Meifang Zhuo

2025 Global English Education China Assembly July 2025

Why has this activity been useful for your development or career progression and how this will impact your current or future work?

My PhD research project is about supporting high school English teachers in China for their professional development and wellbeing. Although I have disseminated my research findings before, none of this happens in China. Therefore, attending the conference in China to share my research has helped to increase the visibility of my research but also enhanced the local impact. Instead of changing my approach, attending this conference has helped me to reaffirm my belief in my approach to supporting language teacher development. The world is changing fast, and each year there seems to be a new trend coming up which has been reflected in the big number of topics related to AI. But I believe we should stick to something fundamental and support teachers to have that peaceful mindset and essential skills/knowledge to cope with the changing world.

Have you learnt new concepts or tools outside of your usual discipline?

I attended a keynote given by Prof. Brian Parkinson from the University of Oxford, who discusses the effects of social appraisal from the perspective of experimental psychology and how a positive teacher contributes to students’ positive learning. Through his talk, I understand more about how our emotions can affect other people and overall social relations. I can also relate this to my proposal for supporting language teacher development and wellbeing and why it is so important to emphasize teacher-student relationships in the classroom.

Did you identify any opportunities for future collaboration?

One professor leads a team to support schoolteacher professional development, and I am keen to work with her soon to promote my idea of supporting language teacher development and also learn from her way of working. We have managed to exchange contacts at the conference.

Some pictures from the day