Conclusion

In general，Chinese language teaching in Australian universities has been developing well in the last a few decades.Currently it is facing an unprecedented challenge due to the rapid growing of Chinese heritage background students who are mixed with the local English speakers without any knowledge about the language in the classroom.By using a mixed research method of documentary search and qualitative investigation，this study has involved in these seven participating universities along the eastern coast of Australia.The research revealed that the current curriculum，pedagogy and assessment are problematic，consequently，a productive and supportive learning environment needs to be created for both Chinese heritage background students and non-Chinese background students.As a result，in this paper，the researchers have proposed a 4D model aiming to contribute to the innovation of existing Chinese language programs and the future development of Chinese language education in Australian tertiary education context.