Before coming to Edinburgh to study, 2022 graduate Xiaohuan worked as a second language teacher in South Korea and Shanghai for ten years. Here, she talks about her reasons for studying at Edinburgh and how she thinks the Master's will aid her career. 'It completely exceeded my expectations'The first reason [for choosing to study at Edinburgh] was that I had hit a bottleneck in my teaching and career and needed a Master’s degree to improve my qualifications and expand my knowledge. The second was because I wanted to experience the excellent education system my European and American students were receiving, as it would help me better understand the learners and education. In addition, the University of Edinburgh has an excellent reputation, and its one-year Master's programme was able to meet all of my needs very well. In fact, it completely exceeded my expectations. This degree programme is not just for teaching English. It allows me to use language teaching theories to reflect on and solve the problems I encounter in teaching Chinese. Also, many courses in language teaching are integrated with sociological theory. This has enabled me to think about students, education and society on a broader level.'The teachers are role models'All the courses and workshops are very well set up. The teachers are role models and are very good at encouraging students and supporting them in every way, whether physically or mentally.Many of the language teaching theories I have learnt here are quite advanced and have helped me broaden my horizons, think dialectically about language education and exercise my critical thinking. The teachers... are very good at encouraging students and supporting them in every way, whether physically or mentally. Source of Knowledge (SoK) and Conceptualising Research (CR) are my favourite courses, with SoK focusing on the research paradigms and philosophies and CR focusing on applications. The great thing about these two courses is that when I see an article, by analysing which paradigm it falls into, I would know where it sits in its academic field and where it has been and can be studied in the future. Also, through both courses, I realised that quite a lot of theories are not right or wrong, they are just interpreted from different perspectives, and as long as you can make it sound logical and have enough evidence to support it, it is convincing. I have also applied these philosophical principles to explain social phenomena and problems I encounter, as well as to contemplate my own life. They worked very well.Vital skills development[I developed] the ability to solve problems, conduct independent scientific research, find relevant papers, read academic papers in English quickly, write papers, and think critically.What I found most useful were the ideas and methods for doing research and solving problems I encountered in my teaching process.Regardless of previous teaching experience, acquiring the theory and skills of language teaching is very helpful in [preparing] you to be a good educator.'I improved my qualifications, so I can apply for more and better-paid jobs'Firstly, I improved my qualifications so that I could apply for more and better paid jobs. Secondly, I have learnt how to analyse and solve problems in my work by reading literature and doing teaching experiments. My experience of living in an intercultural context and my understanding of language education in different cultures have made me a global citizen who dares to challenge the more diverse possibilities. Thirdly, I am more sensitive to various phenomena in the teaching process and I will be able to notice and accumulate problems in teaching for further research in the future.Fourthly, I will be able to apply some practical principles about teaching and learning to my future classroom, to build a more positive relationship with students and to stimulate their autonomy in learning.Finally, I have experienced some difficulties during my year abroad, but more importantly, I have grown physically and mentally in the process of solving them.My experience of living in an intercultural context and my understanding of language education in different cultures have made me a global citizen who dares to challenge the more diverse possibilities.Want to learn more about our MSc Language Education programme?Our highly flexible programme encompasses all languages and is suitable for both experienced and novice language teachers. MSc Language Education Tags Language Education Publication date 21 Apr, 2026
