Enhancing Research-Led Teaching & Learning for Postgraduate Research Students through Interdisciplinary Research

50,000

This postgraduate-centered, action research project aims at bringing up educational innovations in interdisciplinary research-led teaching in Schools of HSS and Design. Four faculty members from China Studies, Media and Communication and Architecture will collaborate to improve cross-disciplinary research-led teaching & learning for postgraduate research (PGR) students. We will enhance the research capabilities of PGR students by organizing reading groups and postgraduate workshops, and by conducting interdisciplinary research collaboration with them. We will improve our pedagogical and professional practices by evaluating students’ experiences and writing reflective papers on pedagogy. Our collaborative project outputs will include presentations at workshops and symposium, journal articles and an edited volume on our reflective educational experiences. The new pedagogical approaches gained from this project will be introduced to the Graduate School of XJTLU for training future PhD supervisors. The project is expected to contribute to research-led teaching & learning as well as interdisciplinary research collaboration in XJTLU.

Our TDF project Enhancing Research-Led Teaching & Learning for Postgraduate Research Students through Interdisciplinary Research has been successfully completed. During the 2 years of its duration, we have recruited 5 PGR students to join our interdisciplinary research projects and conduct research with our support. The students conducted field work, collected and analyzed data with us. We have organized one reading group and 2 interdisciplinary workshops. We have produced:
1)One journal article co-authored by investigators;
2)One edited volume with Palgrave Macmillan co-edited by investigators;
3)Two book chapters co-authored by investigators and PGR students;;
4) One monograph "Documenting Suzhou: An archive of the city’s life, space and Architecture through Interdisciplinary Teaching" (forthcoming with Palgrave Macmillan).