Doing Refective Practice in English Language Teaching 9781032014579, 9781032013633, 9781003178729

Table of contents :
Cover Page
Half Title Page
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Contents Page
Preface Page
1 Invitation
1. Are You a Reflective Teacher?
2 Why Reflect?
2. Taking Stock
3. Life History
4. Personal Critical Incidents
5. Feelings About Teaching
6. Teacher Burnout
7. Ten Questions
8. Reflective Dispositions
9. Recognizing a Reflective Teacher
3 What Is Reflective Practice?
10. Routines
11. Bandwagons
12. Reflection as Process
13. Reflection as Action
14. Reflection as Product
15. Reflection as Community
16. Reflection as Moral Agency
17. Reflectivity
18. Dimensions of Reflection
19. Levels of Reflection
20. Spirals of Reflection
21. Typologies of Reflection
22. Reflecting on Philosophy
23. Reflecting on Principles
24. Reflecting on Theory
25. Reflecting on Practice
26. Reflecting Beyond Practice
27. Tailoring Reflection
28. Some Cautions
4 Written Reflections
29. Writing
30. Why Write a Teaching Journal?
31. Starting a Teaching Journal
32. Types of Teaching Journals
33. Audience
34. Using Teaching Journals Effectively
35. Teacher Narrative Writing
36. Teacher Research Writing
37. Technology and Writing
5 Reflecting in Groups
38. Dialogue
39. Group Reflections
40. Type of Group
41. Setting Up Groups
42. Roles and Responsibilities
43. Modes of Reflection
44. Communicating and Interacting in Groups
45. Trust
46. Time
47. Sustaining the Group
48. Evaluating the Group
49. Resisting Plateauing With Groups
6 Classroom Observations
50. Delight or Despair?
51. Purpose
52. Qualitative Observations
53. Self-Observation
54. Critical Friends
55. Recording
56. Category Instruments
57. Focus
58. Teacher Action Zone
59. Bumpy Moments
60. Classroom Critical Incidents
61. Etiquette
7 Lesson Planning
62. Why Plan?
63. Approaches
64. Creating a Plan
65. Planning and Textbooks
66. Implementing the Plan
67. Evaluating the Plan
8 Reflecting on Teaching and Assessing the Skills
68. Reflecting on Teaching Writing
69. Reflecting on Assessing Writing
70. Reflecting on Teaching Speaking
71. Reflecting on Assessing Speaking
72. Reflecting on Teaching Reading
73. Reflecting on Assessing Reading
74. Reflecting on Teaching Listening
75. Reflecting on Assessing Listening
76. Reflecting on Teaching Grammar
77. Reflecting on Assessing Grammar
9 Classroom Management
78. Manager or Conductor?
79. Organizing the Class
80. Space and Time
81. Diversity
82. Mixed Abilities
83. Learning Styles
84. Classroom Climate
85. Maintaining Order
86. The Back-Row Distracter
87. The Nonparticipant
88. The Overexuberant Student
89. Expecting the Unexpected
10 Classroom Communication
90. Classroom Communication
91. Classroom Interaction
92. Teacher Questions
93. Feedback
94. Grouping
95. Non-Verbal Communication
96. Classroom Communicative and Interactional Competence
97. Collecting Data
11 Teaching Portfolios
98. Reflection and Direction
99. Types
100. Contents
101. Subject-Matter Knowledge
102. Planning, Delivery and Assessing Instruction
103. Professionalism
104. Reflection
12 Practice Teaching
105. Microteaching
106. Field Placement
107. Teaching Context
108. Cooperating Teachers
109. Identity Development
110. Discourse Development
111. Evaluation
13 First Years
112. Transition
113. Your Classroom
114. Your Colleagues
115. The ‘Shock’
116. Overcoming the Imposter Syndrome
117. Developmental Stages
118. Getting Support
119. Professional Roles
120. Reflection as Way of Life
References
Index

Citation preview

Doing Refective Practice in English Language Teaching

This practical and engaging book introduces readers to refective practice in English language teaching. Assuming no background knowledge, Thomas S. C. Farrell clearly and accessibly walks through ways that teachers can integrate and implement refective practice in the classroom and in other contexts to beneft their teaching and their own professional development. Each chapter covers an important dimension of refective practice and features many ready-to-use activities that are designed to empower teachers and allow them to overcome challenges they’ll face throughout their careers. Covering many types of refection and the many purposes it serves, this book addresses written refection, lesson planning, classroom observation, classroom management, group communication and more. This resource is ideal for preservice and early career language teachers and is an important supplement to courses in language education and applied linguistics programs. Thomas S. C. Farrell is Professor of Applied Linguistics at Brock University, Canada.

ESL & Applied Linguistics Professional Series Eli Hinkel, Series Editor

Conversation Analysis and Second Language Pedagogy A Guide for ESL/EFL Teachers, 2nd Edition Jean Wong, Hansun Zhang Waring English L2 Reading Getting to the Bottom, 4th Edition Barbara M. Birch and Sean Fulop Teaching ESL/EFL Reading and Writing, 2nd Edition I.S.P. Nation and John Macalister Reconciling Translingualism and Second Language Writing Tony Silva and Zhaozhe Wang Teaching ESL/EFL Listening and Speaking, 2nd Edition Jonathan M. Newton and I.S.P. Nation Storytelling in Multilingual Interaction A Conversation Analysis Perspective Jean Wong and Hansun Zhang Waring Teaching and Learning Second Language Listening, 2nd Edition Metacognition in Action Christine C. M. Goh and Larry Vandergrift Foundational Principles of Task-Based Language Teaching Martin East What English Language Teachers Need to Know Volume III Designing Curriculum, 2nd Edition MaryAnn Christison and Denise E. Murray Doing Refective Practice in English Language Teaching 120 Activities for Effective Classroom Management, Lesson Planning, and Professional Development Thomas S. C. Farrell For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/ ESL-Applied-Linguistics-Professional-Series/book-series/LEAESLALP

Doing Refective Practice in English Language Teaching 120 Activities for Effective Classroom Management, Lesson Planning, and Professional Development

Thomas S. C. Farrell

Cover image: © Getty Images First published 2022 by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 and by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2022 Thomas S. C. Farrell The right of Thomas S. C. Farrell to be identifed as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identifcation and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN: 978-1-032-01457-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-01363-3 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-17872-9 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729 Typeset in Optima by Apex CoVantage, LLC

Contents

Preface

x

1 Invitation 1. Are You a Refective Teacher? 8

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2 Why Refect? 2. Taking Stock 12 3. Life History 14 4. Personal Critical Incidents 16 5. Feelings About Teaching 17 6. Teacher Burnout 20 7. Ten Questions 22 8. Refective Dispositions 23 9. Recognizing a Refective Teacher 25

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3 What Is Refective Practice? 10. Routines 28 11. Bandwagons 29 12. Refection as Process 30 13. Refection as Action 32 14. Refection as Product 33 15. Refection as Community 34 16. Refection as Moral Agency 35 17. Refectivity 36 18. Dimensions of Refection 37 19. Levels of Refection 38 20. Spirals of Refection 41 21. Typologies of Refection 41

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Contents

22. Refecting on Philosophy 43 23. Refecting on Principles 44 24. Refecting on Theory 45 25. Refecting on Practice 46 26. Refecting Beyond Practice 47 27. Tailoring Refection 48 28. Some Cautions 48 4 Written Refections 29. Writing 51 30. Why Write a Teaching Journal? 52 31. Starting a Teaching Journal 54 32. Types of Teaching Journals 55 33. Audience 56 34. Using Teaching Journals Effectively 57 35. Teacher Narrative Writing 59 36. Teacher Research Writing 60 37. Technology and Writing 62

50

5 Refecting in Groups 38. Dialogue 65 39. Group Refections 66 40. Type of Group 67 41. Setting Up Groups 68 42. Roles and Responsibilities 69 43. Modes of Refection 70 44. Communicating and Interacting in Groups 71 45. Trust 72 46. Time 73 47. Sustaining the Group 74 48. Evaluating the Group 75 49. Resisting Plateauing With Groups 75

64

6 Classroom Observations 50. Delight or Despair? 79 51. Purpose 81 52. Qualitative Observations 82 53. Self-Observation 83 54. Critical Friends 84

78

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Contents

55. Recording 85 56. Category Instruments 87 57. Focus 89 58. Teacher Action Zone 90 59. Bumpy Moments 91 60. Classroom Critical Incidents 92 61. Etiquette 93 7 Lesson Planning 62. Why Plan? 97 63. Approaches 98 64. Creating a Plan 99 65. Planning and Textbooks 103 66. Implementing the Plan 105 67. Evaluating the Plan 107

96

8 Refecting on Teaching and Assessing the Skills 68. Refecting on Teaching Writing 113 69. Refecting on Assessing Writing 114 70. Refecting on Teaching Speaking 115 71. Refecting on Assessing Speaking 117 72. Refecting on Teaching Reading 117 73. Refecting on Assessing Reading 119 74. Refecting on Teaching Listening 120 75. Refecting on Assessing Listening 122 76. Refecting on Teaching Grammar 122 77. Refecting on Assessing Grammar 124

112

9 Classroom Management 78. Manager or Conductor? 128 79. Organizing the Class 129 80. Space and Time 130 81. Diversity 132 82. Mixed Abilities 133 83. Learning Styles 134 84. Classroom Climate 135 85. Maintaining Order 136 86. The Back-Row Distracter 137 87. The Nonparticipant 138

127

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Contents

88. The Overexuberant Student 139 89. Expecting the Unexpected 139 10 Classroom Communication 90. Classroom Communication 143 91. Classroom Interaction 145 92. Teacher Questions 147 93. Feedback 149 94. Grouping 152 95. Non-Verbal Communication 154 96. Classroom Communicative and Interactional Competence 155 97. Collecting Data 157

142

11 Teaching Portfolios 98. Refection and Direction 161 99. Types 162 100. Contents 164 101. Subject-Matter Knowledge 166 102. Planning, Delivery and Assessing Instruction 167 103. Professionalism 169 104. Refection 170

160

12 Practice Teaching 105. Microteaching 174 106. Field Placement 175 107. Teaching Context 176 108. Cooperating Teachers 179 109. Identity Development 180 110. Discourse Development 182 111. Evaluation 183

173

13 First Years 112. Transition 187 113. Your Classroom 188 114. Your Colleagues 189 115. The ‘Shock’ 190 116. Overcoming the Imposter Syndrome 191

186

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117. Developmental Stages 192 118. Getting Support 194 119. Professional Roles 197 120. Refection as Way of Life 198 References Index

202 207

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Preface

Doing Refective Practice: 120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers is a practical, activity-focused book that shows learner language teachers, early career language teachers and experienced language teachers how to engage with refective practice. The book is not a theoretically focused book about refective practice nor is it a research focused book about refective practice. Rather, this book engages language teachers in the process of doing refection as they examine all facets of their practice through the 120 refection activities placed throughout the book. Refective practice generally means that language teachers at all levels explore their philosophy, principles, theory, practice and critical refection beyond practice so that they can grow professionally throughout their careers. Doing Refective Practice: 120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers is written deliberately in a relatively informal style, which follows the stated aim of making it more accessible—and less intimidating—for learner language teachers as well as novice, early career language teachers who might be daunted by the prospect of a more overtly theoretical approach to refective practice. This also makes it easier for more experienced language teachers and/or teacher educators/trainers to dip in and out of the refection activities depending on their levels of interest in a particular topic. In addition, I deliberately do not include many references in each chapter except, when necessary, as interested readers can consult the other books (see later) if they want to engage in theoretical or research related discussions about refective practice. Thus, this book is practicable and assessable to all language teachers and, as a result, purposefully different to other more conceptual-focused books, but at the same time is complementary to these books. In fact, not many publications on language x

Preface

teacher refections exist that offer practical guidance for language teachers wishing to do refective practice. The book consists of thirteen chapters. Each chapter presents an important dimension of refective practice related to language teaching and begins by listing activities that are covered, followed by a brief introduction and different refection activities that form the basis for refection. Each chapter ends with a conclusion. The refection activities in each chapter follow a logical progress within the chapter and address specifc issues related to the chapter heading and as explained in the brief introduction. Chapter 1, Invitation, outlines how refective practice in this book encompasses a holistic approach that not only focuses on the intellectual, cognitive and meta-cognitive aspects of practice to which many other approaches are limited, but also the spiritual, moral and emotional noncognitive aspects of refection that acknowledges the inner life of teachers. The chapter also outlines a case study of a language teacher ‘doing’ refection to showcase the power of the process for language teachers. The chapter includes one refection activity. Chapter 2, Why Refect? outlines and discusses the importance of refection and offers eight refection activities for language teachers to refect on: Taking Stock, Life History, Personal Critical Incidents, Feelings About Teaching, Teacher Burnout, Ten Questions, Refective Dispositions and Recognizing a Refective Teacher. Chapter 3, What is Refective Practice? provides specifc details about what refective practice is along with some cautions. This chapter provides nineteen different refection activities for language teachers to consider that include Routines, Bandwagons, Refection as Process, Refection as Action, Refection as Product, Refection as Community, Refection as Moral Agency, Refectivity, Dimensions of Refection, Levels of Refection, Spirals of Refection, Typologies of Refection, Refecting on Philosophy, Refecting on Principles, Refecting on Theory, Refecting on Practice, Refecting on Beyond Practice, Tailoring Refection and Some Cautions. Chapter 4, Written Refections, provides details about how language teachers can engage in written refections and includes nine refection activities such as Writing, Why Write a Teaching Journal?, Starting a Teaching Journal, Types of Teaching Journals, Audience, Using Teaching Journals Effectively, Teacher Narrative Writing, Teacher Research Writing and Technology and Writing. xi

Preface

Chapter 5, Refecting in Groups, provides details about how language teachers can engage in dialogic refection and includes twelve refection activities such as Dialogue, Group Refections, Type of Group, Setting up Group, Roles and Responsibilities, Modes of Refection, Communicating and Interacting in Groups, Trust, Time, Sustaining the Group, Evaluating the Group and Resisting Plateauing with Groups. Chapter 6, Classroom Observations, outlines and discusses how language teachers can engage in classroom observations to facilitate their refections and includes twelve refection activities such as Delight or Despair?, Purpose, Qualitative Observations, Self-Observation, Critical Friends, Recording, Category Instruments, Focus, Teacher Action Zone, Bumpy Moments, Classroom Critical Incidents and Etiquette. Chapter 7, Lesson Planning, outlines and discusses lesson planning for language teachers and includes six refection activities such as Why Plan?, Approaches, Creating A Plan, Planning and Textbooks, Implementing the Plan and Evaluating the Plan. Chapter 8, Teaching and Assessing the Skills, outlines and discusses how language teachers can refect on their teaching and assessment of fve main skill areas related to language learning and has ten refection activities such as Refecting on Teaching Writing, Refecting on Assessing Writing, Refecting on Teaching Speaking, Refecting on Assessing Speaking, Refecting on Teaching Reading, Refecting on Assessing Reading, Refecting on Teaching Listening, Refecting on Assessing Listening, Refecting on Teaching Grammar and Refecting on Assessing Grammar. Chapter 9, Classroom Management, outlines and discusses different facets of classroom management for language teachers and includes twelve refection activities such as Manager or Conductor?, Organizing the Class, Space and Time, Diversity, Mixed Abilities, Learning Styles, Classroom Climate, Maintaining Order, Back-Row Distracter, Nonparticipant, Overexuberant Student and Expect the Unexpected. Chapter 10, Classroom Communication, outlines and discusses how language teachers can refect on different aspects of their classroom communications and interactions and includes eight refection activities such as Classroom Communication, Classroom Interaction, Teacher Questions, Feedback, Grouping, Non-Verbal Communication, Classroom Communicative and Interactional Competence and Collecting Data. Chapter 11, Teaching Portfolios, outlines and discusses how language teachers can refect with the use of teaching portfolios and includes seven xii

Preface

refection activities such as Refection and Direction; Types; Contents; Subject-Matter Knowledge; Planning, Delivery, Assessing Instruction; Professionalism and Refection. Chapter 12, Practice Teaching, outlines and discusses how language teachers can refect during their initial teaching practice and includes seven refection activities such as Microteaching, Field Placement, Context, Cooperating Teachers, Identity Development, Discourse Development and Evaluation. The fnal chapter, Chapter 13, First Years, outlines and discusses how language teachers can refect as they transition from their teacher education programs to their frst years of teaching. It includes nine refection activities such as Transition, Your Classroom, Your Colleagues, The ‘Shock’, Overcoming the Imposter Syndrome, Developmental Stages, Getting Support, Professional Roles and Refection as Way of Life. The book is written in a clear and accessible style and assumes no previous background in language teacher education or refection. Thus, introductory courses as well as graduate courses will be able to use the book with ease. Native-speaker language teachers and non-native-speaker language teachers alike will be able to interact with the contents of the book because of its accessible writing style and comprehensible vocabulary. The frst six chapters that introduce various important activities directly related to the topic of refection and how it can be implemented. The remaining chapters can be considered self-contained discussions of important aspects related to language teaching, learning and assessment and can be used in different ways depending on the focus of the particular course learner language teachers and/or early career language teachers’ levels of interest. Each chapter has practical refection activities in appropriate places where readers can pause to refect themselves on what the research has revealed and where they stand on the particular issue. These practical activities syntheses the research on refective practice generated in the previous books so that language teachers (I use the term ‘language teachers’ throughout the book to refer to all kinds of second and foreign language teachers of English) can explore their practice at whatever level they choose. Thus, the primary audience for this book consists of those taking courses in Applied Linguistics/TESOL who are going to become or becoming language teachers. Certifcate in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (CELTA), Diploma in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (DELTA), xiii

Preface

Master Degree in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (MA TESOL) students who study the contents of this book will be better prepared for the realities of what they will face in real classrooms and real schools. I see this book as being a component to all language teacher education programs, be they introductory cert courses or other graduate and post-graduate courses and, especially (and as noted previously), as a companion book to my previous Routledge books: Research on Refective Practice in TESOL1 and Promoting Teacher Refection in Second Language Education: A Framework for TESOL Professionals,2 as well as a companion to Mann and Walsh’s (2017) book with Routledge, Refective Practice in English Language Teaching Research-Based Principles and Practices. Program administrators, cooperative teachers and supervisors who are responsible for training and educating teachers will fnd this book very useful when it comes to encouraging teachers to refect, as the research results are overwhelmingly positive, and each chapter provides a guide how teachers (novice and experienced) can implement such refections. In addition, experienced language teachers can use this book as a refresher for their professional development as they look at the various problems of practice that are presented and compare them to their own contexts. Thomas S. C. Farrell

1 Farrell, T. S. C. (2018). Research on refective practice in TESOL. New York: Routledge. 2 Farrell, T. S. C. (2015). Promoting teacher refection in second language education: A framework for TESOL professionals. New York: Routledge.

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1

Invitation

Introduction The capacity of being able to refect is now seen as an important part of a language teacher’s education and training. Indeed, in one extensive review of the literature on second language teacher education Wright (2010: 267) points out that the goal is to produce “refective teachers, in a process which involves socio-cognitive demands to introspect and collaborate with others, and which acknowledges previous learning and life experience as a starting point for new learning.” A furry of different typologies and approaches of encouraging teachers to refect on their practice developed in the feld of general education and many have been embraced by the feld of TESOL. However, I believe that most of these existing approaches are very narrow, and a more holistic approach to refection should be adopted in teacher education courses and by novice teachers in their early career years. This can be achieved through the implementation of the refection activities in Doing Refective Practice:120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers.

Implementing Refective Practice in Language Education Refection is now widely acknowledged as an essential component of many second language teacher education programs worldwide because, as Freeman (2016: 208) maintains, refection offers a way into the less “accessible aspects of teacher’s work.” Over the years, many different approaches and methods have been proposed as to how teachers can refect, yet most of these see restrict refection to a retrospective role focusing on what works or does DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-1

1

Invitation

not work in the classroom while all the time overlooking the inner lives of teachers. Although these approaches may offer a structured way into refection especially for some novice teachers, I believe there is a danger that we are confning refection in a bubble to a ‘fx-it’ approach or a repairing of some perceived defcit in teaching that separates the teacher from the act of teaching. As Freeman (2016: 217) recently pointed out, SLTE needs to move away from such an emphasis on ‘post-mortem refect’ and ‘refection-as-repair’ that confnes refection to problem solving and only the technical competencies of teaching that ignores the inner lives of teachers. If we continue to ignore the inner life of teachers as we always have in the feld of TESOL with the push to follow mandated curriculum and the like, we will not be able to counteract teacher burnout, which is why refective practice was originally developed and reinstated in the 1980s. Pre-service (and in-service) teachers need to be encouraged to think about themselves and their teaching in a way that includes activation of their feelings, emotions or the affective side of refection, so that they can develop the inner resources to meet future challenges in the profession. Implementing a holistic approach to teacher refection produces more integrated second-language teachers with self-awareness and understanding to be able to interpret, shape and reshape their practice. Doing Refective Practice: 120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers encompasses a holistic approach to refection that not only focuses on the intellectual, cognitive and meta-cognitive aspects of practice that many other approaches are limited to, but also the spiritual, moral and emotional non-cognitive aspects of refection that acknowledges the inner life of teachers (Farrell, 2015; 2018). Teacher educators can encourage preservice (and in-service) teachers to take such a holistic approach to refective practice so they can view their professional (and even personal) worlds and what has shaped their professional lives as they become more aware of their philosophy, principles, theories, practices and how these impact issues inside and beyond practice as teachers in training and throughout their early career years and beyond.

