• Introduction
  
  
• Finalists
  
  
• Mr Dean Fisher
  
  
• Ms Sandy Wong
  
  
• Dr Paul Shin
  
  
• Dr Isabel Yan
  
  
• Dr Paul Lam
  
  
• Dr Ping Kwong Kam
  
  
• Dr Tom Vinaimont
  
  
• Challenges of 21^st Century
  
  
• About TEA
  
  
• Special Thanks
  
  

 

About me

My name is Dean Fisher.  I'm from the UK and I've been working in the English Language Centre at CityU for almost ten years.  I love my job and I am passionate about teaching and also about how people learn. As a teacher I aspire to inspire my students to become better learners, better thinkers and ultimately to provide my students with some of the major skills they will need to take control of their future.

My teaching philosophy

My teaching philosophy is based around four fundamental ideas: that teaching and learning should be student centred; that learning can only take place if the students are motivated; that teaching should involve the nurturing of autonomy and the skills required to become an independent learner and, finally, that teaching and learning should promote the enhancement of thinking skills such as creative and critical thinking, problem solving, decision making, systemic thinking, discussion skills and so on.  To remind myself of the importance of these ideas to my teaching, I picture three interlocking circles with 'Students' at the centre and each of the three circles representing one of the other ideas.  Visually they all overlap with each other portraying their strong interrelationship in my teaching.

Particular teaching experiences & strategies to share

For the past year I have been CityU's coordinator for the Hong Kong Inter-university English Language ePortfolio.  This is an educational initiative funded by the University Grant's Committee to better prepare students for employment and for the more technologically-oriented and changing world in which we live.  I am a firm believer in the power of ePortfolios to enhance learning and with the valuable help of the EDO I have been leading a team of ELC teachers and lecturers and professors within City University to research and explore how the ePortfolio can best be used by our students as a tool to enhance their learning.

In the ELC I have worked with teachers to make the ePortfolio an integral part, and an assessed component, of three of our courses: Spoken Language, Foundation English and Presentation Skills.  I also recently wrote an eight-hour conceptual ePortfolio workshop open each semester to all CityU students to help them understand the importance and effectiveness of ePortfolios for learning and employment so as to be able to create first-rate portfolios of their own.

The ePortfolio fits very neatly into my philosophy of teaching, because it is student-centred in the way that it allows me to see my students as individuals with individual needs; the use of video, graphics, sound and pictures brings a motivating creative dimension to my students' learning; it encourages my students to take responsibility for their learning, to record and to reflect on feedback and to become more independent and, finally, the ePortfolio automatically promotes the use of a variety of valuable thinking skills .

Special thanks

I would like to warmly thank:

• members of the ELC Staffing Committee and my Foundation English course students for nominating me for this award;
• the following students and colleagues for their kind words in the video: Tung, Vera, Cora, Joy, Jean Young, Christoph Hafner, Priscilla Jones and Jenny Leung;
• my ePortfolio workshop students who took part in the filming;
• Hokling Cheung and Vicky Chan of the Education Development Office for their help and support in our collaborative ePortfolio project;
• all those colleagues who wrote letters in support of my nomination.