Enhancing the Chinese writing skills of non-Chinese speaking students

Background A majority of the ethnic minority students living in Hong Kong acknowledge the importance of knowing the Chinese language for their future education and employment opportunities in Hong Kong. However, a survey revealed that 91% of respondents did not know how to write Chinese or considered their writing skills to be poor [1]. Another survey [2] found that 31% of those who had lived in Hong Kong for over 10 years still found the language barrier to be the greatest obstacle to finding a job. Despite acquiring basic spoken Cantonese, written Chinese was still difficult for them. Both reading and writing skills are often required for employment, but these skills are considered difficult to acquire in the current education system [3]. This study aimed to enhance the skills of non-Chinese speaking students (NCS), largely ethnic minority students, in writing Chinese.