Doing Refective Practice: A Case Study The following outlines the refections of one novice English as a second language (ESL) teacher in his frst year of teaching as he attempted to incorporate strategy training when teaching English reading classes to ESL students in a high school (from Farrell, 2015). The teacher attempted to teach reading 2

Invitation

strategy training in his classes from the start of the semester because he said they were “taught this idea in my teacher preparation program.” He was especially interested in teaching his students the learning strategies of questioning, clarifying and predicting as well as vocabulary recognition techniques to less-profcient ESL students, many of whom were struggling with their reading comprehension and as a result did not like to read in English. We started with a discussion of his philosophy of practice, and the novice teacher stated: “I have a defnite philosophy of teaching: I think that all students always come frst. If a particular program of course of action will beneft them, I will try to carry it out. If it’s not going to beneft the students, I will try to scrap it or play it down.” He said that much of his approach to practice will have this philosophy as an underlying infuence although he also realized that he had no real teaching experience and his practicum experience was only him observing others teach, so he said that he did not really get any ideas from that experience. He was especially interested in teaching reading to struggling ESL students because he said that he felt this was his ‘calling,’ or vocation as a teacher. He said that he was not really interested in teaching students who were excellent, as he said that they would probably not beneft much from his knowledge, and that was not why he got into teaching. So, he asked me to observe his teaching of reading rather than any other language skill. He said that his beliefs about learning and teaching reading centered around learner strategy training that he studied about in his teacher education program, and he believed that if you teach ESL struggling readers how to use strategies such as prediction, questioning and clarifying, they would become better readers. I observed fve of his reading classes: two at the start of the second semester, two in the middle of the semester and one near the end of the semester. Each observation covered two double periods of forty minutes for each period except for the fnal observation, which was one forty-minute class. Excerpts from each of the lessons are provided. These excerpts (in the form of episodes) show how the teacher attempted to incorporate strategy training into his teaching of English reading. The teacher authenticated the episodes and the interpretations that follow. Observed Lessons: Start of Semester These lessons were conducted at the start of the second week of the semester. The frst lesson started with the teacher stating that he was going to 3

Invitation

review reading comprehension methods. In this lesson, the teacher tried to get his students to think and refect about how they usually read and how they answer reading comprehension questions after reading a text. First, the teacher took the students through what he called ‘the traditional steps for answering ten reading comprehension questions’ because he noted his students were used to this and how the students seemed to not be able to answer most of the questions. Then he attempted to introduce the learning strategy of prediction (that he learned in his teacher education program) while they were reading. The following dialogue, as outlined in Episode 1, shows how the teacher tried to introduce the strategy of prediction and how the class responded. The teacher makes a reference to ‘this usual way on comprehension’ in the frst line, indicating that, in traditional English reading classes in his context, the students are asked to read a passage, underline and words they do not understand and then answer the comprehension questions that follow the passage. The teacher then checks the answers and informs the students whether they are correct or not. He was trying to break this cycle. Episode 1 T:

Which students don’t follow this usual way of comprehension? [Most hands go up] T: Today another method . . . try and guess what is going to happen in a story. [The teacher writes the title of the story ‘The Last Dance’ on board] T: What is the frst thing that comes to mind? [No answers] T: What will the story be about? [No answers] T: Read the frst paragraph. T: Now what do you think the story is or will be about? [Teacher asks more questions about the frst paragraph; no student able to answer] [The teacher then asks the students about their metacognitive skills] T: What happens in your mind? Thinking, predicting. [No reaction from any student] T: What is the next paragraph going to be about? Read like this. [Students read] Key: T=teacher 4

Invitation

This short exchange in Episode 1 shows how the teacher was trying to get his students to think about their reading strategies and to consider using the strategy of prediction that he had learned during his teacher education program. However, the reality of the classroom and students he was teaching quickly made him realize that it was not going to be easy to introduce this strategy. Indeed, after this class, he told me that he felt frustrated that his students were not responding to the idea of predicting while reading in the way he had hoped and that this was different to what he expected from his theory classes while he was training. Nonetheless, he said that he saw some hope, as the students had told him that they had never been asked about how they read (their reading strategies) before. They said they were usually told to read the passage silently (or aloud) and answer the comprehension questions. Thus, the teacher said that at least he got some response and that some of the students were becoming curious about what the teacher was trying to do. Consequently, he said that he would continue with strategy training, as the students needed a new approach because they had failed to comprehend passages so often before in classes he had observed while he was on teaching practice and during his first year of teaching. Observed Lessons: Mid-Semester These lessons took place in the middle of the second semester. The teacher told me before this class that he had continued with strategy training since my last visit, especially the strategy of prediction for reading lessons. However, he said that he did not incorporate it into every reading lesson, since the frst set of lessons because he noticed the students were no responding. The class started with the teacher asking the students to read a passage silently. After ten minutes of silent reading, he asked the students to refect on their learning as outlined in the following dialogue in Episode 2. Episode 2 T: T:

How many used predicting? [Three students raise their hands] The rest of you . . . how many read each word? [All students raise their hands] 5

Invitation T:

I advise you to try the new methods. I can’t force you but you will fnd it easier to answer comprehension questions. I know it works. Try it and you have a choice. Key: T=teacher Again, this short example in Episode 2 shows how diffcult it was for the teacher, as he said, ‘to break the old habits of traditional reading approaches,’ especially for less profcient ESL readers. After class, the teacher said he was disappointed again that the students had not used the ‘new’ technique, but he would keep trying. He said that he noticed a degree of resistance and he said, ‘Old habits die hard.’ He continued: ‘It may be that weak readers tend to lock themselves into a pattern or cycle of self-doubt about their inability to read and that they cannot easily break from this.’ The teacher noticed that the students were using their fngers to guide their eyes across the page, and he interpreted this physical act as further evidence that they were reading word for word. He also said that the students gave up easily if they encountered vocabulary they did not understand, if they did not understand the frst sentence of a passage or paragraph or if they could not answer the frst comprehension question. In fact, they equated failure (and mental pain) with the act of reading. The teacher remarked that the students in his class had always ‘groaned loudly’ when he had told them that they were about to do a reading in English class. So, at the mid-semester point, the teacher began to question the validity of his beliefs about strategy training for struggling ESL readers, as he said he wondered now whether these strategies would in fact be useful or not for his students. He also worried that his classes may now have become boring for his students because he was trying to teach these new strategies. Up to this mid-semester point, he said that he had attempted strategy training in questioning, clarifying (however, he did not give me any examples of how he taught these two strategies, and I do not know how much time he spent on this strategy training) and predicting strategies with little success. He said that from this mid-semester on he would slow down and try to reinforce strategies already introduced. By this, he said he would try to develop activities and exercises that would reinforce the strategies. Observed Lesson: End of Semester I then observed a class near the end of the semester. Before the class, the teacher said he was a bit frustrated with the slow uptake of any of the 6

Invitation

reading strategies he had tried to teach the class because he said that the students had resisted many of them, even though they could still not answer any of the ten or so comprehension questions that he sometimes asked in the usual ‘traditional way.’ However, he pointed out that he was beginning to get them to predict ‘a bit when reading’ but that it very slow and hard work for him to keep pushing then to try to predict while they were reading. Episode 3 that follows outlines part of transcript of his attempts to get his students to predict once at the beginning of his lesson and again in the middle of the lesson. Episode 3 T:

Today we will try to predict again . . . Not reading. Here is the title. What do you think the story will be about? [Nearly all students raise hands. Teacher then chooses some students to answer, and they give opinion] [Fifteen minutes later, students read frst paragraph of story] T: Don’t worry about what kinds of words you don’t know yet . . . only what type of passage it is. How many bothered about diffcult words? [Four hands raise; class of forty] T: Are all the details important? Ss: [Most shout] No! T: What is important then? Ss: [Most shout] Guess what story is about. T: Yes, to predict. Key: T=teacher; Ss=students Episode 3 shows how the teacher had to continually remind his students to try to predict what a reading would be about as they read and how this was always trying to remind them how important it was to have some strategy when reading. The teacher realized that it would take time to get his students to implement any reading strategies, so at the end of the semester he noted that he would have to spend time the following semester ‘pushing reading strategies but that it would not be easy.’ This ‘theory-driven’ approach to refecting on practice, in which philosophy and theory have an initial infuence on instructional practice, is probably a natural sequence of development for pre-service and novice teachers in their early career years because they do not have much 7

Invitation

teaching experience. When their early practices are observed, it is most likely that theory can be detected in their practice; however, over time, and with refection, it is possible that their everyday practice will begin to inform and even change their philosophy and theory and they may come up with new principles of practice. Thus, continued refection can nourish both practice and theory of practice.

Are You a Refective Teacher? At this very early stage, I begin the reflection activities with a set of pointed questions related to your current perceptions about reflection and if you think you are already a reflective teacher. It will be interesting to compare your answers to these questions again when you come to the end of Chapter 13 to see if there are any differences to your findings. Refection 1 • This refection asks you to consider if you are a refective teacher at this moment in time. {{Are you a refective teacher? How would you know if you are or are not? {{If you consider yourself to be a refective teacher, how do you refect? {{Can you outline any recent examples of your refections on your teaching? {{What topics were important for you during your refections? {{If you do not consider yourself to be a refective teacher at this moment in time, what future plans do you have (if any) to become a more refective teacher? {{Do you think refecting on your teaching is worth doing? Why or why not? {{What benefts do you think you might gain as a result of refecting on your work? {{What would be diffcult about refecting on your work? {{As you moved to online teaching because of the COVID-19 pandemic, how do you refect on your practice? {{Do you fnd it easier or more diffcult to engage in refective practice while teaching on online platforms? 8

Invitation

The Invitation Doing Refective Practice: 120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers encourages pre-service English language teachers and novice English language teachers in their early career years to refect not only the ‘what do I teach?’ and the ‘how do I do it?’ in terms of what methods and techniques used to teach, but also the deeper, more personal refections, such as ‘why I do what I do,’ or refecting on the purpose and ends of our practices and even deeper into the ‘who’ of teaching. Or. as Palmer (1998: 5) notes, “good teaching cannot be reduced to technique; good teaching comes from the identity and integrity of the teacher.” Research fndings related to encouraging language teachers to refect are very promising (Farrell, 2018). For example, the fndings suggest that when language teachers are encouraged to refect on their philosophy, language teachers can better understand their sense of professional identity and especially its origins, formation and development. When language teachers are encouraged to refect on principles, language teachers become more aware of their previously tacitly held assumptions, values and beliefs about teaching and learning, and as a result, they are better able to make re-evaluate them in light of their new knowledge. When language teachers are encouraged to refect on theory, they are able to build repertoires and knowledge of instruction. When language teachers are encouraged to refect on their practice and theory, the research reports an overall positive impact of classroom observations because they lead to enhanced awareness of theory and practice connections. When language teachers are encouraged to refect beyond practice in combination with philosophy, principles, theory and practice, language teachers are able to refect well beyond their classroom teaching practices on such issues as social justice, teacher roles and power differentials. In his review of the research, Farrell (2018) concludes that the language teaching profession has, for the most part, embraced the concept of refective practice, but at the same time it must be on guard against others (e.g., administrators, supervisors and teachers) using it solely as a tool to ‘fx’ problems rather than as a means for overall professional development. Thus, I invite all learner language teachers (ESL, EFL and all related second language teachers, really), novice language teachers in their early career years, language teacher educators, administrators and all other interested stakeholders to engage in refective practice by building on the theory and integrating the synthesized research on refective practice in 9

Invitation

language teaching that were generated in my previous Routledge books (e.g., Farrell, 2018; 2015) as well as research conducted in many other related books (e.g., Mann & Walsh, 2017), papers and online platforms. The book and activities are designed to help learner language teachers and novice language teachers embark on their teaching careers armed with the tools of refection so that they can face any future challenges throughout their teaching careers.

Conclusion Although refective practice has, as Mann and Walsh (2013: 292) have noted, “achieved a status of orthodoxy” in the feld of English language teaching, not many practical suggestions have been proposed that move beyond just looking at classroom activities, but also to include refection on the inner lives of language teachers. I believe that Doing Refective Practice: 120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers is such a book because it presents such a holistic approach to refective practice that not only focuses on the intellectual, cognitive and meta-cognitive aspects of refection, but also includes refection on the spiritual, moral and emotional non-cognitive aspects of a language teacher’s professional practice. In this way, teachers can use that Doing Refective Practice: 120 Refection Activities for English Language Teachers as a lens through which they can view their professional (and personal) worlds—what has shaped their professional lives—as they become more aware of who they are, what they do, how they do it, why they do it and where they do it. I hope you accept my invitation to explore the 120 different refection activities outlined and discussed in this book, and I believe that if you do, you can become a more informed decision-maker, with more self-awareness and understanding to be able to interpret, shape and reshape your practice throughout your career.

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2

Why Refect?

Activities Covered • • • • • • • •

Taking Stock Life History Personal Critical Incidents Feelings About Teaching Teacher Burnout Ten Questions Refective Dispositions Recognizing a Refective Teacher

Introduction Most educators agree that a teacher’s day begins long before the teacher enters the classroom and ends well after the teacher leaves the classroom, with endless planning and grading before and after actual classroom lessons. In fact, teaching often is listed as one of the most stressful professions as teachers must endure a severe hectic pace throughout each day of each term. York-Barr, Sommers, Ghere and Montie (2006: 2) refer to this context and hectic pace as “hot action” and maintain in such circumstances “it is not unusual for teachers to put aside carefully constructed lessons because of unanticipated events, circumstances, or responses.” It is not surprising, then, given such a hectic pace at which language teachers must juggle various multiple tasks while making thousands of different on-thespot decisions each day, that the risk of burnout because of emotional and physical exhaustion is very real. This chapter outlines and discusses why language teachers should engage in refective practice by taking stock of DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-2

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their current teaching situations, considering where they have come from and what they have experienced as well as their feelings about teaching, whether they currently consider themselves as refective teachers, teacher burnout and what kind of attitudes are important when engaging in refective practice.

Taking Stock In many counties today there seems to be growing demands being placed on teachers to standardize education programs so that students will be able to pass standardized tests. These educational reforms, however, have been implemented (some would say imposed), for the most part, without input from practicing teachers who must implement them. This is also true for many English language teachers; however, in 2020 and 2021 the stress levels of language teachers have become even more diffcult because of the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic worldwide. Language teachers had to suddenly switch from face-to-face instruction to delivering their lessons on online platforms, with many teachers (and their students) having little or no prior training using such platforms. The impact on language teachers, language students and language schools has been enormous because most language courses, initially designed for face-to-face instruction, were suddenly ‘forced’ move to online platforms. This sudden move meant that language schools, language teachers and their students needed to adapt fast to a new virtual world that, for many, was an unknown teaching world. Consequently, many teachers may feel alienated and isolated because they have been asked to implement changes that they have had no part in infuencing and more especially during the COVID-19 pandemic (at the time I write this book). Language teachers may feel to be like technicians (or may be seen as such) who implement programs that have been pre-packaged and prescribed by others in ways and on platforms they have not been trained to use. Language teachers may thus feel a sense of helplessness about their situations and roles in a perceived impersonal education system. So, it even becomes more important for language teachers (indeed teachers of all subjects) to step back and refect on their practice because of such burdens with so many new demands on their time both inside the classroom be it face-to-face instruction or on online platforms, as well as outside their lessons. 12

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As mentioned earlier, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic has greatly increased language teachers’ stress/stressors and heightened levels of emotions because of their sudden conversion to online platforms that have shattered all the usual classroom teaching boundaries: physically, temporally and psychologically (MacIntyre, Gregersen, & Mercer, 2020). Thus, there is an even greater need for teachers (and students and administrators) to engage in refective practice so that all stakeholders can better examine and refect on and evaluate the real experiences and emotions of this sudden upheaval related to teaching language in the age of COVID-19. For language teachers, engaging in refective practice generally means that they take the responsibility of looking at all aspects of their practice that includes their philosophy, beliefs and theories that shape that practice both inside or outside the classroom, face-to-face and online, so that they get a clearer understanding of their practice. Engaging in such refective practice during the global pandemic can also help language teachers refect on their adjustments and related emotions that enables them to better recognize and understand any adjustment challenges and emotional impacts that occur so that they can begin to initiate necessary changes. Along with the dynamics of a lesson (see also Chapter 10 on classroom communication) and the demands on a teacher’s time to prepare for his/her classes, institutional constraints further limit teachers’ hours in the day to refect on their work. These institutions do not normally give teachers time to refect because there is continued pressure to get through the curriculum. This all makes for a stressful existence for teachers. Is it any wonder that some teachers feel isolated and frustrated and entertain thoughts of leaving the profession? These teachers are ideal candidates for teacher burnout (see Refection 6). Some of these feelings of frustration can be avoided, however, if teachers embrace opportunities to refect (however informally) on their teaching before and after (and even during) classes (face-to-face and online). It really all depends on how much time teachers are willing to invest in their own professional development. If teachers can become more aware of what happens in their classroom and can monitor accurately both their own behavior and that of their students, they can function as more effective teachers. This can be achieved by having teachers engage in personal refection, as well as refective conversation with others. Such a refective process begins with teachers assessing where they are now in terms of their practice, or ‘taking stock’ of their practice. 13

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Refection 2 • Refect on yourself as a teacher (take stock) as a starting point on for your refective journey using this book. {{Do you fnd teaching (face-to-face and/or online) exciting and challenging? {{Do you think language teaching is a job or a profession? {{What is the best aspect of your life as a language teacher? {{What is the worst aspect of your life as a language teacher? {{Do you spend much time thinking about new ideas for teaching your classes? {{Do you ever discuss teaching with your peers/colleagues? {{Do you ever ask your peers/colleagues to observe you teach and later provide feedback on your lessons? {{Are there any things you think you would like to change about your teaching? If so, can you change these? {{How has COVID-19 impacted your life as a language teacher? {{What have you learned about yourself as a language teacher so far? • Now you have your starting point. Continue your refective journey through the various chapters and the 120 refection activities/prompts you see.

Life History It is nearly impossible to separate the human self from the professional self because our actions as teachers in classrooms are inevitably shaped by our past experiences growing up as children, our experiences in grade school and whatever experiences we have had up to the present moment. Within the feld of education studies, ‘life history’ has been used to capture an individual’s story. These stories can contain depictions of critical persons, personal critical incidents (see next section) and other critical phases in the stories that make up teachers’ lives. Life history presents each language teacher from his or her own perspective and in such a manner, a teacher can refect on their individual involvement and commitment to teaching and students. When analyzing the story, a teacher can look for events, people or phases that really stand out as meaningful situations for him or her as well as how they felt at that particular time. For example, teachers can talk about their childhood experiences and the people and events that 14

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had a major impact on them as they grew up. They can also articulate their experience in grade school: how they were taught, the teachers they remember (for good or bad) and the various positive and negative experiences they had during their school years. Teachers can then consider why they became a teacher and what infuenced this decision, such as experiences described before, that include infuential teachers as role models and the like. Refection 3 • Life history refection enables us to refect on the various infuences we have had during our elementary school years, high school, university and our training to be a teacher in a TESOL certifcate course and/or an MA program. Read the following life history related to how a novice ESL teacher outlined her signifcant experiences from grade school to her MA degree. {{Elementary school I had a teacher in grade 6 who took the time to make sure I understood the difference between grammar points I was having trouble with. He encouraged me in my schoolwork even though I was not a very academic student, pushed me and another student to submit work for something that I wouldn’t have done on my own and then took some personal time to reward us with dinner out with his wife. For a kid that didn’t have much or many opportunities, that really made me feel special and helped me think that I could do well in school. I also happened to have a French teacher that took the opportunity to talk to her students inside and outside of class. She was excited to teach the language and that showed in her teaching. She made opportunities for us to use the language by arranging an exchange trip to practice French. {{High school Defnitely there were teachers that I had that I didn’t like the way they taught, which made me not want to ever teach like them. One of my French teachers in grade 9 or 10 drilled us on etre and avoir constantly. There was not much opportunity to practice the language verbally, and when there was, we were usually put into the awkward position of giving an unknown answer in front of the whole class. There was also a teacher who came to math class drunk every day 15

Why Refect?

and didn’t care about the students, and yet there was no system to evaluate him or get rid of him. I didn’t learn much that year. There were teachers that positively infuenced me as well. In grade 12 I took a family studies course that allowed me to do a co-op program and try out a job. I wanted to be an interior designer. After working in a paint store for a while I asked to switch and try something different. I started working at a public school with two girls [ESL students] who needed help with their English. My supervisor was a travelling ESL teacher. Up until then, I didn’t know that job existed. I enjoyed what I was doing a lot, and my supervisor encouraged me every time we talked and helped me to learn how to teach. It was because of this experience that I found out about the program at a university and pursued ESL. {{University During my time at university, I took a German class, which I didn’t do very well in. It made me appreciate the diffculties language learners go through. I also took a certifcate in TESOL and, later, received an MA degree in teaching English to speakers of other languages, and I realized that there is a lot of difference between speaking English as a native speaker like I am and actually teaching English to speakers of other languages. I really enjoyed my practicum, and this solidifed my desire to become an ESL teacher as a career. • Refect on your life history infuences. {{Elementary school {{High school {{University {{TESOL training (include your TESOL qualifcations) {{Other

Personal Critical Incidents Following the previous section on life history is the specifc focus on personal critical incidents. Although we can really subsume in the previous section, I want to focus on incidents that have had an impact on teachers that occurred outside the classroom (see Chapter 6 for teaching critical incidents), because these could have resulted in a signifcant change in a teacher’s personal and professional life. When a personal incident occurs, 16

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it interrupts (or highlights) the taken-for-granted ways of thinking about a situation including teaching and thus becomes critical, and by analyzing such critical incidents, teachers can examine the values and beliefs that underpin their perceptions about why they became a teacher, teaching and their perception of students. Such incidents are critical because they can be considered a turning point in a teacher’s career and can be captured when the teacher examines episodes from his or her past. These career critical incidents can be represented in the form of a brief autobiographical sketch, either oral or in writing and the incident may have had a lasting impact on why a person decided to become a teacher (or not). Refection 4 • Analyze the following personal critical incident of a novice ESL teacher and her reason for becoming a teacher from early in her life: {{I knew that I wanted to teach when I was in grade 1. I remember very clearly a teacher asking a student a question about colors, and I knew that that student was colorblind, I also knew that he was very shy and embarrassed about it. I advocated on his behalf that day, and I have been doing it ever since. I could not understand how a teacher could be so out of touch with her students (since she was the one who had administered the test in the frst place), and I vowed that day that I would always try to understand my students. • Outline any personal incidents that have occurred in your life that you clearly remember. {{Explain the incident in terms of its meaning, value or role to you as a teacher—consider how the personal critical incident led to a change in your understanding of teaching. {{How have your understandings and conceptions (of the classroom, of the language, of the students, of yourself) evolved as a result of this refection?

Feelings About Teaching Teaching is a very emotional experience for both teachers and students, and for teachers, emotions constitute a fundamental dimension of teaching and of being a teacher. In fact, Teng (2017: 118) maintains that “emotions are part of the very fabric that constitutes the teacher’s self,” especially in 17

Why Refect?

terms of their personal and emotional investment into their practice. In other words, language teachers are human beings frst, and as such have human reactions to the different events they experience while they teach, so it is important not to avoid their presence but rather to refect on them. Such refection helps language teachers, as Gkonou and Miller (2020: 6) point out, “compare their emotions about practice with colleagues and take action to improve current conditions.” For language teachers, Richards’ (2020) distinguishes positive and negative emotions. Positive emotions, he notes, include such feelings as confdent, curious, engaged, enjoyment, enthusiastic interested, happy, joyful, passionate. Negative emotions include such feelings as angry, annoyed, anxious, depressed, dissatisfed, exhausted, frustrated, sad, stressed, tense, uneasy, worried. As Richards’ (2020: 3) points out, language teachers express their emotions (both positive and negative) in terms of the different feelings they “have about themselves, their colleagues, their learners, classroom activities, their teaching context and teaching resources.” Refection 5 • Refect on the following questions related to your feelings about teaching: {{Do you ever express positive emotions about teaching? If yes, what are these (from the previous list) and when do you express them? {{Do you ever express negative emotions about teaching? If yes, what are these (from the previous list) and when do you express them? {{Do you ever feel helpless about your teaching situation and your role as a teacher? If so, why? {{Do you think that you are working as a teacher in an impersonal school environment? If so, what can you do about this? {{Do you think that you are working as a teacher in an impersonal education system? If so, what can you do about this? {{Do you know why anyone would leave the teaching profession? {{Do you personally know any teachers who have quit the profession? If so, why did they say they wanted to leave teaching? {{Do you know how you can take more control of your teaching situation? {{What advice would you give to a new teacher on how to keep themselves positive as a teacher in their frst year(s) teaching? 18

Why Refect? {{Do

you think refecting on your practice (for example, with the contents of this book) can help you take more control of your professional life? If so, how? • Now try this ‘Personal–Intellectual Inventory’ related to your feelings about your work (adapted from Gold & Roth, 1993). {{Answer Yes (Y) or No (N) to each of the following questions. • I take suffcient time each week to think about new ideas for my professional work. Y/N • I enjoy intellectual challenges and look for them in work. Y/N • I fnd teaching to be intellectually stimulating most of the time. Y/N • I look for novelty in my professional life and use it as often as I can in my teaching. Y/N • I develop innovative techniques in my teaching. Y/N • I encourage other teachers to critique my lesson and I fnd this useful. Y/N • Teaching offers me the intellectual excitement that I need since my college days. Y/N • If you answered ‘no’ to the previous question, do you fnd your own intellectual fulfllment? Y/N • I am positive thinker most of the time. Y/N • I like to discover things for myself. Y/N • My work is intellectually gratifying for me most of the time. Y/N • There are many opportunities for me to inquire about things for myself. Y/N • I am creative in my teaching. Y/N • I often use critical thinking skills to satisfy my intellectual curiosity. Y/N • I use the process of self-analysis to keep myself interested and growing. Y/N • I enjoy many aesthetic experiences. Y/N {{Now circle all the ‘No’ responses. You have now identifed the area of your needs you must work on. {{Now answer the following questions for more insight: • List three things you have learned about yourself after taking this inventory. 1. 2. 3. 19

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• Can you change these things? How? • Are you willing to change? How? • Will you get help if necessary?

Teacher Burnout Teaching has been classifed as a very stressful career, and this is also the case for language teachers because they must deal with many challenges related to “heavy workloads, time pressures, and diffculties juggling roles” (MacIntyre, Gregersen & Mercer, 2020: 1). Add to this the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic from 2020 onwards and the sudden move to online teaching for many language teachers, and the stressors and stress teachers must endure puts many at breaking point. In fact, MacIntyre, Ross, Talbot, Mercer, Gregersen, and Banga (2019: 26) maintain that the “risk of burnout may be even more severe for language teachers as they suffer from additional unique stressors such as language anxiety, frequently unstable job contracts, and insecure working conditions.” Burnout is as “a psychological syndrome of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment that can occur among individuals who work with other people in some capacity” (Maslach, Jackson, & Leiter, 1996: 4). When language teachers suffer from emotional exhaustion, they lose motivation, commitment and enthusiasm to teach, and ultimately their students suffer as well. Refection 6 • Have you ever experienced a feeling of being burned out from teaching? Describe these feelings. • If yes, can you outline what you think caused the burnout? • If yes, how has moving online teaching because of the COVID-19 pandemic further exasperated these feelings of burnout? • How can you overcome the feeling of burnout? • What advice would you give to a beginning language teacher in terms of how he/she can avoid becoming a burnout victim? • Burnout in teaching can sometimes (but not always) be associated with teachers feeling tired, depressed, ignored, trapped, anxious and even bored. Refect on your current burnout levels (adapted from Alschuler, 1980).

