Teaching French as a Second Language to Chinese students: Instructional staff adaptation and intercultural competence development

This case study is an analysis of second language instructors' processes of adaptation to Chinese students at a small French University. More precisely, in this qualitative case study, it will be shown that the instructional staff's adaptation to an unfamiliar work environment and student population contributed to the development of their intercultural competence. Moreover, it will be argued that such competence was not developed to its full potential. Finally, we offer recommendations for teacher education programs at the end of the article. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.