Highlights of the Biliterate and Trilingual Storytelling Competition 兩文三語故事演講比賽2018-2019活動花絮
Most people like listening to stories. They will naturally be familiar with the narrative conventions in their own language and may quickly transfer this familiarity into telling the same story spoken in another language. On 22 March 2019, the Centre for Language in Education (CLE) organized the Biliterate and Trilingual Storytelling Competition for all the EdUHK students. The theme for this event was In love with Shakespeare. The contestants had to tell one of the three stories written by the famous writer, William Shakespeare. Each story had to be told by using three languages: Cantonese, English and Putonghua, and there were six finalists in the competition.
The champion of this competition was Poon Wing Hay, who was a student studying Bachelor of Education (Hons) in English Language. She told the story, Romeo and Juliet in a confident manner. She was praised by the two adjudicators, Professor Dennis Cheng Kat Hung (Chair Professor of the Department of Literature and Cultural Studies) and Dr. Anisa Cheng (Lecturer of the Department of English Language Education) for her clear pronunciation, a high degree of fluency and vividness of non-verbal delivery. She was also proficient and skillful in letting the details of the story transit successfully across the three languages.
Ding Yidan, who was a student from the programme Bachelor of Social Science (Hons) in Global and Environmental Studies, won the first runner-up. She told the story, Hamlet, in a clear and expressive voice. In the English soliloquy, she pretended to be the Prince Hamlet, who was struggling with his ‘to be or not to be’ decision. Yidan also successfully told the story with a suitable pace and cadence.
The second runner-up of the competition was Meng Yaqiong, who was pursuing her master of arts degree programme in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). She selected the story, Merchant of Venice, for the competition. She told the story with a natural flow with a combination of gesture and pose, which defined the story as a depiction of an experience that contains plot, theme, and a point of view with a sense of audience.
The climax of the competition was naturally the announcement of the results. To most of the surprise of the audience, the International Tutors together with our EdUHK students had produced another climax to the event! They adapted one scene from Romeo and Juliet, in which the Capulet and Montague families were ready to spark off a fight. Their performance was full of humor, fun and wits. They made a debut when they even spoke Cantonese and Putonghua, which won a full applaud of the audience.
The competition ended with a thank you speech given by the Head of CLE, Dr. Pamela Leung Pui Wan, who sincerely expressed gratefulness to the adjudicators, members of the organizing committee, the CLE teachers and staff, the International Tutors, the student helpers and the audience. The competition has successfully brought out the message that promoting biliterate and trilingual abilities among EdUHK students is always the goal of CLE.