20

Why Refect? {{How

often do you experience these feelings in a relation to your teaching? Circle the appropriate letter: Never (N), Once (On), Rarely (R), Sometimes (S), Often (Of), Usually (U), Always (A). • Being tired N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Feeling depressed N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Having a bad day N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Exhausted (physically) N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Exhausted (mentally) N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Being wiped out N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Feeling pushed around N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Being unhappy N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Trapped N, On, R, S, Of, U, A N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Cynical N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Worthless N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Want to quit • Hostile N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Disillusioned about people N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Bored N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Hopeless N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Resentful about people N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Pessimistic N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Listless N, On, R, S, Of, U, A • Anxious N, On, R, S, Of, U, A {{How to obtain your score: • Never = 0 points • Once = 1 point • Rarely = 2 points • Sometimes = 3 points • Often = 4 points • Usually = 5 points • Always = 6 points {{Burnout Scores: • 0–60 = Ideal • 61–80 = Mild Burnout • 81–100 = Moderate Burnout • 101–120 = Severe Burnout

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Ten Questions Teaching for any period of time raises many questions about the teaching activity itself, the location (classroom) and context in which the activity occurs and the people involved in the activity. The primary players in education are the teacher and the students, with school administrators performing secondary roles and parents, especially when teaching young learners. It is the teachers who have chosen their role as a career, and they may or may not have made a conscious decision to pursue this career. Nevertheless, whether novices or veterans, there comes a time in a person’s career where they may wake up some morning and ask themselves why they are doing what they are doing. Of course, everyone has the option to avoid even asking this question and go on as normal. Teachers, too, may wake up some morning in mid-career and have questions about teaching as their career. Indeed, they may have wanted to ask these questions for some time but have been afraid or have not had the time to answer them. Refection 7 • Explore the following questions: 1. Why did you become a language teacher? Did you want to become a teacher? 2. Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: ‘Those that can, do, those that can’t, teach?’ Explain your answer. 3. What does it mean to be a language teacher? What does a language teacher do? 4. If a child asked you to explain what you do (your job as a language teacher), how would you explain this to him/her? 5. What do your family and friends think about you as a language teacher? 6. Do they ever say that you ‘talk like a teacher’ or other such things that may identify you as a teacher? If yes, what are they and what does all tell you about yourself as a teacher? 7. What do you think your students think about you as a teacher? 8. What do you want to be known for as a language teacher when you retire (your legacy)? 9. Do you think language teachers should refect on their practice? Explain your answer. 10. What is refective practice? (see Chapter 3). 22

Why Refect?

• Which questions were diffcult/easy for you to answer and why? • What did you learn about yourself as a teacher as a result of answering these questions? • Do you agree that these questions get to the heart of who you are as a language teacher? • Can you suggest any other questions to add to these ones?

Refective Dispositions I think you may agree that the questions posed previously may be easy to ask but are not easy to answer, especially at this stage of your refective journey. Nevertheless, you may also agree that it is important for language teachers to at least ask themselves each question as an important frst step on their journey to discover who they are as (refective) teachers. It may be a good idea for you to write down your responses to these questions now, as this exercise may help activate your prior knowledge (schema) about teaching. Even if your answer to many of the questions is ‘I don’t know,’ write it down, as it is benefcial to know where you stand before you can embark on a refective journey. You may want to revisit your answers to these questions again once you have completed using this book. When you do, see if you would change any of your answers. Connected to the diffculties of answers all the questions and refections posed so far in this chapter (and the chapters to come) is another very important question for you to consider related to how you answer these questions and how forthright and honest you are when answering. As Dewey (1933) noted, there can be no true refection without a teacher developing a set of attitudes that he or she must consider before engaging in refective practice, three of which are open-mindedness, wholeheartedness and responsibility. Indeed, even though this book has many strategies, methods and examples of how to refect, I believe it is not enough to develop knowledge of these refective methods and strategies, but it is also necessary to develop character attitudes to accompany these refective processes. Being open-minded means teachers listen to more than one side of an issue and admit they may be wrong as they reexamine their philosophy, principles, theory and practices. Being responsible means considering the consequences of what one has done (or our actions) and what one has learned. Being wholehearted means to continually review our beliefs 23

Why Refect?

and actions and seek every opportunity to learn more about our practice throughout our careers. Refection 8 • Before you embark on your refective journey into your teaching life and all that entails, examine Dewey’s (1933) three characteristics and see what degree of each you possess. {{Open-minded (a desire to listen to more sides than one) • Are you open-minded? • If yes, how do you know? • How open-minded should a teacher be? • Can you give an account of an example of how you are openminded as a teacher? {{Responsible (careful consideration of the consequences of actions) • Are you responsible? • If yes, how do you know? • Can you give an account of an example of how you are responsible as a teacher? {{Wholehearted (seek every opportunity to learn) • Are you wholehearted? • If yes, how do you know? • Can you give an account of an example of how you are wholehearted as a teacher? • What levels of these characteristics do you possess as a teacher now (high, medium, low)? • Which of these characteristics do you need to develop more as you continue as a teacher? • Can you think of other desirable characteristics a refective practitioner should possess? As you embark on your refective journey while reading and interacting with all 120 refective activities presented in this book, I suggest you continuously revisit Dewey’s three refective dispositions/attitudes and assess which characteristic you possess during each refective activity you engage with. As you complete different chapters and different refective activities, monitor your level of open-mindedness and levels of responsibility as you wholeheartedly explore, examine and refect on your practice both inside 24

Why Refect?

and outside the classroom (be that classroom in face-to-face settings and/ or on online platforms).

Recognizing a Refective Teacher I gave a plenary address at one conference several years ago, and at the end of my presentation I was asked how we could recognize a refective teacher if we saw one. This question made me think for a moment because I had not thought about it before this. I had to consider if the answer lies in the way a person teaches their lessons, how he/she talks about teaching or how he or she looks in the staff room, perhaps in a brooding mood with index fnger placed on forehead (Rodin-like)? Or is there something else involved with this recognition? I wear a baseball hat, and some even wondered that, if they wore a hat, they would be recognized as a refective teacher. I leave you to refect on this puzzle for a moment in the refection that follows, however, and just as in the previous section, I encourage you to consider this question as you read and refect on all 120 activities in this book. Refection 9 • How would you recognize a refective teacher if you saw one? Explain. • Is it possible to recognize a refective teacher anytime? • Would you include each of the three refection attributes outlined earlier in any such recognition? If yes, why? If no, why not? • Zeichner and Liston (1996: 6) have suggested fve key features of a refective teacher as follows: {{Examines, frames and attempts to solve dilemmas in classroom practice. {{Is aware of and questions the assumptions and values he/she brings to teaching. {{Is attentive to the institutional and cultural contexts in which he/she teaches. {{Takes part in curriculum development and is involved in school change efforts. {{Takes responsibility for his/her own professional development. • Look at these features and assess how close you follow, or do not follow, each of these features, and comment on each of these. 25

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Conclusion This chapter has encouraged language teachers at all levels to engage in refective practice as part of their own professional development as they emerge from their teacher education programs that include their early career years and well into their teaching careers. Rather than jumping into the refective process, the chapter suggests teacher take a step back to consider why they should refect, and to take stock of who they are at the present moment, what personal incidents have shaped them so far and how these have impacted their decision to become a language teacher. The chapter also acknowledges that teaching is an emotional activity and that language teachers have particular feelings about teaching (and more especially during the COVID-19 pandemic and the sudden move to online teaching) that warrants refection because too many negative feelings and emotions can lead to teacher burnout. The chapter poses ten diffcult questions for language teachers to consider, as well as the important point that any kind of refection necessitates the development of a particular disposition or attitude if that refection is to be meaningful for the teacher. Refective practice means celebrating the successes as well as the diffculties in our practice, for both propel us toward professional growth.

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3

What Is Refective Practice?

Activities Covered • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Routines Bandwagons Refection as Process Refection as Action Refection as Product Refection as Community Refection as Moral Agency Refectivity Dimensions of Refection Levels of Refection Spirals of Refection Typologies of Refection Refecting on Philosophy Refecting on Principles Refecting on Theory Refecting on Practice Refecting Beyond Practice Tailoring Refection Some Cautions

Introduction The previous chapter asked you to step back for a moment and take stock of who you are as a person, where you are now in terms of your feelings and emotions about teaching and how all these may have impacted your DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-3

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decision to become a language teacher. This chapter begins with questions related to teacher routines and then answers why refective practice is not just another educational bandwagon to burden teachers with. This chapter offers details on all aspects of refection, from what it is to the different types, levels, dimensions and typologies of refective practice. The chapter then examines the person who is refecting and offers some cautions when engaging in refective practice. I hope that each teacher, teacher educator administrator, and student will develop their own understanding of refective practice as a result of reading the contents of this chapter.

Routines We all follow routine in our lives, mostly because it makes it easier for us to live, but it also makes us a little bored at times, and that is why need vacations. Teachers also follow routine in their teaching lives. Routine in a teacher’s life helps that teacher to conduct many classes each day and grade mountains of papers each week. Routine in how classes are conducted also helps the students follow what is going on in class, otherwise they would have a diffcult time trying to fgure out what was expected of them in each class. So, routine can help teachers and students alike. The problem is that teaching can become so routine for teachers that it turns into a mechanical act conducted without much thought. As Zeichner and Liston (1996) have suggested, many of our routine actions while teaching our classes are guided primarily by tradition, someone outside the school with authority (such as the ministry of education) or convenience. However, they note that refective action means we are always questioning our beliefs and our routines so that we do not go stale. Many language teachers may not actually be aware that they are in fact following routine actions in their lessons, as everything may seem normal each day. However, when they reach a state of burnout (see previous chapter) and wonder what has caused this state, they will see that the mindless following of routines perhaps may be the culprit. A major premise of this book is that engaging in refective practice will identify any routines that need to be altered as well as counteracting any feelings of burnout.

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Refection 10 • • • • • • • • • • •

Are you aware of any routines in your teaching? How do you start your classes each day? How do you end your classes each day? How do you use textbooks: by page numbers exactly (routinely)? If you answered no, what do you with the prescribed textbooks you must use? Where do you stand/sit in each class? How do you call on students to answer questions? Do you tell the same jokes in different classes? Do you keep the same materials year after year and continuously use these materials in your classes? Are you aware of any routines in your teaching, either face-to-face and/ or teaching online? Do you think that teachers should follow routine in their teaching and use of materials (textbooks, etc.)? Explain your answer. When was the last time you stopped for a moment and wondered why you were doing what you were doing in the classroom (e.g., your teaching methods and materials)?

Bandwagons Some have suggested that refective practice in language teaching is just another bandwagon. Indeed, when it frst made a resurgence in the 1980s, it was very appealing because it seemed to promise an all-encompassing way for teachers to develop while in training and in-service. However, after that, different scholars attempted to shape refective practice to their particular agendas (some education-related, but also some political) while forgetting that its origin was many years before that, through the wonderful work of Dewey (1933). At that time Dewey (1933) pointed out that refection is not just mulling things over like wondering how class went after the lesson without any evidence to support these opinions, which unfortunately seems to be a wide interpretation of refective thinking today. Indeed, and as pointed out in the previous section, Dewey (1933) observed that teachers (and students) can be locked into routine thinking and actions that can stife creativity. Thus, he maintained that teachers should act in a more deliberate and intentional manner by collecting

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evidence about our practice rather than just plugging in every day in a type of mindless approach to teaching. Unfortunately, it seems that many who have defned and developed various typologies refective practice (see following sections) for have lost Dewey’s original spirit of refection and the necessary disposition teachers need to adhere to when practicing refection (see previous chapter). Although it seems, as Tabachnik and Zeichner (2002: 13) have pointed out, that “there is not a single teacher educator who would say that he or she is not concerned about preparing teachers who are refective,” the many different defnitions and typologies that have mushroomed in recent years seems to have led to misunderstandings about what it is and how it can be achieved. Perhaps this is why some have suggested that refective practice is just another bandwagon with a different bag of tricks. Dewey’s (1933) refective inquiry is most likely a precursor to the present-day action research movement popular in many language teacher development programs worldwide and thus hardly just another educational bandwagon. Much of what follows in this chapter will hopefully clear up some of the misunderstandings related to this interesting yet complex topic of refective practice. Refection 11 • Do you think engaging in refective practice is appealing for many language teachers? • Do you think that engaging in refective practice is a mark of professional competence in many different professions outside language teaching today? If yes, why? If no, why not? • How would you defne a language teacher’s ‘professional competence’? • Do you think the concept of refective practice has become another bandwagon in language education? If yes, why? If no, why not? • If most language educators agree that some form of refection is desirable, why do you think that there is some confusion regarding what exactly refective practice is?

Refection as Process According to Dewey (1933) refection is a process in which teachers refect in fve main phases: 30

What Is Refective Practice?

• Suggestion: A doubtful situation is understood to be problematic, and some vague suggestions are considered as possible solutions. • Intellectualization: The diffculty or perplexity of the problem that has been felt (directly experienced) is intellectualized into a problem to be solved. • Guiding Idea: One suggestion after another is used as a leading idea, or hypothesis; the initial suggestion can be used as a working hypothesis to initiate and guide observation and other operations in the collection of factual material. • Reasoning: Reasoning links present and past ideas and helps elaborate the supposition that refective inquiry has reached, or the mental elaboration of the idea or supposition as an idea or supposition. • Hypothesis Testing: The refned idea is reached, and the testing of this refned hypothesis takes place; the testing can be by overt action or in thought (imaginative action). Although this process is circular and somewhat iterative, Dewey noted, they should not be taken as linear in that teachers can only think about one stage before moving to the next and so on. Rather, Dewey noted that refective inquiry can be a bit messy and that teachers can jump back and forth between stages as they attempt to solve a problem. Schön (1983, 1987) furthered Dewey’s ideas and suggested that the process of refection should include teachers not only refecting after class (refection-on-action) but also during class while teaching (refection-in-action). According to Schön (1983, 1987), there is a sequence of ‘moments’ in a process of refection-in-action: • A situation or action occurs to which we bring spontaneous, routinized responses (such as in knowing-in-action): • A student cannot answer a question about a topic he or she has explained in great detail during the previous class. • Routine responses (i.e., what the teacher has always done) produce a surprise. • The teacher starts to explain that the student had already explained this topic in the previous class and that this silence was troubling. The student now, for example, begins to cry during the class. • This then gets our attention. • This surprise leads to refection within an action. 31

What Is Refective Practice?

• The teacher reacts quickly to try to fnd out why the student is suddenly crying by asking questions of the student and/or asking the student’s classmates why they think the student is crying. • Refection gives rise to on-the-spot experimentation. • The student may or may not explain why he is crying. The teacher will take some measures (depending on the reaction or nonreaction) to help solve the problem: ignore the situation, empathize with the student, help the student answer the question by modeling answers, and the like. Killion and Todnem (1991) later added the idea of refecting-for-action, which is proactive and a desired outcome of both refection-on-action and refection-in-action. Teachers can prepare for the future by using knowledge from what happened during class and what they refected on after class. As such, refective teaching is useful for detecting inconsistencies between belief and practice. Refection 12 • What kind of refections do you do (if any) immediately after teaching a class? • Do you ever talk to other teachers after class about teaching? If yes, what do you talk about? • Do you ever ask students to tell you what they think they learned in your class? • Have you ever been teaching a class, and something happened that you were not expecting? If so, either explain this to another teacher and/or write an account of what happened. How did you respond? What was the result of your response?

Refection as Action As mentioned earlier, Dewey’s (1933) evidence-based refective inquiry encourages teachers to avoid making instructional decisions based on impulse or routine; rather, teachers are encouraged to use the information they have obtained so that they can make more informed decisions about their practice of which is terms refection-on-action. Thus Dewey (1933: 9) called for teachers to take more refective action that entails 32

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“active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in light of the grounds that support it and the further consequences to which it leads.” Walsh and Mann (2015) have since echoed this call for evidence-based refective practice by encouraging language teachers to collect data as a concrete means of focusing refections so that they can make more insightful analysis and gain a fuller sense of their own teaching. Later, Schön (1983, 1987) realized that practitioners ‘know’ more than they can articulate about what they are doing while they are doing it. In other words, he was interested in getting practitioners to think on their feet or refect-in-action. Killion and Todnem (1991) encouraged teachers to engage in anticipatory refection, or refect-for-action, so that they are ready before they start a particular lesson. In addition, and as mentioned previously, is Dewey’s (1933) refective inquiry as a precursor to action research that many teachers engage in today when they are interested in investigating a perceived problem in their classroom teaching and want to ‘fx’ that problem. Refection 13 • What word is common to most of the terms introduced in the previous section related to refection? • What does this word tell you about the process of refection?

Refection as Product So far in this chapter, we have addressed that refection is good for breaking routines and is not just another educational bandwagon; one common word associated with our understanding of refection so far is the word ‘action,’ which means that refection is not passively thinking about some issue in our practice. Teachers who engage in refective practice must partake in some kind of action associated with refection. When comparing the ways in which refection is defned or conceptualized within and outside the feld of language teaching, most include teachers refecting on the cognitive and meta-cognitive aspects of their work. Although I outline many more aspects of refection and refective practice in the following sections that can and should be included in any attempts to defne the concept, I simply suggest here that engaging 33

What Is Refective Practice?

in refective practice entails language teachers to seek answers to the following questions: • • • •

What am I doing in the classroom (method)? Why am I doing this (reason)? What is the result? Will I change anything based on the information gathered from answering the frst two questions (justifcation)?

This can be schematically represented as follows: Method

Reason

Result

Justifcation

This understanding of refective practice focuses on what the teacher action is or what he or she actually does in a classroom (method). Refecting on the reasons, results, and justifcation for these actions involves refecting on the wider issues educational issues such as the textbook used the curriculum and other, wider educational issues that impact a teacher’s practice. In other words, the product of such refections will inform future actions by the teacher both inside and outside the classroom (see the section that follows for more). Refection 14 • How would you answer the four questions outlined in the previous section? • Where would you get the information for each question? • What would you do with the information you obtain? • Would you add any more questions to the four previous ones? • What would you do with the product of your refections?

Refection as Community Refective practice does not take place in a teacher’s head, acting as a vacuum of sorts. As mentioned earlier, refective practice is both process and product and takes place in a classroom as well as outside the classroom. Since its resurgence in the 1980s, though, there has been debate about 34

What Is Refective Practice?

the focus of refection, with some saying it is only inside a teacher’s head, or classroom-focused, while others suggest it is school- or communityfocused or that it includes refection outside the classroom as well. Indeed, this debate has still not been settled. I would suggest that language teachers consider the restrictive and subjective nature of confning refection to just inside an individual teacher’s head as well as the classroom (where, incidentally, action research projects are solely focused) as this limits refection to that of repairing perceived instructional problems; this emphasizes behavioural aspects of teaching which is both passive and reductive in nature. I would suggest that refection happens inside a teacher’s head and the classroom in which he teaches, as well as the school whose values he or she supports he teaches in and the community he or she lives in. In addition, and as Dewey (1933) noted, for any real refection to occur, it should be enacted in collaboration and the company of others, thus making it community-based (see also section that follows). Refection 15 • As noted earlier, some educators say that language teachers should only refect in their own heads and their classroom teaching, while other educators say that teachers should take societal infuence into consideration also. {{Where do you stand on this issue? {{Do you think teachers should confne their refections inside their classroom or should they refect on the outside infuences also?

Refection as Moral Agency In the previous section, refection is encouraged beyond the classroom and into the community. This is sometimes called critical refection. Here, language teachers consider the moral and ethical aspects of their practice both inside and outside the classroom. As Hatton and Smith (1995: 35) point out, teachers must make judgements about whether a “professional activity is equitable, just, and respectful of persons or not.” Language teachers engaging in critical refection take the broader context of schooling into consideration and refect on whether the school/institution in which they work in encourages just and equitable practices or if the school/institution institutes policies that make it diffcult to act in ways that are consistent with 35

What Is Refective Practice?

their personal morals. For example, if language teachers want to refect on student performance, they should not only consider the perspectives of the obvious main players—the teacher, the student and the parents—but also to include a history of the schools in terms of equality or inequality in these refections. In other words, critical refection on practice enables language teachers to keep more of a balance between their students’ needs and any school/institutional directive that may place heavy demands on their students’ lives. Language teachers do not just deliver language classes in isolation from the broader society as some may suggest; rather, they are fully vested professional members of the wider socio-historical and politico-cultural contexts in which they teach. Refection 16 • What does the word ‘critical’ in ‘critical refection’ mean to you? • What kind of morals would language teachers refect on? • Do you think language teachers can infuence society, and/or do you think society can infuence what language teachers do in their classroom? If not, why not? • If yes, how do you think society could infuence what teachers do in their classroom? • Have you ever experienced ethical or moral dilemmas with your teaching? • If yes, what were these, and how did they come about?

Refectivity Dewey (1933: 9) defned refectivity as “active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further conclusion to which it tends.” Reiman (1999) suggests that refectivity occurs when teachers display the ability to analyze the process of what they are doing while doing it and at the same time make judgments to revise their practice so that it best matches their students’ needs. This echoes the process of refection outlined earlier as: refection-on-action, refection-in-action and refection-for-action. One scholar brought these all together to explain the notion of refectivity and suggested that refective practitioners are professionals who exhibit their refectivity through constant 36

What Is Refective Practice?

decision making guided by the theoretical and practical principles of their particular discipline (Van Manen, 1977). Van Manen (1977) maintained that in order for teachers to demonstrate refectivity, they must be able to explain their teaching actions before, during and after the process. In Van Manen’s model, each level of refectivity is sequential; one must address the needs of each level before proceeding to the next generally summarized as follows: • Recollective refection. This type of refection allows language teachers to make sense of past experiences and give new, deeper insight into the meaning of those experiences. • Active or interactive refection. This type of refection allows language teachers to make immediate decisions during class as events unfold. • Anticipatory refection. This type of refection allows language teachers to plan, decide on a course of action and anticipate future consequences of such actions. Refection 17 • Have you ever tried any of these three types of refection? If yes, explain. • Which type would be most diffcult for you in face-to-face teaching or on online platforms? • If you have never tried any of these types of refection, can you give an example of each type of refection that a language teacher might engage in?

Dimensions of Refection Language teachers can also consider different dimensions of refective practice. A general understanding of some dimensions related to refective practice suggest that language teachers can explore aspects of issues they are interested in by frst identifying the issues, which can be anything from a problem or some activity that was successful in teaching. Teachers then attempt to generate possible solutions followed by testing them so that they can refne their thoughts about the issue. The whole point of such dimensions is that teachers can learn from these refections so that they can make informed decisions about their practice. Such a refective process can lead to an enhancement of language teachers’ understanding of the issue within 37

What Is Refective Practice?

the context where they teach. More specifcally, Zeichner and Liston (1996: 44–47) identify fve different dimensions of refective practice: 1. Rapid reaction: Something happens in class, and a teacher acts instinctively. The teacher is immediate in refection and action and considers various options related to the issue. 2. Repair: The teacher pauses for thought about what happened. May try to repair (fx) the situation. 3. Review: The teacher takes time out (hours or days) to reassess the issue/ situation rather than making any impulsive, on-the-spot decisions. 4. Research: The teacher researches the issue/situation in all its forms, perhaps by reading the relevant literature related to the issue at hand. 5. Retheorize/research: The teacher rethinks the issue/situation in light of what he/she has discovered during the previous four dimensions of refection and engages in more long-term refection while looking at what others have done. Such dimensions, according to Zeichner and Liston (1996), encourage refective practitioners to uncover their own personal theories (including where they originated) and make them explicit and then question these theories especially how they infuence practice. Refection 18 • Think of some issue you are interested in refecting on and try out each dimension by Zeichner and Liston (1996) and see what you have learned about your personal theories (their origins) and how they infuence your current practice.

Levels of Refection Linked to the idea of critical refection on morals and the concept of refectivity outlined earlier, is the conception that refection can be enacted at different levels. Most scholars agree on three different levels of refection that teachers can engage in: descriptive, conceptual and critical (also see previous section). Descriptive refection is an entry-level refection in which teachers focus on exploring their classroom actions and the actions 38

What Is Refective Practice?

of their students while in lessons. Teachers describe what is happening in their classrooms as the refection on their instructional skills and how their students react to their teaching. Here, teachers gather information or data to enact evidence-based descriptive refection (i.e., ‘what do I actually do?’ based on evidence collected, rather than ‘what do I think that I do?’ based on passing thoughts) as they document many different events that occur during their lessons. In fact, the remaining chapters in this book will give you many issues both inside and outside the classroom in which you can engage in evidence-based refective practice. The second level, conceptual refection, involves language teachers examining their rationale for practice. Whereas the frst level attempts to answer the question ‘what do I do?’, this second level seeks answers to the question ‘why do I do it?’ The third level, critical refection as noted in the previous section, involves examining the socio-political and moral and ethical results of their practice. Refection 19 • What is your understanding of the three different levels outlined earlier? • Do you agree with these different levels of refection? Why or why not? • Do you think that it is possible for a language teacher to refect at all three levels? Why or why not? • Which would be the most diffcult level for you to refect? Explain. • Check your current level: although the following questions are not very scientifc, they will nonetheless get you started on considering what level of refection you may be at and this will help facilitate a discussion on what level you want to refect at (adapted from Taggart & Wilson, 1998). Read the following statements and, for each statement, circle the number of the indicator that best refects your agreement, and give yourself points for each answer as follows: 4 = Almost always; 3 = Regularly; 2 = Situational; 1 = Seldom 1. I can identify a problem or puzzle related to my practice. 4 3 2 1 2. I analyze a problem/puzzle based upon the needs of the student. 4321 3. I seek evidence which supports or refutes my decision (in # 2). 4321 4. I view problems/puzzles in an ethical context. 4321 39

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5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30.

