Dr. Lau Chi Hin, Department of Mathematics

Dr. Lau Chi Hin obtained his Ph.D. in Mathematics from The University of Hong Kong, and B.Sc. and M.Phil. in Mathematics from The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Dr. Lau joined the Department of Mathematics at The Chinese University of Hong Kong as a Lecturer in 2005. Dr. Lau has been teaching two courses on game theory, namely MATH4250 Game Theory, for mathematics major students, and UGEB2530 Games and Strategic Thinking, a University General Education course for almost ten years. Dr. Lau has designed a number of interesting games to facilitate students to study game theory.

Teaching Philosophy

I am truly humbled and honoured to receive the Exemplary Teaching Award in General Education. The award is a great recognition and encouragement to me. I must thank the Department of Mathematics for the nomination and my fellow colleagues for their support throughout these years.

Teaching UGEB2530 Games and Strategic Thinking is a big challenge for me because students have diversified interests and needs. There are some students who are lack of confidence in their ability. I recall that once there was a student who intended to drop out after three weeks of studies because she felt that her proficiency in mathematics was too weak to pass the course. I encouraged her to put more efforts towards the course and promised to help her overcome the difficulties. We agreed that she could drop the course if she still felt the frustration after the first test. She later came to my office regularly to seek for help. I listened to her and built up her confidence by showing that she was capable of using mathematics to solve problems. She had never mentioned dropping out again and eventually obtained an excellent grade in the course.

Game theory is a study of strategy and conflict, in which players make choices to maximize their own benefit. It has application from simple parlour games among friends, market competition between business companie,s to political conflicts between nations. In UGEB2530 Games and Strategic Thinking, students first learn basic concepts and ideas in game theory, and then practice what they have learned through interactive in-class games. At the end of the course, students are asked to apply the theory to study a topic they choose, e.g. trade war, intercompany rivalry, oil price, etc. The creativity of students always surprised me as they are competent to apply game theory in daily life like course enrolment, conflicts with other transportation passengers and social issues.

Most of my General Education students will not meet me again after completion of the course. As one of the most important goals of a General Education course is to broaden students’ horizon of studies, throughout the course, I try hard to facilitate students to build a good learning habit rather than just studying well in a single course and encourage them to read more by providing extra materials and topics for their further studies. I truly hope that my students would understand that life is a process of continuous learning.