Equipo de Trabajo

While  a  growing  body  of  scholarship  focuses  on  diversity  and  teaching  in  HE   (for  example,  Ryan,  2013;  Clifford  &  Montgomery,  2011;  Sovic  &  Blythman,   2013;  Carroll  and  Ryan,  2005),  the  connections  with  internationalisation  are   seldom  made  explicit.  

One  of  the  notable  exceptions  is  a  report  produced  for  New  Zealand  Ministry   of  Education  by  Ho,  Holmes  and  Cooper  (2004)  which  reviews  literature  on   the  internationalisation  of  pedagogy  as  well  as  issues  around  ‘managing   cultural  diversity’  and  underlines  the  cultural  influences  on  educational   traditions  and  on  teaching,  learning  and  educational  practices.  The  report   highlights  the  necessity  to  challenge  the  deficit  approach  to  international   students  and  the  importance  of  valuing  and  celebrating  cultural  difference  in   education.  It  presents  one  of  its  goals  as  the  development  of  ‘culturally  

responsive’  spaces  that  question  and  challenge  the  assumptions  and  attitudes   of  both  educators  and  students  towards  culture  and  knowledge.  What  is  

more,  it  argues  for  the  importance  of  spaces  which  accommodate  multiple   perspectives  and  voices  as  well  as  questioning  prior  assumptions  about   teaching  and  learning  in  creating  an  inclusive  environment,  and  examining   the  behaviours  of  teachers  and  teacher  language  (Ho,  Holmes  and  Cooper,   2004).  

A  substantial  body  of  research  concentrates  on  how  international  students   approach  learning  (for  example,  Biggs,  1999;  Cortazzi  and  Jin,  2006;  De  Vita,   2001,  Sovic  and  Blythman,  2013;  Ryan,  2013).  There  is  striking  tendency  to   address  ‘problems’  and  students’  ‘need  for  help’  when  adapting  to  HE   teaching  and  learning  methods  and  an  imbedded  assumption  that  students   cannot  adjust  to  the  new  learning  context  because  of  overdependence  on   approaches  borrowed  from  their  cultures.  Spurling  (2006),  in  particular,   notes  the  popularity  of  the  ‘deficit’  model,  but  also  the  failure  to  offer   solutions,  especially  in  the  context  of  HE.  Montgomery  (2010,  31-­‐36)  

provides  an  overview  of  relevant  issues  including  deep  and  surface  learning,   memorisation  and  critical  thinking,  and  criticality  and  plagiarism.  

Deep  and  surface  learning  

In  the  1970s,  a  new  notion  of  ‘surface’  and  ‘deep’  approaches  to  learning  was   developed  by  Ference  Morton,  using  a  naturalistic  approach  and  qualitative   interviews  with  students.  Morton  distinguishes  three  approaches  to  learning   based  on  the  reading  academic  articles  (Marton,  Hounsell  and  Entwistle,   1997:  19):  a  deep,  transformative  approach,  a  surface,  reproductive  

approach,  and  a  strategic,  organised  approach  aimed  at  achieving  the  highest   marks.  The  study  recognizes  that  the  relationship  between  the  learning   process  and  outcomes  is  a  complex  one,  as  controlling  learning  contexts  to   produce  deep  approaches  does  not  always  produce  the  intended  outcomes.   Haggis  (2003),  too,  considers  that  learning  is  indeed  a  multifaceted  

interaction  of  wide-­‐ranging  factors,  many  of  which  are  grounded  in  students’   previous  learning  contexts  and  concludes  that  the  notion  that  the  way  

students  learn  can  be  easily  changed  is  an  oversimplification      

Memorisation  and  critical  thinking    

Confucius  Heritage  Cultures  (CHC)  strongly  emphasize  the  role  of  

memorisation  in  learning,  a  notion  often  associated  witha  ‘surface’  approach.   However,  as  Montgomery  (2010,  34)  points  out,  “CHC  may  play  a  part  in   some  students’  approaches  to  learning,  but  this  does  not  mean  that  students   will  uniformly  approach  their  learning  in  HE  according  to  this  influence   alone”.  In  addition,  in  Marton  and  Trigwell’s  (2000)  study,  high  achieving   Chinese  students  were  reported  using  memorisation  as  a  ‘deep’  approach’.   Tang  (1994)  also  observes  that  there  is  a  potential  link  between  memory  and   a  more  critical  understanding  of  ‘deep’  learning.  These  findings  confirm  that   the  theories  of  deep  and  surface  learning  should  not  be  seen  as  polar  

concepts  but  rather  a  part  of  a  bigger,  more  complex  picture  of  how   international  students  learn.  

Criticality  and  plagiarism  

Spurling  (2006)  challenges  the  assumption  that  international  students  are   somehow  unable  to  apply  critical  thinking  because  of  their  educational   background.  Other  research  carried  out  by  Vandermensbrugghe  (2004)   concludes  that  the  definition  of  criticality  is  not  evenly  understood  by  staff,   let  alone  international  students.  By  the  same  token,  Turner  (2006)  reports   Chinese  students’  claims  that  they  were  unfairly  accused  of  having  limited   learning  capacity  because  of  their  ‘inability  to  be  critical’.  Turner  (2006,  3)   argues  that  definitions  of  critical  thinking  stem  from  cultural  traditions,  not   from  “universal  measures  of  higher  education”  and  that  assumptions  about   difficulties  on  the  part  of  students  are  often  due  to  a  lack  clarity  in  the   assessment  criteria.    

Plagiarism  is  another  common  theme  in  the  literature.  Some  studies  seem  to   imply  that  the  international  students’  prior  learning  experience  make  them   somehow  more  prone  to  being  accused  of  plagiarising.  McLean  and  Ransom   (2005)  argue  that  plagiarism  or  ‘cheating’  should  be  also  recognised  as  a   ‘culturally  determined  concept’.  The  ‘guidelines’  are  context-­‐dependent  and   not  always  made  precise  and,  in  HE,  the  ‘rules’  of  writing  and  assessment  are  

not  automatically  understood  by  home  students,  let  alone  international   learners.    

A  wide  range  of  literature  considers  international  students’  challenges  with   plagiarism  (Leask,  2004).  As  Montgomery  (2010,  35)  observes,  this  appears   to  be  “reinforced  by  recent  educational  press  coverage  of  the  issue  of  

plagiarism  and  cheating,  spreading  an  almost  endemic  panic  about  the  issue   of  plagiarism  across  the  Higher  Education  sector.”  Again,  there  seems  to  be   no  evidence  that  it  is  more  typical  for  international  students  to  plagiarise   than  home  students.  The  research  carried  out  by  Barrett  and  Malcolm  (2006)   indicates  quite  the  opposite  –  it  was  home  students  who  were  more  likely  to   ‘commit  the  sin’  of  plagiarism.  Caruna  (2006,  63)  also  provides  support  for   the  work  of  Barrett  and  Malcolm  by  contradicting  popular  “cultural  

expectations  of  plagiarism”,