I use an organized approach to solving problems/puzzles. I am intuitive in making judgments. I creatively interpret problems/puzzles. My actions vary with the context of the problem/puzzle. I feel most comfortable with a set routine. I have strong commitment to values related to my practice. I am responsive to the educational needs of my students. I review my personal aims and actions related to my practice. I am fexible in my thinking related to my practice. I have a questioning nature. I welcome peer review of my professional actions. I use innovative ideas in my lessons. My teaching focus is on my lesson objectives. There is no best approach to teaching. I have the skills necessary to be a successful teacher. I have the content necessary to be a successful teacher. I consciously modify my teaching to meet my students’ needs. I complete tasks adequately. I understand concepts, procedures and skills related to practice. I consider the social implications of my practice. I set long-term teaching goals. I self-monitor my teaching. I evaluate my teaching effectiveness. My students usually meet my instructional objectives. I write about my practice regularly. I engage in action research.

4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321 4321

Scoring Procedures: Add up all the circled numbers. Total: ______

• What level was most evident? Descriptive = > 75; Conceptual = 75–104; Critical = 105–120. {{What attributes do you consider to be most indicative of a refective practitioner? {{Write examples of each of the numbered statements: create possible examples or actions derived from possession of each statement. {{At which level should teachers refect? 40

What Is Refective Practice?

Spirals of Refection So far in previous sections, the presentation of different types, dimensions and levels of refection suggests the process is linear and hierarchical in nature. However, even Dewey noted that teachers do not enter into such a linear process of refection because they may need to revisit previous ideas and/or decisions as their refections progress. Such a linear process suggests that any change that takes place does so in straight lines of refection. Indeed, Schön (1983, 1987) suggests that teachers, when confronted with nonroutine problems in their classrooms, engage in “a process of problem setting that that sees refection as a spiraling process of framing and reframing” (Clarke, 1995: 245). Instead of being a linear process, then, refection is more of a framing and reframing process that is both a spiral experience as well as a linear experience, but the process never really ends because of the presence of this spiral and where refection is ongoing. Refection 20 • Using the notion of framing and reframing, Clarke (1995: 246) suggests a teacher is refective when he/she is: {{Curious or intrigued about some aspect of the practice setting. {{Frames the aspect in terms of the particulars of the setting. {{Reframes that aspect in light of past knowledge or previous experience. {{Develops a plan for future action. • Can you think of a recent problem that occurred in your classroom that made you curious? • Frame this curiosity in terms of the setting that you were and how the setting may have infuenced the occurrence of this problem. • Reframe this problem in light of some previous experiences you may have had with this same problem. • Develop a plan of action that may help you in the future should this problem occur again.

Typologies of Refection Over the years many different typologies associated with refective practice have emerged, and each represents different theoretical traditions and underlying assumptions and beliefs about refection and refective 41

What Is Refective Practice?

practice. I will state up front that my own typology of refective practice, much of which is outlined in the chapter that follows, is infuenced by both Dewey’s and Schön’s models. Of course, all the different typologies that have emerged cannot be featured in the chapter because of space limitations, but I recommend you read some of the main typologies such as those by David Kolb, Graham Gibbs, Christopher Johns, Stephen Brookfeld and Terry Borton (see Farrell, 2019 for a detailed discussion). Initially I developed an early model of refective practice that emphasized a practical approach (hence my interest in Schön’s (1983) pragmatic approach to refective practice) with the idea that practicing language teachers would be better able to locate themselves within their profession and start to take more responsibility for shaping their practice, rather than relying on publisher-produced materials and books that were rampant in the language teaching profession at that time. I saw a need for teachers to be able to break away from relying on these badly produced textbooks with teacher guides to tell them what they should be doing rather than taking responsibility for their own direction while teaching their students. My initial framework (Farrell, 2004) attempted to encourage teachers to look at their own practice with other teachers and decide their own future direction in terms of providing opportunities for their students to learn. This framework of refective teaching is composed of fve components: (a) a range of opportunities and activities, (b) ground rules, (c) provision for four different times or categories of refection, (d) external input and (e) trust. After refecting on both Dewey and Schön’s work as well as other scholars and revisited my early framework of refection following my work with three experienced Canadian ESL teachers (Farrell, 2014) to see if I could develop a more holistic framework of refective practice for TESOL professionals. I also re-examined other different models and frameworks presented earlier to see if these held any useful points for me to consider. This led to the development of my framework (Farrell, 2015) for refecting on practice that has fve different stages/levels of refection: Philosophy; Principles; Theory; Practice and Beyond Practice (see sections that follow). Refection 21 • Read Farrell’s (2019, chapter 2) outline of different typologies of refective practice and consider which ones appeal to you and why. • Which typology do you like and why? 42

What Is Refective Practice?

Refecting on Philosophy As mentioned previously, the frst stage of the framework, philosophy, examines the teacher-as-person because a teacher’s basic philosophy has developed since birth. By talking about past experiences that may have shaped their philosophy, teachers obtain self-knowledge by refecting on their background (i.e., heritage, ethnicity, socioeconomic background, family and personal values) (see also Chapter 2, Refection 2). Although teachers can simply write an in-depth autobiography, one way to engage teachers in this stage is through narrative frames in which they tell a story of their experience or accounts of their life through prompts (i.e., I became a teacher because . . .). Narrative frames offer insight into the past to articulate tacitly held ideas about teaching and learning, as well as help language teachers answer the ‘who am I?’ identity question. Refection 22 • Luft and Ingham (1963) used a technique called the “Jo-Hari Window” to help people understand themselves not only from their point of view, but also from the point of view of others. This window consists of four different sections that helps a person fesh out different categories of the self, as indicated in Figure 3.1. Known to Self

Unknown to Self

Known To Others

Open Self

Blind Self

Unknown To Others

Secret Self

Hidden Self

Figure 3.1 Jo-Hari Window {{Open

Self: The ‘open self’ is known to self and others and consists of anything about you (your name, race and so on) that is evident to others as well as to yourself; consider that you know lots more about yourself than others do, so a lot depends on how much of yourself you may want to reveal to others in order to get some feedback. A lot also depends on how much feedback you receive and are willing to receive from others so that you can better understand yourself. {{Secret Self: The ‘secret self’ is known to self, but not to others. For example, some teachers may feel insecure about teaching and even refecting on their teaching but outwardly they may appear confdent 43

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to others as teachers. For greater understanding of the self, we will decide what to reveal to others about our insecurities so that we can become more aware of who we really are. {{Hidden Self: The ‘hidden self’ is just that, hidden knowledge which is concealed from others and ourselves and consists of aspects of our selves that if revealed in some manner can produce positive surprises. For example, we may have potential to be good mentors for our colleagues, but this potential remains hidden and is waiting to be discovered. {{Blind Self: The ‘blind self’ is known to others, but not to self. For example, we may assume our instructions are always clear, yet our students are confused about what they are really being asked to do, and so this blind self can be reduced somewhat by asking others for some feedback such as getting feedback from students, or our peers. When we open our blind self, we may have the most potential for growth in our level of awareness of who we are as human beings and teachers. • Explore each ‘self’ and refect on how you reveal yourself (to yourself and others) and what you would like to work on in terms of becoming more aware of yourself and your teaching self. • Work with a peer or a group of teachers that you know and trust and try to obtain feedback on specifc aspects of your life as a teacher that you are curious about from their viewpoint and see what you can learn about yourself as a teacher. • Is the teacher you are the person you are?

Refecting on Principles The second stage, principles, encompasses a teacher’s refections of assumptions, beliefs and conceptions about teaching and learning. Assumptions are ideas that we accept as being true despite a lack of evidence. Although assumptions are somewhat diffcult to describe, it can be described as having an intuition about what makes ‘good’ or ‘bad’ teaching. To access assumptions, teachers can refect on teacher maxims, as these guide instructional decisions (i.e., maxim of empowerment—give learners the control). One method that teachers can use to become aware of their assumptions is by talking about teachers (from their school days 44

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or present-day colleagues) they admire. Our choices of these ‘role model teachers’ can reveal our own biases, agendas and assumptions and, in many instances, we frequently choose as role models teachers whose qualities and abilities we would like to emulate and people who excel in the kinds of things we wish we could do. In contrast to assumptions, beliefs are accepted to be true by an individual, can be unconsciously held, originate from a number of sources and may or may not converge with practice. To articulate beliefs, teachers can use images or metaphors or choose statements that best refects their beliefs about teaching and learning as these can be valuable clues to the way teachers view teaching and a guide to the way they act in the classroom. Refection 23 • What are your assumptions about teaching and learning? • Refect on teachers from your school days or present-day colleagues you admire: {{What role model teachers do you admire in terms of representing what a teacher should be? {{What characteristics have you observed in these people that, in your opinion, make them so admirable? {{Which of their actions most typifes what it is that you fnd so admirable about them? {{Which of their abilities or actions would you most like to be able to integrate into your own teaching and why? Or, which of their abilities or talents are absent from your teaching now? • What are your beliefs about teaching and learning? • How do these beliefs infuence your teaching? • Where do your beliefs come from (what is the source)? • What do your learners believe about learning? • What do your learners believe about your teaching? • How do these beliefs infuence their approach to learning?

Refecting on Theory The third stage requires teachers to refect on theories that underlie their practice, whether those are based on hunches, teacher training, books, journals and so on, to see how they translate in the classroom. A theory 45

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attempts to answer the question ‘why?’ in order to increase knowledge of practice and realign thoughts regarding this. By refecting on theory, one can label what happens in the classroom and understand how it infuences the role of both the teacher and students during a lesson. At this stage, the teacher focuses on how they plan their lessons (see Chapter 6 for more on lesson planning) as well as analyzing critical incidents (see also Chapter 2) that happen inside the classroom. A critical incident is any unplanned and unanticipated event that occurs during class but is clearly recalled but only becomes ‘critical’ when subjected to conscious refection (see also Chapter 6). Refection 24 • Recall an incident that you would consider critical to you as a language teacher: {{Why was this incident signifcant to you? {{What happened directly before the event? {{What happened directly after the event? {{How did you react at the time of the event? {{What is your interpretation of this event? {{What underlying assumptions about your teaching does this critical incident raise for you? {{Now that you have refected on this critical incident, would you react any differently if it happened again? Why or why not?

Refecting on Practice The fourth stage, practice, is the most visible aspect of what a language teacher does, because we can observe the teacher while teaching a class (see also Chapter 6 for more on classroom observation). This stage is strongly connected to the frst three stages, as development of awareness of the convergence or divergence between belief and practice is the start of a process of reducing any inconsistencies between what we think we do while teaching and what we actually do while teaching. Refecting on our practice can bring to light the reasons for convergence or divergence between philosophy, principles and theory with our practice. The main purpose for such refection is that we can prepare for future action using the knowledge gained from exploring what happened during 46

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a class and what was refected on after a class so that we can look for any inconsistencies between our foundational principles and our actual classroom teaching practices. Refection 25 • Do you think a teacher’s foundational principles (the frst three stages of the framework outlined previously) should always converge with a teacher’s actual classroom practices? Why or why not? • If a teacher engages in more than 1,000 interpersonal interactions each day while teaching, how can they become more aware of everything that is happening in their classrooms (see also Chapter 9 that will provide many ideas on how to observe lessons)? • How many interpersonal interactions do you engage in each day, each class?

Refecting Beyond Practice The fnal phase, beyond practice or critical refection, explores the moral, political, emotional, ethical, and social issues that impact teachers practice both inside and outside the classroom. This stage of refection helps language teachers understand the deeply rooted power dynamics within the feld of language education and is able to question any that may have been externally imposed. With the knowledge gained from this stage, language teachers can become more aware of the impact of language teaching on society and press for any social change for the betterment of their students, colleagues and community in which they work. Refection 26 • Do you think teachers should look beyond their practice and refect on how they impact and are impacted by society? • What are your beliefs about power relations in your classroom, and where do they originate from? • What are the hierarchical structures and traditions within the place you teach and is collaboration with peers encouraged or discouraged? 47

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Tailoring Refection Although I introduce many different types and modes of refection in this book, it should be noted at this early stage that I am not advocating for any one type or mode of refection, as each can be tailored to each individual teacher’s and/or group’s needs. For example, in the chapters that follow, I outline and discuss dialogic refection both from an individual perspective and from a group perspective, yet I am fully aware some language teachers may not feel comfortable sharing their ideas in a group. In addition, I outline and discuss writing as a means of refection, yet I know some language teachers who do not like to write in their frst language. The same holds for classroom observations as I know language teachers who are terrifed of being observed or even observing themselves on videotape. As you read on, no doubt you will have preferred ways of refecting, so I want to point out at this early stage of your reading of this book that this is OK. Also, read about some cautions in the section that follows. Refection 27 • As you read along, please tailor all activities to your particular needs.

Some Cautions As you get started and move forward in your refective journey with the contents of this book, I would like to point out that there are some obstacles that you may need to overcome as you refect. One of these is that it may be diffcult for some teachers, especially learner language teachers and novice language teachers who have not yet build up their repertoire of teaching skills, to engage in interactive refection while they teach. This is understandable, as many teachers are focused in teaching the content of the lesson in that moment and fear that such active refections during lessons may lead to some form of paralysis and result in a dysfunctional classroom. However, refection during action may be the only way to quickly realize at that moment that you may need to make instant changes while teaching (see also Chapter 9). Thus, most language teachers from learner/novice to advanced who have not engaged in refective practice before taking up the contents of this book, may need some more time and opportunity to practice refection and hopefully with a facilitator who can guide them through 48

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these early refections. Because lessons are fast-paced, it will take some practice to be able to refect in action, but with practice this will become easier. In addition, when refecting in the company of others, some language teachers may be shy to share their refections because exposing oneself in a group of colleagues or complete strangers (such as refecting with other teachers) can lead to understandable feelings of vulnerability. Thus, it will be important to establish trust in all group refections. The chapter that follows outlines and discusses how language teachers can engage in group refections through trust (see also Chapter 6 on critical friends). One fnal note of caution is that refection can be diffcult, because you may not know what you will fnd and as such you must have a tolerance for ambiguity associated with your refective practices. Thus, you must actively challenge your routines (see previous section) as you undergo the trouble of searching while enduring suspense of not knowing what you will discover about yourself and your practice. Refection 28 • • • •

Which of the cautions outlined earlier do you agree with and why? Which of the cautions outlined earlier do you disagree with and why? Are you ready to challenge your routines of practice? Can you think of any other cautions that teachers should think about regarding refective practice? List them.

Conclusion This chapter was about you getting started with refective practice by discussing routine, bandwagons related to the concept of refection, refection as a process, action and product, as well as moral refection, types, dimensions, levels, spirals and typologies of refective practice. The chapter then asked how you can recognize a refective practitioner before outlining some key features of a refective teacher. Finally, the chapter noted that refection may be diffcult to undertake in all its forms, but with practice and guidance, it will become easier. That said, I am confdent that as you move through the remaining chapters in this book you will become more aware of your philosophy, principles, theories, practices and the impact of all of these on your place as a language teacher within a context.

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4

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Activities Covered • • • • • • • • •

Writing Why Write a Teaching Journal? Starting a Teaching Journal Types of Teaching Journals Audience Using Teaching Journals Effectively Teacher Narrative Writing Teacher Research Writing Technology and Writing

Introduction Engaging in refective practice generally entails language teachers taking a step back to think about what they do as teachers. This chapter outlines a tool that language teachers can use to refect on their work, and that is to write about it. Writing about teaching can help organize our thoughts into more systematic refections about our work, especially if that writing is linked to the other refective activities suggested in this book. This chapter suggests that by writing about various aspects of our practice in a teaching journal and then looking for patterns within these written accounts, we can obtain even more evidence about our practice that can be used to make more informed choices about our teaching. The chapter outlines and discusses why writing is a good idea, how to start a teaching journal, the different types and levels of writing, the notion of who we write for (audience), how to use teaching journals 50

DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-4

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effectively, narrative and research writing and using technology to help us write our refections.

Writing The act of writing is a social activity, which may seem like a strange remark to start a discussion about writing—at least at frst glance. Writing, however, when mentioned to anyone in passing conversation, seems to be a solitary act featuring a person, with pen in hand or fngers on computer keyboard or phone keyboard, ready to write about something personal to the writer. Yet, in this chapter, I suggest that writing is not an isolated act in which we lock ourselves away in some room writing for ourselves. We are in fact ‘interacting’ with the text, as we can ‘see’ what we are thinking, or our internal dialogue (see previous chapter). So, writing is a process of discovery for the writer, because by writing down our thoughts about a topic and/issue we are thinking about, we can come to know ourselves better as we shape and reshape who we are and who we want to be. By writing our thoughts over a period of time, we can actually see patterns emerge about who we are and want to be and even our growth and development. We can then choose to share (or not) our writing with others to make the social cycle complete (see following section). The act of writing for language teachers has a built-in refective mechanism that encourages teachers to stop to think about what they are thinking about in the frst place. In such a manner writing helps us organize our internal dialogue with the self before writing anything because we must decide what to actually write in words on paper or computer screen. Thus, we can ‘see’ our thoughts as we write them and, as a result, we can refect on them for greater self-understanding and development. As E. M. Forster (1956) suggested, how do we know what we think until we see what we say? In other words, our internal dialogue can be messy and diffcult to get a hold of because our heads are sometimes flled with all sorts of thoughts feverishly moving around in tangled clumps of intertwining messages that are too fast to consider separately or even consider at all. The act of writing helps the writer to better control this internal dialogue and, as a result of reading what they have written, can re-refect on its signifcance. For language teachers, such refective writing can include written accounts of teachers’ thoughts, observations, beliefs, attitudes and experiences about their practice both inside and outside the classroom 51

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(Farrell, 2013). Teachers can include records of incidents, problems and insights that occurred before, during and after lessons as well as any other signifcant events occurring in their professional lives so that they can gain new understandings of their own learning and professional practices. Thus, when language teachers take the time to write in a teaching journal about their practice, they can express their opinions, hypothesize about their practice, and of course refect on what happened during their practice and then compare the results. In addition, I encourage language teachers and other readers of this book to include writing as a mode of refection when engaging with the 120 refection activities outlined throughout this book. In the sections that follow in this chapter, I outline and discuss various modes and reasons for language teachers to engage in writing as refection. Refection 29 • Do you like to write? • Have you ever written any kind of diary or journal? If so, what kind of entries did you make? • Have you ever written a diary or journal about your learning of another language or any other type of learning? If so, what kind of entries did you make? • Have you ever written a teaching journal (exclusively about teaching)? If so, what kind of entries did you make? • If you have never written any kind of diary or journal, do you think it would be useful for a language teacher (or student) do write a journal? If yes, what kind of entries would you expect to fnd in such a journal? • What is your understanding of the phrase ‘How do I know what I think until I see what I say?’ • Do you know what you think before you write? • What would your slogan be for getting the written word on paper or a computer?

Why Write a Teaching Journal? Although the role of writing as a method for language teacher refection has not been widely acknowledged either positively or negatively by language educators existing research nevertheless suggests that journal writing can help language teachers (both beginning and experienced) think more about 52

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their practice. Writing in a teaching journal regularly can be very cathartic, especially if the journal is used to let off steam about frustrations encountered during the teaching day. Language teachers can also write about their successes in the classroom as well. By writing about what went wrong and what went well in classrooms, language teachers can look for patterns in both to see if they can come up with reasons why they perceived these classroom events as having been successful or not. In this way, language teachers seek to be more systematic in our refections when analyzing their teaching. Thus, as outlined in this chapter, a teaching journal is seen as a tool for language teachers to use in order to explore their teaching beliefs and practices. By writing regularly about teaching, teachers can begin to see patterns in their work, how they think about aspects of their work, what their beliefs are and how they teach. A more detailed analysis of teaching journals can even reveal if there are any differences between beliefs about teaching and actual classroom practices. In addition, by writing a teaching journal, language teachers can freeze-frame their practice so that they can refect deliberately on it. In addition, journal writing can be used to collect data about topics language teachers want to refect on in the form of an action research project to discover patterns about teaching over time. By discovering these patterns, language teachers can fnd areas of their practice they may need to change, or they may discover that they are happy with what they have discovered in their journals. The point is, teachers can become more aware of what they are doing by writing about it in a teaching journal. Through different forms of journal writing, individual writing and/or writing for a group, language teachers can step back from an experience and refect on it from afar, thus creating their own meaning of what they are reading through analyzing and interpreting their teaching experiences. In addition, journals can be a place for teachers to collaborate with one another on projects, new innovations in teaching and their opinions of new curriculum initiatives. Refection 30 • List reasons for wanting to write in a teaching journal about your teaching. • List reasons for not wanting to write in a teaching journal about your teaching. • How does writing freeze-frame our work? • Would you share your writing with other teachers? Why or why not? 53

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Starting a Teaching Journal Many language teachers say that starting to write a teaching journal is the most diffcult part of the process mostly because they say they cannot get any words on paper or computer screen. Many suggest that they suffer from a form of ‘writer’s block.’ Indeed, ‘writer’s block’ is a phenomenon in which a writer just cannot get anything down on paper (or word processor), and it can become a real nightmare for someone who is writing for a deadline. We have all ‘suffered’ from some form of this block at times because we may have lost faith in ourselves and our writing abilities. I write a lot, and over the years I have found that one of the best ways of physically getting words on paper and/or computer is to ‘freewrite.’ In freewriting, you just write whatever comes into your head and this process forces you to overcome the ‘block.’ The idea of the freewrite is not to produce a polished fnished piece of writing; rather, the point is to just write whatever comes to mind and, over time, the writer will learn to trust his or her own writing abilities and to just keep going regardless of what is produced. So much of our writing time and energy is spent not writing, because we worry so much about the fnal product. You just have to trust yourself and your ability to write. In freewriting, you are engaged in the process (not product) of writing, rather than the product of writing, so short bursts of uninterrupted writing will help get thoughts into written form. Over time, this form of freewriting will enable you to write without much thought about the writing process itself, such as how to choose the correct grammar while thinking about the correct word, that many times stops us from refecting. Think of this approach to writing like spontaneous speech, in which we ‘blurt out’ words many times without much thought. Later, if you desire, you can begin to consider the type and level of writing you want to engage in (see following section), and who will eventually read it (see following section), but not at this freewriting stage. This is the way to start writing in your refective teaching journal. Refection 31 • Do you think freewriting is useful? • Try a freewrite on any topic of interest. Write for ten minutes without stopping; just try it and see what happens. • What did you discover as a result of this freewrite? • Was the process comfortable or not? 54

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Types of Teaching Journals A teaching journal can be written alone, in the form of a diary for private use and not to be shared, and many language teachers engage in such writing and beneft a lot from refecting on the patterns they see emerge after a period of time. Or the journal can be written as part of group writing to and for each other. Additionally, teachers can collaborate on the actual writing of the journal entries if they want to share in the construction of the actual journal in the form of an interactive type of group journal (like a group essay). This would be an example of true group collaboration (see also Chapter 5). Also, language teachers can ‘speak’ or ‘talk’ their journal entries into a recorder (portable or fxed) for later analysis. The teacher can decide if he/she wants to transcribe all or parts of the tape. Teaching journals that require other teachers to read them usually require the audience to respond to the author (see following section). Teachers also must consider different types of levels of writing teachers can engage in when writing a journal such as descriptive writing, descriptive refection, dialogic refection and critical refective writing. Descriptive writing (not refective) reports events that occurred or is a report of something you have read in the literature. There is no attempt to provide reasons or justifcations for the events. Its main purpose is to provide a support or a starting point for the framework. Descriptive refection attempts to provide reasons and justifcations for events or actions, but in a descriptive way. Although there is some recognition of alternative viewpoints, it is mainly based upon personal judgement; for example, I chose this problem-solving activity because I believe the learners should be active rather than passive. Dialogic refection demonstrates a ‘stepping back’ from the events/actions leading to a different level of thinking about the internal dialogue through the exploration of possible reasons. Critical refection demonstrates a level of awareness that classroom (and beyond) actions and events are explained by multiple perspectives. It involves giving reasons for decisions or events, which considers the broader historical, social and/or political contexts. What must be recognized, however, is that the issues of student management experienced with this class can only be understood within the wider structural locations of power relationships established between teachers and students in schools as social institutions based upon the principle of control. 55

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Refection 32 • Which of the types of teaching journal presented in the previous section most appeals to you: {{A notebook journal? {{A word-processed journal? {{A private journal? {{A journal with a group? {{A journal constructed as a group? {{A ‘speak’ (audio recording)? • Try to think of any other type or format of teaching journal. • What level of writing do you think is most important (if any) among the four in the previous list? • What level would be the most diffcult for you and why?

