Associate Professor Xiao (Hua) Wang graduated from Ocean University of China, and holds a PhD in Physical Oceanography from James Cook University in Australia. He is the Founding Director of the Sino-Australian Research Centre for Coastal Management, University of New South Wales, Australia, and an associate editor for Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science. He has been appointed as an Adjunct Professor at the Ocean University of China (OUC) and also at the Second Institute of Oceanography, SOA. He has over 20 years experience in both undergraduate and postgraduate teaching. His research concerns modelling of ocean circulation, sediment transport dynamics, and understanding of coastal management issues.
A/Prof Wang has long been active in the promotion of multiculturalism and a proud representative of the local Chinese community, holding the positions of President of the Federation of Chinese Community of Canberra Inc.; Assistant Secretary, Secretary, Treasurer and Interim President of the ACT Multicultural Council Inc.; Deputy Chair and Chair of the ACT Chief Minister’s Ministerial Advisory Council on Multicultural Affairs and the Honorary Chairman of the Australian Mantis Boxing Society.
A lifelong martial artist, A/Prof Wang is a practitioner of both Mantis Boxing and Taichi (Taiji Quan) and an enthusiastic promoter of the values of traditional Chinese culture. He wholeheartedly supports the aims of TMS and has the following words of encouragement for those willing to undertake the journey of self-discovery through the study of Taichi and mandarin language:
“The essence of Chinese Culture and Martial Arts reflects an ancient and splendid civilization with a 5000-year history. I congratulate the establishment of TMS to promote this culture and wish its success in all its endeavours.”
Stephen has had a long standing interest in Chinese culture and Chinese language, and has lived in both the Chinese mainland and in Taiwan. In spite of this, it was only in recent years that he had time to devote himself to language study. This he did through a combination of self study and participation in Mandarin courses at the Australian National University. Having previously acquired a Ph.D in educational psychology, Stephen had a strong understanding of efficient learning principles which he then adapted to the study of Chinese. As a result, he made rapid progress in his studies and recently obtained a ‘high distinction’ in ANU’s ‘Chinese 8’ course, the university’s most demanding Mandarin course.
Given his own experiences, Stephen has an excellent understanding of those areas of language learning most likely to cause problems, and the most effective means of overcoming these issues.
While there is no doubt that Mandarin is a very difficult language for most English speakers to master, Stephen has demonstrated that the use of proper teaching techniques can greatly speed up the learning process, so that even busy people who can only allocate a short amount of time to study, can still make very significant gains.