

Feedback

Need for re-consideration of academics and TAs' roles

• Confined within the classroom• Some students ended up with unsolved problems• Easy access to academics and TAs• Regular consultation hours & online

communication tools (e.g., email & BBS)c

In classOut of class

Autonomous learning

Need for re-consideration of necessary academic skills

• Course characteristics may influence students’ adjustment strategy use

• Chemistry ⇔ Other subjects

Academic Skills

CONCLUSION

For Further Studies

• Management processes in other academic activities in detail

• Who, what, why?• Need for longitudinal perspectives