Audience I mentioned earlier that the main idea of using a teaching journal is to write about our practices as regularly as possible over a period of time and then to analyze these entries for patterns and conspicuous events. Alternatively, these teaching journals need not be analyzed. If they are not analyzed, then they become a history of what the language teacher is doing/ has done without any formal analysis. So, language teachers can write for themselves where the teacher is both the writer and the audience of the journal. However, in order to make these journal entries even more meaningful for the language teacher, they should be examined after some time and analyzed for recurring patterns of events or themes. This way, teachers can become more aware of themselves; their teaching behaviors and their beliefs, values and practices; and their students. On the other hand, teachers can write for other teachers (or supervisors) so that they can read it and maybe make comments and/or give suggestions (as with a group of teachers). When writing for others, it is important to note that it is the writer’s responsibility to make the entries clear and not the reader’s responsibility to have to make interpretations about what the writer may be trying to say. Teachers must also decide if they want the reader(s) to make comments about what was written (oral or in writing). I cannot say how teachers should respond to another teacher’s journal, as each entry will most likely be specifc to the context. However, I would suggest that 56

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each teacher use nonjudgmental and supportive language when writing a response to a journal entry. Refection 33 • If you write a journal for others (supervisor, group), what type of response would you like to see? • Would you like the reader to challenge you? Why, why not? • Would you like the reader to make judgments or not? • Would you like the responses in writing or orally given? Why? • Should you respond to the responses? • What cautions would you give a peer/group about how to respond to a teacher’s journal? • Try to make up a list of rules about how teachers should respond to each other’s journals.

Using Teaching Journals Effectively As noted in the previous section, it is always diffcult to start writing a teaching journal because of writer’s block but also because there are so many topics that language teachers can choose to focus on, from micro-type topics such as: group work in class, giving of instructions, the use of questions and giving feedback/correction of errors, to more macro concerns such as lesson planning, textbook selection, curriculum development and administration infuences. Both micro and macro lists of issues that concern teachers are endless. With that in mind, I suggest that teachers start refecting through journal writing by starting on a general topic frst rather than jumping into their teaching with too critical a view. I have found over the years that language teachers can be their own worst critics and for the most part only focus on the negative and completely forget what they do well and what goes well in their classrooms. So, it may be more benefcial just to begin a teaching journal and make regular entries whenever possible. I used teaching journals with a group of experienced language teachers (Farrell, 2014), and I discovered that these teachers wrote about similar topics in their teaching journals over a sixteen-week period. The most frequent topic in the teachers’ journals over the sixteen-week period of refections related to their approaches and methods of teaching (ffty-six references), followed by evaluating their teaching (forty-nine references), their theories 57

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of teaching (thirty-nine references), their levels of self-awareness (ffteen references) and various questions they raised about teaching (fve references). Regarding their approaches and methods of teaching, the teachers wrote more frequently about their methods of teaching and the procedures they use in their classrooms and about the content of their lessons. They rarely wrote about the theories underlying these approaches/methods. Their source of knowledge was mostly traced to their classroom experience. Although they mentioned their students the broader school contexts, the major focus remained in their classroom experiences. The teachers evaluated their teaching more negatively than positively and primarily in terms of the problems that occurred. However, they generated few solutions of their own. Regarding theories and beliefs, the teachers wrote about their personal beliefs (personal opinions) and justifcations. There were no references to actual theories of teaching or learning. The last two categories consisted of references to perceptions of themselves as teachers and the infrequent asking of questions seeking advice. What is striking about all these entries is that the teachers never wrote about the successes or joys of teaching. In fact, they saw the teaching journal primarily as a place to let off steam about their teaching. Alternatively, some teachers may already have issues that they consider important to them, and they explore these issues by writing about them in their journal. However, sometimes these issues may remain at the tacit level of refection, and I have found that attempting to answer the following question useful in raising the tacit refections to the level of conscious awareness: refect on a recent teaching practice or experience in the classroom, positive or negative, that caused you to stop and think about your teaching. In attempting to answer such a question, language teachers must refect (through journal writing) on their assumptions and beliefs about the experience they have recalled, thus becoming more critical refective practitioners. Additionally, I suggest that language teachers continue to write about the focused topic for at least a month while reviewing their entries each week. At the end of the month, it may be a good idea to write a summary of some of the important events that arose and what has been learned as a result of the refection process. Refection 34 • Which of the fve topics presented earlier would you write about in a teaching journal? Why? 58

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and methods to teaching? {{Evaluating teaching? {{Theories of teaching? {{Self-awareness of oneself as a teacher? {{Questions about teaching? • Try think of other topics to write about in teaching.

Teacher Narrative Writing As an alternative to writing a teaching journal, language teachers can also write their own story to express their identities, their personal experiences, and even the conficting beliefs and values as they enter teaching as a novice and/or as an experienced teacher who has accumulated many experiences throughout their teaching lives. By writing their stories, language teachers can feel cathartic relief, as the story-telling process offers an outlet for tensions, feelings and frustrations about teaching. For example, novice language teachers who are feeling frustrated about the reality of what they see in classrooms in their frst years of teaching, which differ from their expectations while training in pre-service, can write about these as their story and also remind themselves why they became teachers (see also Chapter 2 on life history). There are many different ways to write your teaching story. You can freewrite (see earlier section) without paying attention to the organization, grammar or word choice, as discussed previously. You can, alternatively, write a poem that tells your story, or you can write your story in a formal essay style that is structured into paragraphs and follows formal writing conventions. Any of these ways of writing will be useful for language teachers, and many will have other different ways to write that will make complete sense to them. However, when you write a narrative, you should do so with the idea of making sense of it and in order to do this, you can follow a framework to make it useful so you can reach the level of awareness that you are seeking. The framework I use for such writing has the following story structure: orientation, complication, evaluation and result. Orientation provides most of the initial necessary background details and answers the following questions: Who? When? What? Where? Complication is the ‘meat’ of the story because it gives most of the details about what happened and usually the problem that occurred, along with any turning point in the story. Evaluation answers the question: So what? 59

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What does the story mean for the participants? Result outlines and explains the resolution to the problem/crisis. When you use this adapted framework to situate your story, you can get a clearer hold over what it all means to you, the deeper hidden assumptions you have, as you try to give it some meaning. You can recreate whatever pedagogical actions may have led to the complication you talk about if you give a concise orientation to your story by listing all of the people involved in the story and indicating when and where this story occurred. As you begin to evaluate the meaning of the story for your professional lives, you also begin to conceptualize the set of important theoretical issues associated with your story that may have otherwise gone unnoticed. In this way, you can achieve a result that will give you a clearer understanding of your practice so you can achieve fresh perspectives, new insights and a sense of self-renewal. Refection 35 • Write a narrative about any aspect of your practice that includes the story structure: orientation, complication, evaluation, and result. • Discuss this with a peer.

Teacher Research Writing Another form of writing that language teachers can engage in is teacher research writing. Such writing entails a more formal approach to engaging in research about language learning and teaching. Throughout their teaching careers, from the pre-service training years to the novice and in-service years, language teachers have been told what to do by so-called experts who mostly come from university education departments armed with research. Unfortunately, most of this research has been conducted on teachers by academics for academics, rather than with teachers for teachers. In other words, throughout their careers, many language teachers have experienced research as something that is conducted on them by others. More often than not, the results of such research never get back to the teachers or to the institutions that hosted the outside researchers in the frst place. If the results are in fact shared, then they are shared in the form of a prescription: teachers are expected to translate the results into action with the assumption that their practice will automatically improve as a result. Thus, the language teacher has often been seen as a consumer, but not a generator, of research. 60

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Recently, however, language teachers have been encouraged to become generators of their own knowledge rather than consumers of others, and they can do this by engaging in research that is usually in written form. I was lucky to be the series editor of TESOL’s Language Teacher Research (LTR) six-volume series, in which each volume was organized around a template to help teachers and readers compare across chapters and volumes by looking at aspects such as the research issue, background literature, procedures, results and refection. This was explained as follows: • Issue: The statement of the issue includes a brief description of the context and the participants. • Background literature: This brief review of the literature asks language teachers to write only about the background literature relating to the issue being researched. • Procedures: Language teachers document the procedures fashioned or responses made to the issue. • Result: What were the results of the issue researched? • Refection: What will the language teachers do now and in the future? What has the language teacher learned as a result of the process? Refection 36 • If you can access any of the LTR books in the series, comment on the different research topics across all six continents. Do you think any topic that was investigated was more important than another topic and why or why not? • Read about International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL) teacher research initiatives and all of the teacher research books they have generated all freely available to download from the IATEFL Research Special Interest Group: http://resig.weebly. com/books.htm. • What would you like to write about concerning a research focus? • If you have decided on a topic, try to follow the LTR template presented earlier as you go about doing this research. • What do you think is the biggest obstacle to you conducting research in your own classroom? How can you overcome this? • What kind of support would you need to do classroom research? How can you overcome this? 61

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Technology and Writing With advancements in technology, different ways of promoting ‘discussions’ beyond face-to-face interactions using technology-enhanced environments have become more popular, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, Google Docs, an online collaborative word processor, is a platform that can provide optimum opportunities for collaboration among language teachers. Teachers can write position papers for each other or really anything on this platform, and its simplicity means all can access easily. The issues of audience and feedback will be important to decide here, too (see previous section for more on these). Other writing platforms that can be used for collaboration by teachers for the purposes of refection include forums, chats, blogs, wikis and Twitter. Such online formats are easy to use (do not require understanding of HTML or web scripting), interactive and can be continuously updated. Any teacher can create a blog with an MS Word document and without any knowledge of web scripting. A blog is really an online journal, but instead of being fxed when written as in journal writing, blogs can be easily updated when the teacher wants to add further thoughts, opinions and refections. Blog writing can relieve the emotional stress language teachers may be feeling as a result of some teaching event and can expect a response from other teachers so that they can further refect on that event or issue. Edublogs (www.edublogs.org) is s free blogging service that is completely dedicated to educators. Wikis are another online option for teachers to refect collaboratively on their practice and, like blogs, require little technical knowledge to set up. Work is automatically posted online when you are fnished writing the page, and unlike blogs, they are designed solely for collaboration among groups of users such as teachers. PB Wiki (http://pbwiki.com), for example, is a popular wiki service for educators and is very easy to use. Language teachers can also refect together using Twitter, usually in one or two sentences with a maximum of 140 characters in a tweet. Twitter is fast becoming very popular as a form of communication and interaction for language teachers in many different contexts. Teachers use Twitter when seeking advice about a particular way to teach one of the skills or to undertake research or to fnd out if others had similar experiences with a particular method of teaching. It is a powerful social media networking mechanism, and for that reason alone is very useful in instantly connecting language teachers from around the globe. 62

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Refection 37 • How have you made use of technology to write your refections? • What are your favorite modes of online platforms to use for your refections?

Conclusion Teachers do a lot of writing within their workday, be it on lesson planning, reports on students’ progress or the like, but they seldom take time to write for themselves professionally about their practice. This chapter has outlined and discussed how language teachers can write to refect on their practice individually and/or in groups, and that such writing can include teacher journals, narratives, and teacher research writing as well as using technology to write (e.g., blogs, wikis, twitter). By writing regularly, teachers are able to identify and address issues critical to their practice within their teaching contexts, and as a result can provide more learning opportunities for their students. Teachers can revisit their writing in order to make sense of it so that they can better understand themselves as language teachers. Interpretations based on patterns noticed in these journals can help teachers make more informed decisions about their practice. Writing in whatever form language teachers decide can be used in conjunction with the other modes of refection outlined in this book, and readers can write their refections to all 120 refective activities outlined in all the chapters of the book.

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Refecting in Groups

Activities Covered • • • • • • • • • • • •

Dialogue Group Refections Type of Group Setting Up Groups Roles and Responsibilities Modes of Refection Communicating and Interacting in Groups Trust Time Sustaining the Group Evaluating the Group Resisting Plateauing With Groups

Introduction The previous chapters introduced you to different aspects of refection including the types, dimensions, levels and my typology of refection, and recognizing key features of a refective practitioner. This approach seems to indicate that refection is an individual activity in which language teachers refect alone without any input from peers, colleagues, supervisors, mentors and/or administrators. In addition, the previous chapter on written refections also could lead to conclusions that refection can be a solitary writing process as one interacts with the written page or online instrument. However, in the opening chapter I also pointed out that refection is community-based and that Dewey (1933) originally maintained that refection 64

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is best practiced in the company of others. This chapter outlines how language teachers can dialogue with other language teachers as they form and maintain refective groups. The chapter outlines and discusses the different types of groups, how to set up a group, the members’ roles and responsibilities, different modes of refection, communicating and interacting in a group, the concepts of trust, time when working in groups, how to sustain and evaluate groups and resisting plateauing with groups.

Dialogue Dialogue is a large part of humans’ thinking processes, be it as internal dialogue with the self or more external dialogue with others. For language teachers, as Kumaravadivelu (2012: 95) has noted, “teaching is a refective activity which at once shapes and is shaped by the doing of theorizing which in turn is bolstered by the collaborative process of dialogic inquiry.” Refective practice through dialogue of course begins with the self where a teacher engages in internal dialogue about his or her own practice. However, this dialogue with self can be expanded to include others such as a group of language teachers that form a teacher refection group. Language teachers can engage in refective dialogue either face-to-face or in an online mode. As Mann and Walsh (2017: 8) point out, refection benefts from such dialogue because it “is a crucial part of the refection-action-further-action cycle, since it allows for clarifcation, questioning and ultimately enhanced understanding.” When language teachers engage in individual refections through internal dialogue, they can feel safe and focused as they follow their own schedule. When language teachers engage in dialogic refections with other teachers, they can receive more support and more ideas and feedback than from their own internal dialogic refections. Language teachers’ dialogic refection with other teachers in groups can facilitate sharing and exchange of ideas and resources as well as expertise. Refection 38 • How do you think internal dialogue can beneft a language teacher’s refections? • How do you think dialoging with other teachers can beneft a language teacher’s refections? 65

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• What are the advantages and disadvantages of internal dialogic refection? • What are the advantages and disadvantages of dialogic refection with others?

Group Refections Language teachers can engage in refective practice by themselves, as noted previously, and this is a good starting point for many learner language teachers who may be a bit uncertain about the process. However, while we are self-refecting, we may encounter issues or situations that may be unpleasant, and so we may avoid these and become biased in our refections to only topics that do not upset us. In other words, we can become biased in what we self-refect on, so we may need to be challenged because we may become too comfortable with our teaching or because we have not asked ourselves some hard questions about what we do. Thus, we may need to be challenged about our beliefs, and the only real way of doing this is to share them with other teachers. One way of encouraging such dialogue with others is by forming teacher refection groups in which individual teachers can share their beliefs, ideas and practices and get feedback and more ideas about activities and other such support. Language teachers join a teacher development group in order to pursue professional development, because individually they can only do so much such as attend conferences, read the literature on language teaching, and selfmonitor their teaching. In such group settings, whether face-to-face or on online platforms, language teachers can encourage more exploration of teaching and learning and as a result gain more of an understanding of their individual practice. Such communities of practice can help language teachers to (re)confgure, defne and redefne their philosophy, principles, theory, practice and critical refections beyond practice. Engaging in such dialogue with other professionals increases the likelihood that teachers will learn something from each other, because each individual teacher will bring a different perspective to the discussions. In such a manner, entering into discussions with another teacher or group of teachers can result in new knowledge, new perspectives and new understandings that would have been diffcult to obtain for teachers refecting alone. Of course, there are always some issues that can disrupt dialogue in groups such as dominating 66

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members and agendas, issues of trust, lack of focus and other issues I hope to cover in this chapter. Consequently, language teachers should consider what type of group they want, how to set it up, the members’ roles and responsibilities, the modes of preferred refection, how to communicate, trust and time factors and how to sustain and evaluate the results of the group discussions. Refection 39 • Which do you think would be a more effective mode for teachers to refect: as individuals, or as a group of teachers (three or more) refecting on together? • Outline the advantages and disadvantages of each mode of refection. • Why form your group of teachers? What is the purpose of your group? • If you think a group is more effective for teachers to refect, then how would you go about the following: what type of group, how to set it up, the members roles and responsibilities, the modes of preferred refection, how to communicate, trust and time factors and how to sustain and evaluate the results of the group discussions? Compare your answers with what you read in the next section.

Type of Group When a group of language teachers decide that dialogic refection within a group is desirable, they must then consider what type of group they want. First, it is best to have equal power spread among all members, so that everyone’s interests can be accommodated without imposing on others. Such teacher groups emphasize collaborative refective discussions as they mutually fulfll their desires by acting together as a group rather than as individuals within a group. Therefore, all the members in the teacher refection group must be willing to commit to the support of one another’s refective practices if it is to be an empowering experience for each member. Groups can meet face-to-face or on online platforms. Such virtual groups of language teachers can easily communicate and interact on the Internet. One of the positive aspects of these virtual groups is the willingness of many professionals within the feld to offer advice and good-quality information free of charge to teachers from all over the world. One of the drawbacks (apart from the vast amount of e-mails these groups generate) 67

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of these virtual communities of language teachers is that since the vast majority of the participants have never met, some professional teachers may feel they are users (not contributors) of the group, just gathering up all the information without putting anything back into the group. Refection 40 • What type of group would you like to be a member of as a group of language teachers discussing their practice? • What is your image of this group? • What are the advantages and disadvantages of meeting with a group face-to-face and virtually on online platforms?

Setting Up Groups When setting up a teacher dialogic refection group, it will be important to effectively address the issues of members’ roles and interaction within the group so that discussions are supportive when members are sharing their experiences. Thus, each member should feel safe and comfortable when sharing within the group. When sharing, all the members of the group should also feel connected to each other and even passionate about the group so that they can offer insights and advice and ponder solutions together to any perceived problems of practice. Such teacher refection groups can offer moral support, with vulnerabilities shared and aired in a safe environment. Risk taking should also be encouraged in such teacher groups in which self-confdence is enhanced by positive encouragement and feedback for each of the group members. That said, group members should not just validate everything each member says about their practice simply because a member said it. Consequently, teacher refection groups must be on guard against overly romanticizing the teacher’s voice; rather, such groups should also be a place where constructive criticism and even confict is welcomed, because such critical dialogue can be a necessary catalyst for any change. The question of leadership is also a very important consideration for language teacher refection groups. Who would decide the leader? Would it be a voluntary position? What would the leader’s responsibilities be, such as deciding the topic, nominate speakers, end topics and so on? Then again, if nobody wants to be the leader, then each meeting a different leader can take responsibility for deciding the location, 68

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topic and rules of discussion/intervention. Perhaps a suitable name for this leader would be ‘facilitator.’ Group members are encouraged to express their views in order to meet their own learning needs—to refect on their work. A good facilitator will encourage discussion and support the group in developing a routine of open discussion. Refection 41 • What problems can arise when setting up a teacher refection group (e.g., when organizing the group, group size, confict, rules, and frequency of meeting)? • How will you set up your group? • Who will be the leader? Or does your group need a leader? • Where will the meetings take place, and how often will they be held? • Why is risk taking important for a teacher refection group? • Why would confict lead to change? • Why should group members not just validate everything another member says in a group? • Why should groups be on guard against overly romanticizing the teacher’s voice? • What would be each group members’ roles and responsibilities? Compare your answers with what you read in the next section.

Roles and Responsibilities Each teacher refection group will be composed of members with different roles. Perhaps a democratic approach to all group discussions, where nobody attempts to manipulate the group into doing what he/she wants, would be the best approach. It may also be possible for a teacher development group to have a type of co-existing leadership in order to provide more opportunities for getting the task done (one co-leader) and maintaining group cohesion (another co-leader). Other roles within language teacher groups can be that of team worker, who is always trying to cement and keep the group together. Another role can be implementer, who is always there to see that things are completed. Yet another role can be group monitor, who always tries to ensure that all opinions and options are considered. In addition, and closely related to group members’ roles, is the responsibility of setting and maintaining the topic to be discussed by the 69

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group. Participants can frst brainstorm a topic together and then narrow it down by identifying specifc questions to explore. This narrowing down of a topic allows participants to focus their attention on issues that have personal meaning for them. The group can also at this stage decide if they have the resources available for them to continue refecting on that particular topic. When the topic is temporarily exhausted, then the group can start another cycle of brainstorming a topic followed by a narrowing of the topic with development of specifc questions addressing that topic. Thus, group membership roles are also important for topic selection and maintenance, and participants can all decide together whether they want to stick to topics rigidly or to be fexible with them. Refection 42 • What do you think of the following roles for group members who are not the leader/facilitator: team worker, implementer and monitor? • Regarding roles of individual members in a teacher development group, what is your opinion of the roles Belbin (1993) suggests: {{Coordinator or facilitator who makes a good chairperson and ensures that everyone in the group has an opportunity for input. {{Shaper who drives the group forward. {{Implementer who gets things done. {{Monitor evaluator who ensures that all options are considered. {{Team worker who helps cement the group together. {{Resource investigator who develops outside contacts. {{Completer/fnisher who fnishes things off. {{Expert who provides specifc areas of knowledge. • What other roles do you think would be necessary in your group? • How will your group select topics to discuss for each meeting?

Modes of Refection Once the group has been set up and members have discussed and agreed on the allocation of different roles for the period of refection, they then should consider what opportunities they will provide for refection. The main mode of refection in considered in this chapter so far is via dialogue, but language teachers can also combine this with other modes such as written refection (see Chapter 4 for more on this), as well as 70

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classroom observations that include the use of audio and video recordings to aid refection (see Chapter 6 for more on this). Of course, all of these can also be considered doable on online platforms as well as face-to-face meetings. Each group will have to discuss and agree on the number of group discussions they can commit to during the period of their refection as well and when they will engage in written refections and when (or if) they will observe each other teach. I have found over many years that some language teachers like to write about their refections, while others only want to engage in dialogic refection, yet still others want to engage in classroom observations. It is most probable that language teacher refection groups would most likely beneft from the combination of talking, writing and observing rather than focusing on any one of these modes of refection. Of course, each teacher refection group may want to consider other modes of refection and/or adjust the three talked about previously to their own particular setting and unique needs of all the members of the group. Refection 43 • What is your preference for a mode of refection from talking, writing and/or observing? • Which mode would be easiest for you and why? • Which mode would be diffcult for you and why? • What other modes would you like to engage in?

Communicating and Interacting in Groups An effective language teacher refective group operates for the beneft of all its members together rather than any one individual in particular. That said, all group members bring different individual expectations, fears and hopes, and not all of these may be transparent to the other members of the group. Accordingly, group members should be sensitive to each other. In addition to differences in expectations, there will be a wide range of interests, teaching experiences, abilities, ages and social backgrounds in each group. In addition, discussions within the group will yield various communication and interactional challenges that may not become apparent until the group has in fact commenced their discussions. Thus, it may be a good idea to try to articulate how the group will be able to recognize patterns of 71

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interactions within the group and which of these provide opportunities for refection and which block such opportunities such as individuals acting overly defensively. One method I have used for checking the interpersonal climate of the group is by seeking answers to the following questions: • • • • •

Who communicated the most in the group? Who did not speak very often? Who was absent? Who asked the most questions to individuals or the group? Which pairs/threes (depending on the number of participants in the group) communicated most? • How can the group explain these interaction patterns? • How can the group function even more effectively next time? Refection 44 • What is your opinion of the method, outlined previously, about checking the interpersonal climate of our group? • Have you ever participated in discussions with other teachers on a regular basis? • If yes, please describe your experiences: What did you talk about? What was the interaction like? What did you gain from the discussions? What do you think could have been done better in the group? • If you have not had any experience in a teacher group, can you think about what you would hope to accomplish from discussions with other teachers? • Try to answer the questions posed here from your perspective. For example, what would you like to talk about? What type of interaction do you think should be encouraged? What do you think you can gain from the discussions?

Trust Entering into group discussions with other teachers can lead to feelings of vulnerability and thus pose some amount of individual threat and associated anxiety for all group members, especially in the early stages of the group. Because teaching is a very personal activity, as language teachers in a refection group begin to open up and discuss professional (and personal) 72

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issues that are important to them with others whom they may or may not know, there will inevitably be a certain level of anxiety present. So, a non-threatening environment of trust should be fostered in the group. Ways of establishing trust can be incorporated into the refective process itself, such as emphasizing description and observation over judgment in group discussions. The members of the group can establish ground rules early on that will ensure respect and trust in all discussions, even if there is disagreement when controversial issues arise. One way of ensuring that trust is to guarantee that confdentiality will be of utmost importance. Confdentiality means that the group’s discussions and writing will be kept within the group and will only be made public if each member of the group gives permission. Refection 45 • How can groups develop trust from the very beginning? • What aspect of trust development is most important? • Do you think all group members should sign a paper that none of the results of the refection (groups, journal, classroom observations) can be disclosed without written permission from each member?

