Past Recipients

The MLTAWA Hilde Dixon Award reflects the values exemplified by Hilde during her teaching career and was first presented to Fulvia Valvasori (Italian) in 2006. Consecutively this prestigious award has been bestowed on Lesley MacPherson (French) in 2007, Angela Signorile (Italian) 2008, Noburo Hagiwara (Japanese) 2009, Claire Leong (French) 2010, Susette Rose (Japanese) 2011, Anita Chong (Chinese) 2012, Kate Reitzenstein (Indonesian) 2013, Esther Blood (Italian) 2014. In 2015 the award was presented jointly to Bianca Petale (Italian) and Jieqi Zhang (Chinese) and in 2016 to Helen Kuehs (German). Nathan Harvey (Japanese) received the award in 2017 and Sue Cooper and Sandra Jackson, both teachers of Indonesian, were joint recipients in 2018. In 2019 the Hilde Dixon Award went to Bonnie Woo (Chinese). In 2020, Margot Whittle (Japanese) won the award, followed by Tanja Colgan (German) in 2021. In 2022 the Hilde Dixon award was won by Colleen Barclay (Italian) and Francesca Castleden (Italian).

2019 Recipient – Bonnie Woo

Bonnie is an exemplary and creative teacher of Chinese who works at the Methodist ladies’ College. She was one of the pioneer primary Chinese language teachers in WA and has worked extensively with the Department of Education for almost 20 years to develop resources and curriculum materials. She always seeks new ways to motivate students and is a strong advocate of intercultural language learning. Her contribution to the teaching and learning of Chinese has benefitted teachers all over Australia. She has been a mentor to many teachers of Chinese.

She is a long serving member of the Chinese language teachers association and has served in a variety of positions, including president and vice president, on the association committee. Her exemplary organisation, management, communication skills, and persevering approach to challenges is a motivating force to her association.

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