Chia Suan Chong

Chia has contributed widely to ELT, teacher training, developing materials, writing articles on ELT and much else. In 2018 she published her book, Successful International Communication, and is the co-author of many others.

Chia believes that in today's world, HLT is about considering the psychology of the human beings in the classroom. Her views on English as a Lingua Franca, politeness, pragmatics and intercultural understanding, and student wellbeing have been explored in interviews, podcasts and articles where she advocates emphasising a holistic approach in language teaching and learning. She often deals with the affective facets of learning that have a significant impact on students’ learning. These include their motivation, their reasons for learning, the way they feel in the classroom, their awareness of where they are on their learning journey, and ultimately, their sense of achievement.

Chia is convinced of the central role played by wellbeing in learning and teaching. To make students feel they exist outside of and not just during the lesson, she believes that teachers need to set aside a certain amount of time each day to make students feel comfortable and safe in order to maintain the learning process. Teaching will be more effective if teachers first pay attention to those emotional aspects to inform their approach to teaching.

Creating effective intercultural communication in today's world is, without a doubt, her most significant contribution to HLT. Chia emphasises that most communication breakdowns do not happen because of language but rather because of a clash in the way that people from different cultural backgrounds interact. It is for this reason that she highlights the need to teach not only communication skills but also accommodation skills that enable students to be more flexible and empathetic in interactions that may not run as smoothly as they would have imagined.