Time Having facilitated many refective practice language teacher groups over the years, I have found that time can be a huge factor for all teachers (Farrell, 2004). Thus, each language teacher group must consider and discuss four different aspects of time associated with refection: individual, activity, development and the period of refection. A certain level of commitment by individual participants in terms of time availability should be negotiated by the group at the start of the process. Associated with the activity, time each participant has to give the project is the time that should be spent on each activity. Another aspect of time that is important for teacher selfdevelopment groups is the time it takes to develop. Analytical refection takes time and only progresses at a rate which individual teachers are ready to refect critically. Finally, groups must consider the time frame for the project as a whole or the period for refection for the group. How long should a group, a pair, or an individual refect? Having a fxed period in which to refect allows the participants to know what period during the semester they can devote wholly to refection. 73

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Refection 46 • What time factors from the ones listed in the previous section would you be most worried about if you were in a language teacher group? • How often should groups meet? • How long should each meeting be? • Will the group stick to the time decided strictly? If not, what procedures have the group decided to put in place to deal with meetings that go over time?

Sustaining the Group Linked to the issue of time associated with language teacher groups, and especially the period of refection for that group, is the issue of its sustainability. In order to sustain any teacher refection group, each member must be committed to the life of the group. What will be the life of the group, then? One semester, two semesters and so on must be decided before the group commences their initial discussions. There should be a beginning and an end, so that each member knows their level of commitment and that the group as a whole sticks to that commitment. Farrell (2014) has suggested the following criteria for sustaining language teacher refection groups that build in some of the previous sections covered in this chapter: • Commit to the group: make time to be at each meeting, try to be on time for each meeting and stay the course of the group refections as a whole. • Negotiate ground rules: try to work out what ground rules you want to establish for each meeting in terms of topics to be covered. • Assign roles: give each group member a specifc role (e.g., leader, implementer, expert—see previous section) and assign a task each week to each member in order to focus the discussion of each meeting (e.g., bring in a reading of interest on theory or practice of a specifc aspect of language teaching to share with the group). • Listen to each other: really listen to everything each member says without judgment for as long as possible so that all members have had a right to voice opinions in a democratic format, and then member should offer feedback that is supportive. • Look at the positives: Focus on achievements and accomplishments rather than on what is diffcult to achieve in the group. 74

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• Agree to confdentiality early on: Decide on some way where confdentiality will be guaranteed from the very frst meeting, possibly in the form of a written agreement or contract stating how group members will deal with confdentiality. Refection 47 • Do you think having a set period for refections will help sustain a group? • How do you encourage language teachers to commit to a period of group refections? • What is your opinion of the Farrell’s suggestions for sustaining a group over a period of time outlined previously?

Evaluating the Group After a teacher refection group concludes its period of refection, it is important that all group participants evaluate the infuences of the group on their personal and professional growth so that they can have some closure. Participants can refect on whether they achieved their individual and group goals, their individual and the group accomplishments and factors that can be considered if they or others want to set up another teacher development group. Also, at this stage the group can consider if they want to share their fndings with other teachers who may beneft from hearing about their experiences. They can attend a conference and report about their group to other teachers, and they can also write up the group developments for a journal publication. Refection 48 • How should groups evaluate the success of their group? • Do you think members of the language teacher group should share their fndings with other language teachers? • If yes, how, and where should they share their fndings?

Resisting Plateauing With Groups Language teachers of all experience, from novice frst-year teachers to the hardened 20-year veteran teacher, all experience some form of plateauing in their professional lives. Some experience severe plateauing and develop 75

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negative general feelings, are more skeptical about their work as teachers and indeed other teachers. Other teachers experience mild forms of plateauing but tend to have more positive feelings and are less skeptical about their work as teachers and other teachers. Some causes related to feelings of plateauing are associated with the fact that teaching is a ‘front-loaded’ job in which teachers receive all of their rewards the day they enter the classroom as qualifed novice teachers. Thus, teachers can develop negative feelings immediately after they graduate because of the perceived lack of career advancement. Indeed, novice language teachers are usually loaded up with the same number of teaching hours of their more experienced colleagues which is not the same in other professions where novices are phased into their profession. For more experienced teachers, the lack of any real promotional opportunities because of the front-loaded nature of teaching can also be a factor in generating negative feelings about their work, because they have no real career ladder to climb. There are many other factors that can weigh heavily on a language teacher’s perception of their job, such as an unsupportive administration or a heavy workload that includes preparation, grading and conducting other tests that can leave language teachers feeling underappreciated by their administration. Thus, language teacher refection groups, in which colleagues, from novice to experienced teachers, can discuss many different issues with each other and ward off feelings of plateauing throughout each phase of their professional career. Shared discourse in language teacher refection groups can helped the teachers articulate their refections on teaching by making the tacit explicit, because these teacher conceptions often remain hidden. Such groups can engage in dialogic and other modes of refection, especially if they perceive that they have plateaued or come to a standstill and so they can learn how to understand, confront and eventually resist such plateauing in the group. Indeed, teachers can join a teacher refection group even if they are not plateauing so as to be able to interact with colleagues in an informal manner and to support each other and receive support from the group so that they can resist burnout and plateauing before they happen. One way of counteracting teacher plateauing is by frst understanding it more and thus being able to recognize it for what it is. Refection 49 • What do you think are the main causes of teacher plateauing? • Do you feel appreciated by your administration? Why or why not? • What are your duties as a language teacher in your school? 76

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Conclusion Dialogic refection in a language teacher refection group of peers, be they novice or experienced, can be a powerful way of exposing language teachers to different viewpoints. These viewpoints can be seen as positive when the group members are supportive. These group discussions can center on teaching philosophy, principles, theory and practices, as well as critical refections beyond practices. This chapter outlined and discussed how teachers can form such a group as well as the type of language teacher refection group they would like to be involved in. Group members must also decide the different roles and responsibilities they will take on, their preferred modes of refection, how they will communicate within the group, trust setting as well as time factors and how they will sustain and evaluate the success of the group. The chapter ends by outlining how language teacher refections groups who engage in dialogic refective practice can help novice and experienced teachers resist plateauing that can occur easily if teachers are left in isolation and drifting alone as they teach. Indeed, since the moment novice language teachers set foot in a classroom and school, they have been socialized into a profession that encourages them to work in isolation from their colleagues (e.g., teaching alone in classrooms with closed doors or alone for online virtual lessons), and this has led to feelings of insecurity for many, and so they have become nervous about sharing their experiences with others for fear of being ‘exposed.’ However, as the contents of this chapter indicate, if language teachers come together on their own initiative in order to dialogically refect on their work with other teachers, they can complement individual members’ strengths and compensate for each member’s limitations, all for the common good of the group and the institutions in which they work.

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Classroom Observations

Activities Covered • • • • • • • • • • • •

Delight or Despair? Purpose Qualitative Observations Self-Observation Critical Friends Recording Category Instruments Focus Teacher Action Zone Bumpy Moments Classroom Critical Incidents Etiquette

Introduction In previous chapters I outlined and discussed different issues language teachers can refect on before they enter the classroom and how they can consider managing lessons so that they can have effective outcomes for their students. The previous chapter alluded to the idea that classrooms are very busy places or, as I mentioned in Chapter 2, places of ‘hot action’ because of the hectic pace of lessons. Indeed, I also noted that it is very diffcult for language teachers to maintain their original plans because of some unanticipated events that will inevitably occur. In addition, with many all the many different activities happening at the same time, it is nearly impossible for language teachers to be on top of everything that 78

DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-6

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is happening, so some of this ‘hot action’ remains hidden to the teacher. This chapter outlines and discusses how language teachers can become more aware of what is happening in their lessons by engaging in classroom observations either alone, with critical friends or with the use of recordings and category instruments so that they can explore exactly what they do and what is actually happening in their classrooms. The chapter also outlines some classroom observation etiquette that language teachers can consider when engaging in observations. The main theme of the chapter is that by systematically refecting on their classroom teaching and their students’ learning, language teachers can develop better awareness and understanding of not only their own instructional processes but also the different agendas that are being pursued by their students.

Delight or Despair? When I conduct workshops on teacher refection and development and the topic of classroom observations come up, I can see immediately that some language teachers, especially if they are just beginning their teaching careers, tend to frown at the prospect of being observed. The usual response I receive is similar to this: ‘Oh, no! I hate being observed because I have this fear that I am going to be exposed in some way!’ I rarely get this answer: ‘Oh! I am delighted that my class is going to be observed, as now I can receive valuable feedback on my teaching that will help me grow as a teacher!’ Indeed, my own training and development as a language teacher with classroom observations was negative from the very beginning (Farrell, 2022). During my practicum (see Chapter 12), a university-appointed teacher educator–supervisor arrived unannounced for each of the four observed one-hour lessons during the year. In addition, the supervisor on no occasion either before or after the observed lessons held any discussions with me and then left immediately after. In other words, I had no pre-observation or post-observation lesson discussions and, in fact, never had any discussions with the supervisor from the beginning to the end of teaching practice. In fact, on each occasion the before I had arrived in the classroom, she was sitting at the back each time and then flled out a checklist (of which to this day I have not seen) and then left at the end of class without a comment. I believe that these sessions, still very much prevalent in our profession, are akin to ‘drive-by’ drop-ins that can turn off a teacher for life if they are judgmental concerning the teacher’s teaching skills. I realize 79

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that some may ask why classroom observations evoke such negative feelings and emotions in language teachers when, in fact, teachers are being observed every day by their students and do not mind. In fact, many teachers ask their students how each lesson is going and/or if they need any help, so those doing the observations may think that teachers should be used to being observed and should just get on with teaching. However, this may not be the case because classroom observations, for the most part, can involve the observer giving judgments about teaching based on that observer’s preconceived notions of what ‘good’ and ‘bad’ teaching is or should be. This is probably the single most important reason for teachers going on the defensive because they perceive that they must defend what they are doing in their classroom, rather than describe what they are doing in light of their planned pedagogical objectives. I believe that classroom observations can be less judgmental and more developmental, regardless of whether you are being observed by a supervisor or a peer, so that we can promote refection. After all, it is the classroom teacher who must continue teaching the class and it is what he or she thinks about their class that has more impact on learning than what an outsider thinks. For this to happen, each teacher being observed must be informed that the observation is not an evaluation but a chance for the teacher to develop his or her critical thinking skills as he or she gets to know more about their teaching. Thus, discussions about the observation after the lesson should involve descriptions of teaching rather than making judgments about teaching. These descriptions can be verbal or written, depending on the purpose of the observation (see following section). The results of classroom observations can be helpful for language teachers to make more informed choices about their teaching by helping them better understand their own instructional processes. In the end, with lots of such observations, language teachers can look forward (with delight perhaps) to learning more about their practices, rather than dreading such events. Refection 50 • How do you feel about having your class observed by another teacher or administrator? • What do you expect from having your lessons observed by another teacher or administrator? • What would the benefts be for a teacher to have his/her classes observed? 80

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Purpose Although I alluded to two main reasons for classroom observations, such as to evaluate teachers and for teachers to develop, we might also conduct classroom observations for other reasons and purposes. One of the most important purposes in terms of refecting on practice is to become more aware of what we actually do, not what we think we do, in class. We can then compare the results of what we do from the evidence gathered and compare this with our philosophy, principles, theory and critical refections beyond practice (see also Chapter 3 for more on these) and see if there is convergence or divergence anywhere. Indeed, the contents of this book focus mostly on helping language teachers become more aware of what they do, before, during and after their lessons so that they can make informed decisions (based on these systematic refections) about their practice. There are many reasons why teachers are unaware of what is happening in their classrooms. This is because so much happens so quickly that a teacher cannot hope to see everything going on around him or her. That is where technology can come in to help (audio recordings and video recordings— see following section) and having an outside observer (critical friend—see following section) can give the teacher another ‘eye’ on classroom events. Another reason teachers are unaware of what is happening in classrooms is that teacher education programs have not equipped them with the skills for analyzing classroom behavior, and they may not have the terminology necessary to discuss the teaching process. However, by becoming more aware of their teaching behaviors (by conducting classroom observations), teachers can help narrow any gap between their beliefs about what they are doing in the classroom and what they actually do. Refection 51 • Do your philosophy, principles, theory and critical refections beyond practice match your actual classroom instructional practices? • If yes, or no, how do you know? • Have you experienced any of these issues outlined by Good and Brophy (1991: 26–27) that occurred because of lack of teacher awareness of their own behavior in the classroom? {{Teacher domination. {{Lack of emphasis on meaning. 81

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of factual questions. {{Few attempts to motivate students. {{Not cognizant of effects of seat location and grouping. {{Over reliance on repetitive seatwork. • How would you explore each in terms of conducting classroom observations?

Qualitative Observations There are several ways language teachers can approach classroom observation. I take two broad approaches to looking at classrooms, qualitatively and quantitatively. I usually favor a qualitative approach to classroom observations because the basic philosophy behind this phenomenological research method is ‘putting the self in another’s shoes’ when observing others teach rather than making judgments based on the observer’s perceptions alone. Looking at what goes on in a classroom from a qualitative point of view means a teacher can look at a classroom from many different angles (i.e., triangulation) and then try to put all the information together at the end in order to see what ‘picture’ has been ‘painted.’ In order to do this, teachers must look at teaching by gathering data from audio and/or video recordings (see following section), sitting and observing the class while taking ethnographic notes (describing what happens as it happens, or as it happens every two minutes—see section on category instruments for more), and by having dialogic discussions with the teacher (critical friend—see following section) after the class what he or she thought of the class. As Watson-Gegeo (1988: 588) says: “By increasing their observational skills, teachers can gain new awareness of classroom organization, teaching and learning strategies, and interactional patterns in their own classrooms.” This information would be mixed with the overall picture of the classroom, the students, their background, the teacher and his or her background and the context within the school and the wider community. Refection 52 • Quantitative observations usually describe a classroom event using numbers, meaning derived using statistical operations and entails observation of specifc behaviors at specifc intervals of time. It also 82

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uses checks whether or not specifc actions were observed, usually using a checklist. • Qualitative observations usually follow the notion that we will not know exactly what is to be recorded. There is a general focus, events are recorded as they happen and we try to make meaning of them later using verbatim or selected verbatim narrative accounts, with no statistical measures. • What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? • Which approach would you prefer and why (I realize because of my preference I only outlined a qualitative approach so you may have to read more on the quantitative approach to answer this question in detail)?

Self-Observation A teacher can carry out classroom observation alone, with another teacher (as in critical friendships—see following section) and/or with a group of teachers (see Chapter 5). Self-observation basically means a language teacher will observe and evaluate his or her own teaching, and this can be accomplished in many different ways. In fact, many language teachers may feel more comfortable with the whole idea of observation if they begin with the self so that they can become more confdent in what they discover about themselves. What I have discovered working with language teachers over the years is that many have such a fear that they may be doing something wrong that they give up this refection. For those that do, I have found that they are for the most part happy that what they discover is fne and in line with their beliefs and what is written in the literature about teaching. In such a manner, they can construct their knowledge about their practice as they become more aware of what it is that they actually do. As they continue to engage in self-observation, they know more about how to collect information about their teaching and examine some key events that happen while they teach. To gather such information about their teaching they can write journals (see Chapter 4), self-reports, tally sheets and/or recording (audio and video—see following section) lessons with or without coding schemes (see following section). Journal writing (see also Chapter 5) connected to classroom observations consists of written recollections of a lesson in as much detail as possible and as soon as possible after the 83

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lesson. Of course, it would also be useful for the teacher to write before the lesson about what he or she wanted to achieve in that lesson and how he or she was going to go about teaching the lesson. Then immediately (if possible) after that lesson the teacher can refect on what he or she though the students learned and what the lesson accomplished. By later reviewing what was written, aspects of teaching that may not have been obvious during the class may become clearer to the teacher. Another form of writing refection for self-observation by language teachers is the use of self-reports, and these can be done quantitatively or qualitatively (see also previous section). A quantitative approach to self-observation involves completing some kind of checklist either during the lesson or after it. Any aspect of teaching can be included on such checklists, and the amount of detail can also be decided by each teacher. For example, when used over a period of time, self-reports can help language teachers discover the kinds of activities he or she uses or favors, and the kinds of activities that worked well or did not work well. Refection 53 • What are the advantages and disadvantages of engaging in selfobservation? • What topics would you self-observe while you are teaching and why? • Try to think about your teaching while you teach (you may write down on a piece of paper your thoughts at various times during the lesson if you get a chance).

Critical Friends When language teachers have become more confdent observing their own classes with whatever method they decide, they may then want to share their fndings with other teachers by discussing what they noted or by inviting another teacher into their class to observe them teach. Of course, some teachers may want to start with this type of observation and skip the selfobservation, and that is fne too. Teachers try to fnd a peer that is willing to observe them teach and then give feedback on their class. These peers can be critical friends who encourage you to talk about your teaching as they ask questions, probe and even confront you to really refect on your practice. This is not an easy process, as it involves establishing a high level 84

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of trust with another teacher. Also, certain rules must be established before commencing the observations, such as the role of the observer, the number of observations and if both teachers will have their classes observed (see also etiquette in following section). For example, before each observation, the teachers need to meet to discuss the aim of the observation and agree on observation procedures or instruments (quantitative, qualitative or both) to be used during the observation, and in the post-observation discussion, the observer reports on the information that he or she collected. Such an approach to classroom observations allows both teachers (or even more if you have a ‘critical friends group’) to observe each other teach and to get feedback on issues that a teacher engaged in self-observation might miss (or omit intentionally). Peer observations within a critical friendship, then, is a great opportunity for teachers to develop collegiality and develop a critically refective stance to their own practice. Refection 54 • • • • • • • •

•

Have you ever had a peer observe you? If yes, what procedures did you set up for this? How did you feel when it ended? Ask a friend/colleague/peer to join you in a critical friendship. Ask your critical friend to observe you teach without giving any feedback (this will get you used to having another peer in your room). You can also observe your friend teaching. Then meet each other and discuss your feelings of having another peer observe while you teach. Draw up a list of observation ‘rules’ that both observers should follow when you conduct further classroom observations (see also etiquette section later in the chapter for more ideas on this). Read the next sections on how to record and what to do with the recordings as well as category instruments before conducting further observations.

Recording When a language teacher ‘observes’ his/her own teaching or engages in a critical friendship, they need to use equipment such as a digital recorder and/or a video recorder. Teachers may feel more comfortable starting with 85

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the use of a digital recorder rather than a video recorder, as it is sometimes a shock to hear one’s voice for the frst time on tape. I remember the frst time I recorded my voice on a tape recorder while teaching, my frst reaction was, ‘Do I speak like that?!’ After recording your class for a while, you soon get used to hearing your own voice and can then move on to more detailed refections. Teachers may want to start frst with audio recording their class before videotaping their class, as audio recording classes may be less threatening (also for their students). When teachers have gotten used to hearing their own voice while teaching and maybe had some practice transcribing what they hear, they can move on to videotaping their classes. Both teachers and students may need more time to get used to having a video camera in their classroom and for this reason, teachers should place a video camera in each class for a period of time (about two weeks) so that all are used to having the camera in the class. Otherwise, the data gathered will be over infuenced by the ‘Ripple Effect’—when we throw a stone in water, it produces ripples; when we have an observer and/or tape recorder/ video camera in class, it too changes the normalcy of the lesson. We can never get rid of the ‘Ripple Effect’; however, we can try and minimize it by giving time to getting used to having the class observed (mechanically or otherwise). When teachers use audio and video recordings of their classes to learn about their teaching, they have to make some choices about how they will analyze what they see and hear. Audio and videotapes have one advantage over having a classroom observer: they can be listened to many times and videotapes can be watched as often as a teacher desires. Teachers can transcribe all or parts of a tape (both audio and video). If teachers have a direct focus and reason for the classroom observation (such as an examination of the type of questions they ask), they can transcribe the relevant parts only (such as every time the teacher asks a question). However, by transcribing all of the class, a teacher can have a better chance to observe patterns in his or her teaching. This will help the teacher make a general exploration of all aspects of his or her teaching. Later the teacher can focus in and conduct an action research project on some aspect of his or her teaching. Refection 55 • Have you ever audio recorded your classes? If yes, what were your frst reactions to hearing your own voice (and the voices of your students)? 86

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• Did you have any problems with where you placed the audio recorder? If so, what were they? • Have you ever videotaped your classes? If yes, what were your frst reactions to seeing yourself teaching for the frst time? • Did you have any problems with where you placed the video recorder? If so, what were they? • How did the students react to the video recorder in the classroom? Were they comfortable or not with this in the room? • How did you react to having a video camera in the room while you teach? Did you change your teaching? • Do you think the video camera should be focused on the teacher or the students? (assuming you have only one camera at your disposal). Where would you place the camera and why? • What should teachers do with audio and video recordings of their classes? • Is it enough just to listen to an audio recording of your class? Why or why not? • Is it enough to watch the videotape of your class? Why or why not? • Should teachers transcribe all of the class or parts? Why or why not?

Category Instruments So far in this chapter, we have discussed how we can set up classroom observations to collect information in various different ways about our teaching. Now we must consider what to do with that information or how we can make sense of this information to increase our knowledge of our practice. If the teacher is analyzing an audio recording, it may be too time-consuming to transcribe all of the tape, as it takes quite some time to transcribe one hour of class. Therefore, teachers can, depending on their focus, transcribe short sections of the tape by taking notes while listening to the tape. If the teacher is analyzing a video recording with a peer, they can play the video and stop at sections they think important in the form of a stimulated recall of events that happened in the class. Next, the teachers should refect on what has happened and make interpretations of whatever events they found interesting. As mentioned earlier, we can engage in quantitative or qualitative observations and, similarly, we can use either of these approaches to make sense 87

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of the information we have collected. Because of limitations of space, I am unable to discuss all the different approaches here or the early approaches within language teaching (e.g., Fanselow’s (1987) excellent category instrument FOCUS—Foci for Observing Communications Under Settings; the Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching [COLT] observation scheme [Spada & Frohlich, 1995]). Suffcient for our practical purposes in this book, language teachers have the choice of using pre-designed coding schemes such as Fanselow’s FOCUS, of which I have made use of this as well as another low-inference category instrument called SCORE, or seating chart observation record (Acheson & Gall, 1987), to plot classroom communication. Language teachers can also take an ethnographic approach to coding of classroom interaction (Watson-Gegeo, 1988). If teachers use a detailed coding scheme, they code according to predetermined categories that are the focus of the observation and all categories hold equal importance for the teacher. In ethnographic observations, data emerge only from the observations themselves. An ethnographic approach can include looking at classroom interaction and identifying patterns of interactions observed while noting how these patterns may or may not relate to social and/or cultural factors (see also Chapter 10 on classroom communication). Some educators, however, have cautioned that qualitative approaches to classroom observation may be too broad an analysis as it does not address specifc questions and it is diffcult to compare results with other classes. Additionally, it would require a highly trained observer to be able to keep up with and record all the dynamic action within a classroom. Also, whatever the observer records will be biased towards what he or she thinks important. If teachers are uncomfortable with qualitative observations, they can conduct more quantitative type observations by using self-reports and checklists. Indeed, both approaches have advantages and disadvantages, and it is probably best for language teachers to use both approaches rather than just one. Refection 56 • Which approach do you think you would take to code the data you collect while observing: a pre-determined category instrument or an ethnographic approach and why? • How would you like to code the data you collect in your observations? 88

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Focus When language teachers engage in classroom observations they can, especially when they conduct their frst few observations, take a general look at what is happening in their lessons. Such an introduction will put them at ease as they become more comfortable with the whole concept of being observed. However, as time goes by, they will begin to notice that a lot is happening in each lesson, so much so that it may seem a bit overwhelming to focus in on any one issue. Therefore, I have found that language teachers may beneft from a pre-lesson focus where they engage in observation with a set focus on particular topics before they teach any class. This way both the teacher teaching the class, and any observer will know exactly what to look at and for and can decide on how best to gather such information also before teaching the lesson. For example, language teachers may not realize the following kinds of things about their teaching (from Richards & Farrell, 2005): their explanations are not always very clear, they sometimes over-explain or under-explain things, they talk too quickly at times, many students do not pay attention while they are teaching, they tend to dominate their lessons, and/or they tend to speak to some students more often than others (linked to the teacher’s action zone—see also next section). They suggest the following topics may be suitable for focused classroom observations: • Teacher’s time management: allotment of time to different activities during the lesson. • Students’ performance on tasks: their strategies, procedures, and interaction patterns. • Use of the textbook: the extent to which a teacher used the textbook during a lesson and the types of departures made from it. • Pair work: the way students completed a pair work task, the responses they made during the task, the type of language they used. • Group work: students’ use of L1 versus L2 during group work, students’ time-on-task during group work, and the dynamics of group activities. • Classroom interaction: the different types of seating arrangements that provide opportunities (or block opportunities) for more student participation and language development (see also Chapter 10). • Lesson structure: the nature and impact of the learning activities. • Classroom communication: the communication patterns evident, including teachers’ use of questioning, that either promote or block opportunities for learning (see also Chapter 10). 89

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Refection 57 • Do you agree or disagree that classroom observations should be focused? • Which of the topics outlined in the previous section would you like to focus your classroom observations on and why? • Can you think of other topics you would like to focus your classroom observation (see also teacher action zone and critical incidents sections to follow)? List these topics in order of importance to you.

Teacher Action Zone Although language teachers generally try to treat all students fairly and give every student in the class an equal opportunity to participate in the lesson, it is sometimes diffcult to avoid interacting with particular students more than others. This creates what is referred to as the ‘teacher’s action zone.’ An action zone for a language teacher is indicated by those students with whom the teacher regularly makes eye contact, to whom the teacher addresses questions, and who are nominated to take an active part in the lesson. These students are located within the teacher’s action zone and are likely to participate more actively in a lesson than students who fall outside the teacher’s action zone. In many classrooms, this zone includes the middle front row seats and the seats up the middle aisle. If a teacher is teaching from the front of the class, students seated there are more likely to have the opportunity to participate actively in the lesson because of their proximity to the teacher, and some students actually choose to sit there with this in mind. Every language teacher has his or her own personal action zone as well that may fall outside the front-and-center model where teachers usually place themselves. For example, a teacher may look more often to the right-hand side of the class than to the left-hand side, call on girls more often than boys, call on students of one ethnic background more often than those of another, call on students whose names are easy to remember, call on brighter students more often than others or, in a mainstream class containing students with limited English profciency, tend to focus attention on the frst language speakers in the classroom and to make relatively few demands on the others. The reason I focus on the teacher action zone in this chapter is that most language teachers are unaware that 90

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it actually exists and that they have their own personal zone that may be inadvertently disadvantaging some of their students in terms of interaction and opportunities for learning. Indeed, in most language classes teaches consider that their students engage actively; however, if active participation is important in learning, then those students not within the teacher’s action zone are at a disadvantage. Refection 58 • If you are teaching a class, do you think you have a clearly defned action zone when you teach? • Does it favor some students in the class more than others? • If so, how could you change your action zone? • If you are observing a class, does the teacher have a defned action zone? • Some learners are often eager to be within the teacher’s action zone because they like to play an active and public role in the lesson. Others are happy to be outside the teacher’s action zone. Should all students be active and public participants in lessons? Why or why not?

Bumpy Moments Another reality of most language teachers’ lives in the classroom is that their lessons will encounter some ‘bumpy moments’ (Romano, 2006) that happen during a class. Such bumpy moments, similar to critical incidents (see next section), occur during a lesson and the teacher must respond immediately. In this book I suggest that these ‘bumpy moments’ occur in every lesson, and teachers can refect on these in more informal ways than formal ones on specifc critical incidents that tend to happen occasionally during a semester. Within language teaching these can be referred to as ‘lesson breakdowns’ and the teacher must react to get the lesson back on track. These can be minor breakdowns, such as with one student in one lesson, or when one or two students interrupt in one lesson and the teacher must consider what to do (doing nothing is also an option). As many experienced language teachers know, these moments/breakdowns are diverse and endless but must be considered one way or another during each lesson. Indeed, some experienced language teachers tell me this is one of the main reasons that they are teachers. 91

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Each language teacher can then determine the personal signifcance of the moment or breakdown by evaluating the event in terms of his or her underlying theories about language teaching and learning. Through identifcation, articulation and refection on such ‘bumpy moments,’ then, language teachers can gain further insight into their instruction that they hope will be even more appropriate to their teaching goals and context. Refection 59 • What are some of the ‘bumpy moments’ you have identifed in your lessons? • What do they tell you about your teaching?

Classroom Critical Incidents A critical incident, like the ‘bumpy moments’ just discussed, is any unanticipated event that occurs during class but is clearly remembered by the language teacher long after the lesson has ended. In other words, it has left a lasting impression and has become ‘critical’ to that teacher because of this. Whereas ‘bumpy moments’ also occur during a lesson, they are usually dealt with at that time by the teacher, and when the lesson ends, the moment is soon forgotten. However, through a retrospective analysis, specifc ‘incidents’ that happen during a lesson become more critical to the teacher after the lesson because they are subject to conscious after-lesson refection. Thus, when a critical incident occurs, it interrupts (or highlights) the taken for granted ways of thinking about teaching, and by consciously analyzing such incidents, language teachers can gain further insight into the philosophy, principles and theories that underpin their perceptions about their practice. In addition, critical incidents can be positive or negative in that an event can occur during a lesson that pleasantly surprises a teacher, such as a language student fuently (and for the frst time) reading a passage, and leaves a lasting positive experience for that teacher. It can also be negative, with some students reacting negatively to some activity that completely derails and disrupts the lesson. That said, many teachers unfortunately only remember and refect on their negative incidents. The process of refecting on such incidents generally requires that language teachers frst write about what happened, why it happened and what it means to the teacher now and in the future. 92

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Refection 60 • Have you ever experienced a critical incident during class? If so, describe the incident and explain why it was critical to you (e.g., what made it critical to you)? • Think back over the past week, month or semester and consider any incident that made you say to yourself, ‘This is what makes my life as a teacher so diffcult.’ Where and when did this event happen, who was involved and what it was that made the event so full of signifcance for you? • Think back over the past week, or month, or semester and consider any incident that made you say to yourself, ‘This is what teaching is really all about.’ Where and when did this event happen, who was involved and what it was that made the event so full of signifcance for you?

Etiquette I end this chapter with a short discussion of etiquette associated with all types of classroom observations. Within language teaching, although frst raised by Murphy (1993) as an important issue for all to consider, etiquette was not discussed so much since. I think it important to consider because all classroom observations are intrusions of what usually occurs, so certain considerations of etiquette should be discussed by all who engage in classroom observations. Such rules of etiquette will be different for the supervisor visit to a learner teacher’s classroom, which for the most part will be for evaluative purposes, than between a language teacher and peer observer, which for the most part is for developmental purposes. We can all learn a lot from observing other language teachers in action, but if this requires another physical presence in the room, then the ‘norm’ of that class will be interrupted not only for the teacher but also for all the students, so all observations should be conducted in an unobtrusive manner regardless. Most likely, supervisors have been trained or are aware of the need for sensitivity when entering such observations with nervous learner teachers and will follow some ‘self-established’ or school-established etiquette regarding the procedures of visiting the teacher while teaching. Those readers who have experienced such visits as learner teachers may remember such procedures and that each visit may have had a pre-lesson 93

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observation discussion, followed by a post-observation discussion. However, peers, learner teachers or any other visitors to classrooms for observation purposes are less likely to be sensitive to such issues related to classroom observation etiquette. Such classroom observation etiquette issues should be discussed before any and all observations and should generate some guidelines to follow so that the observations are benefcial to all concerned. Refection 61 • Murphy (1993) outlined several purposes (see also previous) for engaging in classroom observations, some of which include: {{Observing by supervisors to assist/evaluate. {{Observing to learn how to teach. {{Observing to learn how to observe. {{Observing to provide peer feedback. {{Observing to provide mentor feedback. {{Observing to collect data for a research project. • Write a set of potential classroom observation etiquette guidelines you think are appropriate for each of the different types of observations presented here.

Conclusion This chapter has outlined and discussed how language teachers can engage in classroom observations as a means of refecting on their practice. The goal of refecting on our practice through the use of classroom observations is to become more aware of our teaching. When classroom observations are handled in a non-judgmental manner and where development is the goal, then they can become something language teachers look forward to and which they see as time well spent rather than something to be dreaded and avoided. Classroom observations can be conducted either to capture a broad picture of lessons in a descriptive manner as a means of uncovering patterns in their actual teaching behaviors or they can be focused on capturing specifc and/or pre-determined behaviors such as bumpy moments, critical incidents and/or teacher action zone and so on. Also, by engaging in classroom observations of his or her

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own class, and other teachers’ classes, language teachers can take more responsibility for their own professional development because they will be making decisions based on what they know they do as a teacher and how their students react or do not react to their lessons. In this age of accountability in education, teachers can make a better case for directing their own professional development by knowing what exactly goes on in their classroom and what other teachers are doing in their classrooms.

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7

Lesson Planning

Activities Covered • • • • • •

Why Plan? Approaches Creating a Plan Planning and Textbooks Implementing the Plan Evaluating the Plan

Introduction When language teachers physically enter a classroom to teach a particular lesson, they have most likely already decided what they want to teach and how they want to teach it. Some teachers, especially more experienced language teachers, may plan such details in their heads before class and then try to execute this plan as the lesson progresses. While other teachers, usually more novice language teachers, often write extensive plans about what they will teach, why and how they will teach. Regardless of the method details of how language teachers plan, it is generally agreed that some form of planning is essential if the language teacher is going to teach structured lessons that all students can follow. In addition, lesson plans generally refect a language teacher’s beliefs about teaching and learning second languages as well as how the lesson itself should be managed (see Chapter 9 for more on classroom management). Each activity the teacher decides to use in a lesson will also refect the teacher’s beliefs and will impact how the plan will develop. Although most teachers must be able to make on-the-spot decisions throughout out a lesson, the more detailed they plan in advance 96

DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-7

Lesson Planning

for lessons, the less cognitive overload they have when they actually teach the lesson. This chapter outlines and discusses lesson planning for language teachers that includes why they plan, models and approaches of planning, creating, developing, implementing and evaluating the plan.

Why Plan? “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” asked Alice. “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cheshire Cat (Carroll, 1963: 59). Language teachers may wonder ‘which way they ought to go’ before they enter a classroom. This usually means teachers need to plan what they want to do in their lessons so that they can have a unifed approach for the entire lesson rather than just ten minutes of the lesson. It is like driving to an unknown destination, and so we need a map or navigation to help us get there before we arrive. If we have followed the map, then it becomes a record of where we have been on the journey to our destination. So too is a lesson plan a map of the road we want to go along for the lesson and as such helps us think about our journey before we go there. A lesson plan can help us think of methods and strategies we can use to teach what we have decided to focus our lesson on, as well as the resources we may need to carry out the lesson. Such planning can also help us consider any problems we think we may encounter during the lesson, so we are prepared to resolve them quickly if they appear. For novice language teachers who have not yet built up suffcient repertoire of teaching skills, detailed lesson plans can help them feel more confdent that they are well prepared and thus reduce some of the stress associated with teaching in the frst years. In addition, many language teachers may in fact be required to plan by the school, especially if the class suddenly needs a substitute teacher for any reason. Indeed, knowing that the substitute is following the plan also gives the regular classroom teacher confdence that the class time is being used productively in his or her absence. Ashcraft (2014) has also suggested that lesson plans can also be evidence of a teacher’s professional development and as such can be included in their teaching portfolio as part of their evaluations and for any future job applications. Finally, lesson plans also help students because they will be confdent not only has their teacher prepared their lesson when them in mind but also that the teacher can include activities and methods that take their 97

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interests, abilities and backgrounds into consideration. Thus, lesson planning can help language teachers consciously refect-for-action before they enter the classroom and have such confdence and security of knowing that they have consider the content they want to teach, the materials they need and how the activities used will be sequenced and timed. Then, if anything goes awry during the lesson, they can decide whether to continue following the plan, adjust it or completely abandon it if the situation so requires. After the lesson, the teacher can adjust any changes made to the plan and use this document as a log of what has been taught in that lesson. Refection 62 • • • •

Why would some teachers not plan their lessons? Do you plan lessons? Why would you plan a lesson? How do you think lesson planning can help students?

Approaches There are a number of approaches to lesson planning. A dominant model of lesson planning throughout education, and one that is strangely enough still in use, is a very old model that is very linear in nature and organized sequentially from (1) lesson objectives, (2) selection of learning activities, (3) organization of learning activities to (4) specify methods of evaluation (Tyler, 1950). This is a ends-means approach to lesson planning, and it assumes the learning environment remains fxed, although most teachers know very well that lessons do not happen sequentially. Pre-service and novice teachers may fnd such an approach neat and clean as a starting point to make them feel secure when entering the profession for the frst time. Ashcraft (2014) summarized more recent approaches to lesson planning for language teachers that she called forward, central and backward design planning. Forward planning means the language teacher frst identifes the language (or other content) to be taught and only then decides on which methods and activities he or she will use to teach this content followed by how it will be assessed. This approach to planning is popular when language teachers are required to follow a fxed curriculum and are basically told what to teach (usually with a set textbook) and even how to teach it (e.g., the Berlitz approach). This approach to language learning and lesson planning is 98

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widely followed in many countries worldwide, as the students are tested in all aspects of the curriculum that must be covered. Central planning begins with the language teacher deciding on particular methods he or she will follow as well as the activities he or she will use in the lesson. Next, the teacher decides what content will be covered and how it will be assessed. Here language teachers have more control and can use their preferred methods because of their perceived instructional skills when managing the students using their approach. For backward planning, the language teacher frst decides what he or she wants the students to learn or know as a result of taking that particular lesson and how this knowledge can be identifed. After all that, the teacher then decides on methods and activities that he or she will use to execute the lesson. Richards (2013: 29) maintains that “a backward design option may be preferred in situations where a high degree of accountability needs to be built into the curriculum design and where resources can be committed to needs analysis, planning, and materials development.” The methods mentioned are the more organized approaches to lesson planning, however, each language teacher will most likely have their own individual approach (or take) to lesson planning. Refection 63 • What did you learn about lesson planning approaches in your teacher training program? • How do you approach lesson planning? • Do you follow a Tyler approach to writing lesson plans? If yes, how? If no, why not? • Do you follow either of the three other approaches (forward, center, backward)? If yes, how? If no, why not? • If linear objective-based planning is not used a lot by experienced language teachers as some research suggests, should the rational–linear model (i.e., the Tyler approach) be abandoned outright? Should it still be taught and/or presented in teacher training programs?

Creating a Plan Now that we have discussed why we need a lesson plan and some different approaches to planning, we need to consider how to create an actual lesson plan. Some schools have fxed lesson plan templates that teachers are asked 99

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to fll in and so have little room for individual fexibility. However, most language teachers have to create their own lesson plan and must decide what to include in such a plan. As mentioned earlier, most lesson plans include the lesson objectives that a teacher wants to achieve at the end of a class period. Depending on your approach to lesson planning, the exact objectives will depend on if your planning is forward, central or backward design-focused. For language teaching, lesson objectives should be observable behaviors that students will be able to do in that particular lesson. So, it is best to write these objectives in terms of this desired student behavior. Vague verbs such as understand, appreciate, enjoy or learn should be avoided, because they are diffcult to quantify. Action verbs should be used, such as identify, present, describe, explain, demonstrate, list, contrast and debate are clearer and easier for teachers to design lessons around. They are also easier for the students to understand what will be expected from them in each lesson. After deciding on lesson objectives, the next creation in the plan will be the exact procedures you intend to follow and you hope your students will follow as well. This will include the type of activities you will decide to follow as well as how these will be sequenced in the lesson. Perhaps you will list the materials you will need and how you plan to assess students’ learning and a notation of any out-of-class work you expect students to complete. Some teachers like to include familiar routines in each lesson plan and use these as a means of introducing new material or information. Many lesson plans at this stage also has an overall plan of starting with a warm-up followed by the focus of the lesson where ‘new work’ is introduced in an interesting way that usually builds on previous work. In terms of how the students in your class will be asked to interact, the teacher must also consider how to plan such pairs or groups or indeed if they will be asked to participate individually. I cover this more in Chapter 8, but it should also be included in each lesson plan. Depending on what the focus of the lesson is (e.g., vocabulary, grammar, writing and reading) there then needs to be a period of ‘practical application’ in which the teacher engages the students in useful activities that are well timed in terms of the estimate of how long each activity would take to cover in the lesson and how profcient the students are. In addition, how you will end each lesson should be planned, as I have observed many language teachers racing towards the end of the lesson trying to cram in activities that they thought they could cover before the lesson. I always try to end the lesson slowly with some relaxing activity that sometimes involves asking what they thought they had learned in that lesson and/or what was 100

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easy or diffcult for them in the lesson. Language teachers should by now realize that Reading, Speaking, Listening and Grammar will have different types of lessons. I include an example of a lesson plan for an English reading class here for your refection. Refection 64 • How do you create lesson plans? • In your lesson plans: {{What do you want your students to learn and why? How to you state this? {{How do you choose particular activities to practice? Are all the tasks and activities necessary; are they worth doing and at the right level? {{What materials, aids and so forth will you use and why? {{Will the class share ideas/work and how will this be done? {{What instructions will you have to give and how will you give them (written, oral, etc.)? What questions will you ask? {{How will you check that students understand the different stages of the lesson? • This following lesson plan is an example of a plan in a specifc context, a Singapore secondary school that I used in the past (Table 7.1). Therefore, this plan should not be seen as a prescription, or ‘how to,’ because each teaching context will be different. What do you think of how this plan is written and would you use such a plan? Reading Lesson Plan Time: 12 noon to 12:35 p.m. ondary 2 English

Subject: English Language

Class: Sec-

Language Focus: Reading Topic: Sport Objectives: • To teach the students to skim to fnd the main idea of the passage. Prior Knowledge: • Students have learnt how to locate information by reading and fnding the main sentence of each paragraph. This lesson is to practice increasing their reading speed within scanning and skimming for information. 101

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Materials: • Reading materials—article from book on Sport • Computer projector • Whiteboard Table 7.1 Step by Step Plan Step Time Tasks (Teacher) 1

Tasks (Students)

5–10 Opening: Listen mins Introduction to the topic sport. T activates schema for sport. T asks students to help him/her write down as many different kinds of Sport on the whiteboard within 3 minutes. T asks students to rank their favorite sports in order of importance.

2

5–7 mins Teacher distributes handout on Sports schedule from the newspaper. T asks Ss to read it quickly and answer the true/false questions that follow it within 3 minutes. T goes over the answers. 15 mins T tells students that they just practiced skimming to get the general meaning or gist of a passage.

3

102

Interaction

T Ss Arouse (T=teacher; interest Ss=students) Activate schema for sport.

Ss shout out the answer to the question as the T writes the answers on T the board T writes the answers

Ss read the handout and answer the questions.

Ss call out their answers to the T.

Purpose

Ss

Ss

T

T

Ss

Focus attention of Ss on the concept of skimming for general gist with authentic materials Getting Ss to read passage quickly to get the overall meaning

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Step Time Tasks (Teacher) T gives another handout on Sport from the textbook (New Clue). T asks the Ss to read and answer the true/false questions written on the paper within 5-7 mins T asks Ss for answers and writes them on the board. 4

5 mins T summarizes the importance of reading a passage quickly frst in order to get the gist. T gives homework of reading the next day’s Newspaper front page story and writing down in 4 sentences the gist of the story. Follow-up: Next lesson: To teach the students to skim to fnd the main idea of the passage.

Tasks (Students)

Interaction

Purpose

T Ss check their Ss (Ss Ss answers. possible)

Ss read the handout and answer the questions

T

Ss

T

Ss

To remind students what they have just done and why—to develop pupil metacognitive awareness

Ss call out their answers to the T. Ss check their answers

Planning and Textbooks In many cases, language teachers are required to use a textbook that may not be of their choosing. Indeed, many times language teachers are even required to create their lesson plan around this textbook, and so the textbook becomes the curriculum that must be followed. Because in many countries, ministries of education and the like may consider that their

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teachers have some profciency problems in the target language, and so I add a special section for the mandatory use of textbooks because teachers closely follow the content of the textbook. Thus, the textbook and the content of the language in that text sometimes becomes an important source of input not only for students but also for their teachers. For these reasons and more, language teachers may see the assigned textbook as a map, just like the overall lesson plan for other teachers as mentioned earlier. Teachers may use the textbook (and may in fact be strongly encouraged to do so) to lay out the content to be covered in lessons in a structured (according to the textbook) manner. They then follow this structure (chapter by chapter in the book) to provide a sense of coherent lessons within a course that starts with Chapter 1 in the book and ends with the coverage of the fnal chapter. The students also have a structure to follow for each lesson and they can go back or forward depending on their interests and how they feel they are progressing. I have found that students are often angry if language teachers do not follow the assigned textbook in such a structured manner, because they think they lose their autonomy that the textbook offers them moving back and forward throughout. Some other language teachers however may resent having a textbook assigned, especially if their learners are more profcient in the target language, because they may want to use other more authentic materials. Richards and Farrell (2011) outline how language teacher can adapt such assigned textbooks (i.e., if you have to use it, then you can adapt it). Language teachers can modify the content in each chapter to suit their students’ proficiency levels by adding more authentic materials (they can also delete content). They can also reorganize the content into what they consider to be a more suitable order for their students depending on their proficiency levels. They can modify, extend or skip tasks and activities suggested in the textbook and sequence them in different ways that better suit their needs. Textbooks seem to be a part of most language programs, and although some language teachers may feel constrained when required to use them, it may be wise to consider how they can make them work best for their students, especially if they will be tested on the content of these assigned texts. It also seems that language students prefer to have a textbook assigned, as they think this may provide more structure to their learning of the target language. 104

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Refection 65 • • • • •

Do you use a textbook? If yes, who decided on this book and why? What are the strengths and limitations of the textbook? If no, why do you not use a textbook and what do you use in its place? If you use a textbook, do you deviate from the content of the book in any way? • Will your students be tested on the contents of the book? If yes, will you write the test? If no, who will write the test?

Implementing the Plan The language teacher enters the classroom to teach the lesson based on the plan that has been discussed in the previous sections. Of course, those experienced language teachers know well the truth behind the oft-quoted saying that the best laid plans often go astray, as human beings are unpredictable at the best of times. Therefore, we should consider our lesson plan as a guide to help us facilitate our students’ learning, rather than a blinker we wear as we teach avoiding what is really happening during our lesson. Just as a plane takes off and begins to cruise, many times it experiences turbulence and as a result must make many adjustments in fight, so too will language teachers have to make adjustments to the plan. Novice language teachers in their frst years fnd making such adjustments terrifying because they have not yet built up a suffcient repertoire of teaching skills that will allow such adjustments. Nevertheless, they will need to mentally prepare for unexpected student reactions or nonreactions to activities and materials they thought would be good for the implementation of their lesson (plan). Language teachers at all levels of experience can consider how their plans will be implemented by establishing some principles they consider should be a part of all of their lessons, and these will be based on individual preferences and even individual personality traits. For example, some language teachers do not like when their classes lag and push for a brisk tempo throughout each lesson. Some like to focus on one activity, while others like to move through many different activities in one lesson. All language teachers will also need to plan for as smooth a transition as possible between sections of a lesson so that their students are not confused and in order to maximize the limited time allowed for each lesson. Additionally, if 105

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teachers remember to work for the beneft of their students rather than their own, then they can keep away from falling into the trap of racing through different activities just because they have been written on the lesson plan. Refection 66 • What do you think of Richard-Amato’s (1988) suggestion that language lessons can be generally divided into fve different phases? {{Opening: links are made to previous learning or the lesson is previewed. {{Simulation: a lead into the main activity is provided to create interest in the lesson. {{Instruction: the main activity of the lesson. {{Closure: the lesson may be reviewed and future learning previewed. {{Follow-up: independent work or homework is assigned. • What do you think of Purgason’s (1991) suggested methods of varying a lesson? {{Tempo: activities may be fast-moving or slow. {{Organization: individual tasks, pairs, groups or full-class interaction. {{Mode and skill: may have written or spoken language. {{Diffculty: easy or demanding activities. {{Topic: language teaching point or non-linguistic topics. {{Mood: fun-based or serious activities. {{Stir-settle: activities that excite students or activities that calm and settle them. {{Active-passive: activities may encourage learners to use initiative or follow the teacher. • What do you think of Ur’s (1996) suggestion that components of a lesson be ordered as follows? {{Put the harder tasks earlier. {{Have quieter activities before lively ones. {{Think about transitions. {{Pull the class together at the beginning and the end. {{End on a positive note. {{Activities should not be too long or too short. {{Various techniques for delivering the activities should ‘fow’ together. {{Clear transitions between activities are an important aspect of ‘good pacing.’ 106

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Evaluating the Plan After each lesson has ended, most language teachers evaluate how they felt the lesson went and if they achieved their objectives in terms of their students’ learning what they had intended. Although it may be diffcult to judge exactly what our students have learned in a language lesson, Ur (1996: 220) nevertheless says we can make a good guess based “on our knowledge of the class, the type of activity they were engaged in, and some informal test activities that give feedback on learning.” Thus, based on this knowledge of ourselves as teachers, our students and what you intended to teach, we can make predictions about their learning based on their level of engagement during the lesson, including their attentiveness and activity levels through the lesson. Most teachers are constantly monitoring their students throughout each lesson and their time and energy on a particular activity or task and will make adjustments if energy levels seem to be falling so that they can accomplish their objectives. Additionally, for further investigations of the success of a lesson, language teachers can give the following three questions to their students at the end of each class. The answers to these questions can also assist language teachers with future lesson planning. It is best to avoid asking overly judgmental questions such as ‘did you enjoy the lesson?,’ as this kind of question is very subjective and in some cultures students may be obliged to provide a positive answer. I too have always wondered when I leave a classroom or an online platform what my students learned from that lesson, so sometimes at the end of a lesson, I ask the following questions to my students: 1. What do you think today’s lesson was about? 2. What part was easy? 3. What part was diffcult? 4. What changes would you suggest the teacher make? I have also asked them to write short refection papers about the lesson of the day after the lesson to give their opinion of the topic of that lesson. When reading these papers, I can get a sense if they were following the topic as I had intended. If I thought they were off topic, I commented on their paper, but if I noticed many students seemed to be off topic, then I revisited that topic in the following lesson to reinforce whatever point 107

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they seemed to be missing before starting a new topic. Sometimes I think ‘less rather than more’ is a good mantra for teachers to have, as we must be careful of providing too much information for our students and expecting them to retain it all. Indeed, Bailey’s (1996) research discovered that experienced language teachers’ decision-making principles were based on many interesting aspects of student learning, none of which include the accumulation of content or facts; rather, they were based on ideas such as to serve the common good, teach to the moment, further the lesson, accommodate students’ learning styles and promote students’ involvement. Although most language teachers refect after each lesson, many times these refections are partial at best, because such refections are mostly based on how they perceived their students have enjoyed the lesson rather than on what they have learned. Indeed, each lesson will have a life of its own, and even if you teach the exact same lesson plan the same day to different classes, your students and your students’ reactions will be different each time. Thus, it is important to get as much evidence as possible after each lesson and this will include getting your students’ opinions as well as asking detailed questions of your own. Refection 67 • Try to answer the following questions that will help you evaluate and refect on your lesson and if you achieved what you intended to in that lesson plan (from Ashcraft, 2014: 28–30). Learning Objectives • Did learners understand the objectives of the lesson? If they did not, how could you better communicate the objectives to learners? • Did the learning activities allow learners to accomplish the learning objectives for this lesson? What evidence do you have that the objectives were accomplished? • If the learning activities did not allow learners to accomplish the learning objectives, what changes would need to be made to the objectives or to the lesson activities for this to occur?

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Materials • Were the selected instructional materials (e.g., reading passages, grammar exercises) appropriate for the age and profciency level of the learners? • Were auxiliary materials (e.g., poster paper, scissors, markers) readily available for this lesson? If not, where can you obtain these in the future? • Did you have enough materials for all learners to participate? • Did the technology you employed function correctly? If not, whom should you notify to seek technical assistance? • Did you know how to use the technology in the classroom? If not, where can you obtain technical training? Procedure • If there was a presentation segment in the lesson, how long did it last? Was this amount of information too much information for students or an appropriate amount? If you determine that it was too much information for students, how might the information be divided among multiple lessons in the future? • Were the selected activities appropriate for the age and profciency level of the learners? • Were the activities carried out in an appropriate order? If not, what would be a better sequence of activities? • Did one activity lead smoothly into the next? If not, how could these transitions be facilitated? • Did students appear to understand instructions for the activities? If not, how could instructions be made clearer? • Did the lesson incorporate a variety of formats (i.e., whole class, individual work, pair work, group work)? If not, why not? How could more variety be incorporated within this lesson to achieve the same learning objectives? • Did all of the students participate? If not, what steps can you take to ensure the participation of all students? • If pair or group work was used, how were these pairs or groups formed? Would other groupings have been more effective? • How did this lesson stimulate learners’ motivation? • What options did learners have for processing information or expressing what they know What was the ratio of teacher talk time to student 109

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talk time? If this lesson were to be repeated, how could you increase the amount of time students spend using the language? • What type of interactive decisions did you make during this lesson? What were the outcomes? Assessment • If you employed informal assessment during this lesson, how did you document the results? • If students will be taking a formal assessment based on the content of this lesson, are they adequately prepared for it? If not, how could this lesson be revised to better prepare them? What needs to happen in the next lesson for students to be prepared? • What types of errors did you notice students making? • What error correction techniques did you use? • Did students notice your correction and incorporate the correct form? If not, how might you make your corrections more explicit? Out-of-Class Work • Did students do the out-of-class work assigned in preparation for this lesson? If not, what barriers (e.g., motivational, situational, lack of understanding) did learners encounter? How can these barriers be overcome? General • What was the greatest strength of this lesson? What was the greatest weakness? • Did this lesson refect what you know about second language acquisition, best practices in language teaching, your learners and the context in which you are working? If not, how can you better align your knowledge with your classroom practice?

Conclusion This chapter has suggested that some form of lesson planning is required for each lesson we teach, otherwise the lesson may not proceed in any orderly manner and student learning would be random at best. There are many different approaches to planning that language teachers can choose 110

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from, as outlined in the previous section, but one aspect of language teaching that is present in many language classes is mandatory use of textbooks. Again, language teachers can use and adapt the textbook in different ways and many plan their actual lessons around the textbook, because their students will be assessed on the contents of the textbook. Of course, when executing the lesson plan, most teachers will have to make in-class adjustments depending on their students’ reactions or nonreactions to what they are presented with. Then, after each lesson, teachers can evaluate what they perceive their students have learned and what was diffcult and easy for them and, in such a manner, obtain information that can help them plan following lessons. Overall, this chapter suggests that clearly stated lesson plans will not only help lessen the cognitive load for language teachers as they enter the classroom to teach, but also likely maintain their students’ attention and learning because procedures and time have been optimized throughout each lesson.

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8

Refecting on Teaching and Assessing the Skills

Activities Covered • • • • • • • • • •

Refecting on Teaching Writing Refecting on Assessing Writing Refecting on Teaching Speaking Refecting on Assessing Speaking Refecting on Teaching Reading Refecting on Assessing Reading Refecting on Teaching Listening Refecting on Assessing Listening Refecting on Teaching Grammar Refecting on Assessing Grammar

Introduction In the previous chapter, I outlined and discussed the importance of planning lessons for language teachers. I also discussed different approaches to planning, how to create, develop, implement and evaluate a plan, and for the most part this was related to lesson planning in general. Most language teachers teach specifc lessons of fve important skills related to language learning: grammar, writing, speaking reading and listening. In addition, much of this time teaching these skills also involves assessing each skill so that they can consider their students’ profciency levels in each of the skills. I also recognize that some second language scholars and teachers do not like to break language learning into these discrete skills, as they consider these to be all integrated when a person uses the target language. Additionally, I realize there are a lot more skills involved when learning second 112

DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-8

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languages (such as sociolinguistic competence—for more on this, see Farrell, 2017); however, because I cannot cover them all in this book, I focus this chapter on teaching and assessing the four skills of grammar, writing, speaking, reading and listening as a way of getting you to refect on these as well as any other components you think important for learning specifc skills associated with second language learning.

Refecting on Teaching Writing People write for many reasons (see also Chapter 5 for writing as refection), such as to express feelings, to show their knowledge of the world and for interpersonal and/or professional purposes. Writing can also be done for specifc purposes such as for persuading, informing or expressing. When writing is for persuading, the emphasis is on changing the mind of the reader. When writing is for informing, the focus is on the subject matter of what is written. When writing is for expressing the writer’s own thoughts, the focus is on the writer, his or her thoughts and opinions. Two main (and very different) approaches have been called the product approach and the process approach. The basic assumption behind the ‘product’ approach is that students will focus on producing an accurate composition in the target language as a refection of their competence as a writer. When emphasizing writing as product, language teachers focus on grammar instruction with the notion that this will help students produce long stretches of accurately written language, although content is sometimes considered of secondary nature. Products (e.g., essays, reports) are considered fnished only when the language (especially vocabulary and grammar) is accurate. The basic assumption behind the ‘process’ approach is that students will slowly discover, and further develop, their thoughts as they write in the target language for a particular audience. When emphasizing writing as process, language teachers encourage their students to brainstorm writing topics in class, then the students write multiple drafts, with feedback provided (either by peers or the teacher) after each draft. Finally, when the draft is near completion, students are encouraged to edit it for accuracy (grammar, spelling, etc.). In addition, writing instruction for second/foreign language learners has been infuenced more recently by a ‘genre’ approach that examines ways in which language is used for particular purposes in particular contexts. The genre approach seeks to address not only the needs 113

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of second/foreign language writers to compose texts for particular readers, but also examines how texts actually work. Genre writing includes narrative, descriptive and argumentative writing, as well as different text types (e.g., research reports, business letters, essay examinations, technical reports). Choosing whether to follow a product, process or genre approach writing involves acknowledging the advantages and disadvantages of each approach while at the same time taking our student writing needs into consideration and our philosophy (and knowledge of) about how L2 writing should be instructed. In addition, writers must consider who they are writing for, or their audience, regardless of which writing approach they adopt. Refection 68 • Do you teach writing from among product, process and/or genre? • If yes, what strategies do you use to teach each? • If you do not use any of these approaches, how do you teach writing?

Refecting on Assessing Writing Writing assessment is very complex because it can be performed for a variety of different reasons such as student placement, diagnosis, aptitude, achievement/progress, profciency and for program evaluation purposes. I will focus on writing assessment in the classroom. The type of writing assessment in a classroom will greatly depend on the approach to writing instruction a teacher has adopted (e.g., was it a product, process, genre or a mixture of approaches to instruction?). For example, if students are instructed in a range of writing genres within their language profciency level, then they can be expected to be tested in how they produce some of these genre types. When designing writing assignments and tests for students, teachers must keep their students’ profciency levels and learning styles in mind. Teachers can develop a rubric that provide rules for assessing their writing class. Teachers can develop a rubric that provide rules for assessing their writing class. These rubrics can be holistic or trait (Reynolds, 2010). Holistic rubrics have language teachers provide a single judgment on a piece of writing as represented on a number (from 1–6, with 1 the lowest, and 6 the highest), or a descriptively (unsatisfactory, satisfactory, average, above average, superior). Holistic rubrics represent characteristics of the writing to focus on such as organization or language accuracy, the performance levels that are 114

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acceptable (i.e., 3 may be acceptable for a writing course from a range of 1–6), a descriptor for each performance level (i.e., a 3 paper is an average paper with average organization and some errors in language use) and the rating procedures that will be used (i.e., will you have sample papers already graded to follow?). A trait rubric, on the other hand, separates different traits in an instrument that are tested to give summative information about a student’s progress from a pre-test to a post-test. For example, a writing teacher may want to check student progress on organization in writing, and he or she can design a rubric that examines specifc traits in essay organization such as the introduction, body and conclusion and the logical order of related ideas with supporting examples. If a language teacher wants to focus on a particular aspect of writing, he or she can grade accordingly, for example, grade the frst draft only for content and not spelling, grammar or other such errors. However, before grading in such a manner, teachers should make sure that they demonstrate the difference between content and mechanics by isolating them in different classes for instruction, thus showing the students how they will also be isolated in the assessment process as well. Refection 69 • How do you (or should you) language teachers assess writing?

Refecting on Teaching Speaking One of the main sources of evidence of language competency for second language learners is the ability to speak the language they are learning, and most of the responsibility to make this happen falls on the language teacher in a classroom setting. When we use the term ‘speaking’ in language learning, we usually mean that language teachers intend that their students produce or speak the target language in some form. Richards (2008) suggests people speak a second language for three general purposes: interaction, transaction and performance. Talk as interaction means that the speaker engages in spontaneous exchanges (such as chatting) with others for social purposes. Such conversations involve face-to-face interactions and include such dimensions as turn taking (e.g., taking a turn, holding a turn and giving up a turn), topics (that are appropriate to context and culture) and repair (if breakdown in understanding occurs, one or both, or more, participants need to make efforts to correct or repair/fx it). Speaking as transaction is where the 115

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speaker wants to obtain or exchange specifc information (such as the price of cars) with others and includes the issue of accuracy (e.g., correct grammar) versus fuency (ease of speaking without regard to grammar accuracy) in speaking lessons. Speaking as performance is where the speaker delivers a prepared presentation or speech in a predictable sequence (especially for the openings and closings of such presentations and speeches) before some kind of audience (live or online). The language used is usually more formal and similar to written language (see earlier) and thus needs to be accurate in terms of grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary, depending on the audience. Noticing helps learners attend to particular grammatical features as they come up in speaking, but the teacher does not have the students manipulate or produce these in speech until later. For example, they can listen to a speech and pay attention to specifc grammatical features or read transcripts to notice grammatical features by underlining them. The teacher can later attempt to reinforce the students’ knowledge by requiring them to use (by speaking and/or writing) the grammatical features they have noticed and analyzed. One of the most noticeable skills of someone’s ability to speak a second language is the way he or she pronounces particular words (or his or her phonological skills), because this often helps (or hinders) a listener to understand and to form initial impressions of the speaker. These initial impressions can leave a lasting impression (favorable or unfavorable) on the listener. Not everyone thinks we should teach pronunciation explicitly in speaking lessons, because it can take away from focus on promoting a student’s fuency. I would suggest two aspects of speaking should be use such as intonation (is the learner using appropriate intonation patterns in utterances? Can the learner use intonation contours to signal whether utterances are statements?) and stress and rhythm (Does the learner produce the ‘schwa’ in unstressed syllables? Does the learner use loudness and length to differentiate between stressed and unstressed syllables? Does the learner stress each syllable equally? Is the learner able to produce appropriate strong and weak stresses? Does the learner place the tonic stress on the appropriate words?). Refection 70 • Do you teach with speaking as interaction, transactional, and performance? • If yes, what strategies do you use to teach each kind? • If no, how do you or should you teach speaking? 116

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Refecting on Assessing Speaking Speaking is one of the most diffcult skills to judge for language teachers because there are so many different criteria to consider such as pronunciation, grammar (see following section), vocabulary and sociolinguistic competence already mentioned. Assessment will really depend on the type of speaking we want to test, so again I focus on classroom-based speaking assessment, which will usually depend on the focus of the speaking lessons. For example, if the focus of the speaking lesson was practice talk as interaction in which students were involved in two-way communication task activities throughout the lessons, then this needs to be assessed very differently than if a student was giving a speech as in speaking as performance by standing at a podium and delivering a prepared text for thirty minutes. Popular assessment of talk as interaction includes oral interviews (although there is now also semi-directed testing of oral English available through the use of computers). For speaking as performance assessments (such as a presentation), language teachers grade the clarity of the presentation and note the use of other aspects of discourse such as stress to emphasize important points. Because many language teachers consider their speaking classes to be communicative, when making tests for these classes, they should include some kind of performance in which test takers have to produce language and should be required to engage in face-to-face interactions, and these interactions are unpredictable. In addition, students can be brought directly into the assessment process and can help teachers with the scoring of interactive discussions. Refection 71 • How do you (or should you) language teachers assess speaking?

Refecting on Teaching Reading Reading a text does not mean converting the written text into spoken language, because the reader actually interacts with that text. In other words, each reader will generate their own meaning based on what they see and what experiences they have had with the topic they are reading about. Thus we can defne reading as “the process of constructing meaning through the dynamic interaction among the reader’s existing knowledge, 117

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the information suggested by the written language, and the context of the reading situation” (Anthony, Pearson, & Raphael, 1993: 284). When considering the teaching of reading to second/foreign language learners, language teachers can consider some different models or approaches, two of which are the top-down model and the bottom-up model. The top-down approach suggests that readers bring prior knowledge and experiences to the text and that they continue to read as long as the text confrms their expectations. The bottom-up approach maintains that the actual words and sentences in a text and how they are organized are used by readers to construct meaning. Perhaps by now you are concluding that some of both models interact together when readers try to comprehend what they are reading. This is called an interactive model in which both top-down and bottom-up processes occur when a person reads a text. In order to become fuent in reading, students must have the ability to do many things simultaneously such as recognize the meanings of words as well as recognize text structure and discourse organization so that they can build both comprehension and fuency. Indeed, Jensen (1986: 106) maintains that second language readers should attempt to “approximate native speaker reading rates and comprehension levels in order to keep up with classmates.” She suggests that 300 words per minute is the optimal rate for effcient comprehension. Thus, obtaining reading fuency means balancing reading rate and reading comprehension, which means the greater the overlap between comprehension and rate, the greater the fuency of the reader. Language teachers can help their students to increase their reading fuency by increasing their reading rates in words per minute by emphasizing repeated reading of the same material. Another purpose for reading is to develop comprehension. Reading comprehension is closely related to reading fuency: as decoding becomes more automated (e.g., fuent reading), readers are able to devote more attention to understanding what they are reading. To be able to understand a text successfully, students’ need to be able to (re)construct the meaning by using a combination of what they already know about the topic they are about to read (their prior knowledge), the information that is provided in the text itself that they are reading and their understanding of both (prior experience and information from the text). Teachers play a vital role in assisting with effective reading comprehension by activating this existing prior/background knowledge on a topic before, during and after reading. For example, if prior knowledge of a topic is lacking before students read, teachers can brainstorm a topic 118

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with them to fnd out what they know about a topic and then ask them to make predictions about the content. Students can also be asked to make predictions about the topic using the title of the passage. If language teachers discover that background knowledge of a topic is lacking by the students, they may need to pre-teach vocabulary specifc to the topic, such as key words in the target passages, and provide them with the necessary background information about the topic so that they can comprehend better. One strategy to use during reading is to stop the students and ask them to predict what they think will happen next in the story, and if there are subheadings, these can also be used to guide students’ understanding of the text. After reading, another strategy involves asking students to summarize what they have read. If they have understood the text, they will not have a problem summarizing what they have read. Refection 72 • Do you teach with reading as a top-down process, bottom-up process and/or as an interactive process? • If yes, what strategies do you use to teach each kind? • If no, how do you or should you teach reading?

Refecting on Assessing Reading When assessing reading comprehension, students can be asked to perform any of the following activities (used separately or in combination) such as categorizing classifying, or sorting icons, words or phrases into groups (using illustrations or graphic organizers); drawing based on a written text; matching words with pictures, words, phrases, sentences; matching sentences with paragraphs; underlining or highlighting main ideas or supporting details; completing cloze exercises using a word bank; sequencing pictures, sentences, or paragraphs; and responding to oral comprehension questions, such as in running records or written text supported visually. A common test of reading that occurs in many classrooms is the test of oral reading fuency, which is a combination of accuracy and rate of reading, as in words correct per minute, because either accuracy or rate by itself mean nothing. Another popular test of reading is the cloze test where students are asked to use the appropriate word for the blank of a word that has been deleted from a passage. Usually, the test designer deletes every 119

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nth word so that there is little variation and to make the test as valid as possible. Because students may have different reading profciency levels, it is diffcult to group students at appropriate levels for reading assessment. Therefore, teachers can have students keep records of their own reading development by using for example, the use of a self-assessment graphic organizer called what I know, what I learned, what more I wish to learn (or KLWH). The KLWH can give indications of students’ reading comprehension levels, as well as their use of metacognitive reading strategies. In addition, reading teachers should note that in the traditional mode of testing reading vocabulary tests, in which students are given word lists to defne, or to match, are popular and considered an indication of a student’s reading ability. However, these vocabulary tests may mislead students (and some teachers) into thinking that learning words is the only key to good reading. Although a knowledge of vocabulary is important for successful reading comprehension, it should only be accessed after all other aspects of reading have been assessed. Refection 73 • How do you (or should you) as language teachers assess reading?

Refecting on Teaching Listening Listening for comprehension is a very diffcult skill to acquire for students learning a second/foreign language, and especially for those not profcient in that language. Listening is a complex skill that involves not only being able to correctly interpret the meaning of incoming speech in a second language but also many times having to respond appropriately to it, such as in an interactive discussion that face-to-face conversations involve. Although people have different purposes for listening to others, two of the main purposes that should be highlighted in language lessons are listening for transactional and interactional reasons. In transactional listening, the main purpose is to listen in order to exchange information, whereas in interactional listening, the main purpose is to listen in order to maintain social relationships. The former involves getting some important information from someone, while the latter is more small talk that does not involve getting information (beyond gossip perhaps?) and is for social reasons. In addition, and very similar to reading 120

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presented previously, two important processes that are involved when people listen can be classifed into top-down and bottom-up processing (Goh, 2008). These processes are used many times simultaneously when people listen, but many times one of these can dominate. For example, is a listener is familiar with the topic he or she is listening to, then his or her prior experience will help him or her to better comprehend the message and, as such, he or she will tend to use what is called top-down processing. Thus topdown processing occurs when listeners use their background knowledge of a topic as an aid to comprehend the incoming message. On the other hand, if a listener does not have any background knowledge of a topic he or she is listening to (e.g., physics), then he or she will tend to listen to each word, sentence and cluster of sentences to try to comprehend the message and will thus use more bottom-up processing. Bottom-up processing suggests that listeners analyze an incoming message by making use of their knowledge of how sounds are streamed (phonological awareness), how sentences are organized (grammar cues) and what words are used (vocabulary). That said, listening for comprehension usually involves listeners using an interactive combination of both top-down and bottom-up processes to construct the meaning of an incoming message. In such an interactive manner, listeners can actively create meaning while they are listening. This also suggests that listeners are not passively decoding a message but rather are busy trying to fgure out its meaning; we just cannot see such efforts with the naked eye, nor can we see much that is produced as a result as in speaking or writing. If language teachers want to teach top-down listening processing, students can be instructed on how to notice and look out for particular parts of a text, such as the setting where the listening event occurs. On the other hand, teaching a bottom-up listening approach to processing will encourage students to focus more on listening activities and materials that emphasize the actual words in a listening text and practice listening exercises such as dictations, cloze listening (e.g., every nth word is omitted and students must place the correct word in the blank as they listen to a text) and answering multiple-choice questions after listening to a text. Refection 74 • Do you teach with listening as a top-down process, bottom-up process and/or as an interactive process? • If yes, what strategies do you use to teach each kind? • If no, how do you or should you teach listening? 121

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Refecting on Assessing Listening When teachers are assessing their students’ listening ability for placement in a language program, they usually engage in discrete-point testing in which the elements of language are isolated in which students must listen to recognize minimal pairs for example. For classroom based listening comprehension assessment language teachers can have students listen to their voice and/or other voices from any device and students can be required to write an answer or show their listening comprehension in nonverbal ways. Because listening is a receptive skill it is diffcult to ‘see’ what students understand or retain and thus it is more diffcult to test than the other skills. In addition, because listening tests are usually carried out while students are listening in real time, if they miss any part of the listening test, then they cannot go back over the text as they could in a reading or writing test (see previous section). This may be construed as not being as fair as assessing the other macro skills, so it may be necessary to play the listening text twice so that students can go over their answers. When testing listening comprehension, language teachers can make questions about the listening text that ask students to listen for the gist of what they hear or to listen for specifc details. They can also be asked to follow instructions or directions on a map they have been given. The most common type of questions given in a listening test is multiple choice, and if all the students are from the same L1, these can be written in the students’ L1 so that there will be no misunderstanding because of reading comprehension problems. Students can also listen to a complete text and then be asked to respond to it in a letter or article, or they can be asked to represent the entire text in a picture or a diagram. Refection 75 • How do you (or should you) as language teachers assess listening?

Refecting on Teaching Grammar Often when I say the word grammar to people who are not language teachers, they respond in a nervous, worrying manner and mention that their grammar is not always correct, implying that we are all talking about the same notion of grammar. However, there is not general agreement 122

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in linguistic circles about a commonly agreed-on defnition for the term grammar. More importantly for language teachers, grammar’s exact role in language lessons is still not commonly agreed on: some say we should teach it (but again, there is no agreement about how we should teach grammar), while others say we should never teach grammar overtly in language lessons. Indeed, in many countries around the world, the general approach of teaching L2 over the years has changed from emphasizing overt grammar instruction in the past (although many teachers still rely on a grammar approach to teaching language today) to a more communicative approach in which grammar teaching is more incidental and not the focus of a complete language lesson. This communicative approach to teaching the English language suggests the omission of overt grammar teaching in favor of achieving profciency in English through communicative-type activities in class. Now there seems to be a movement in some countries to question this communicative approach to teaching English (and, in some cases, a call for a reintroduction of grammar instruction) because students are still making grammar mistakes, and this may be linked to lack of explicit instruction in grammar. Unfortunately, the teaching of grammar in many instances is only carried out by a language teacher in reaction to students’ errors with the mantra of ‘if you teach grammar overtly, then the students will make fewer mistakes.’ However, even in the best scenario, teaching students the rules and correcting their every error does not help a language learner avoid errors. At worst, it can impede language production, because this attention to errors makes the student focus on form at the expense of communication. So, what are second and foreign language teachers to do? Grammar, simply put, is the rules of any language, and I believe that language students really do need some knowledge of grammar in order to develop their profciency levels in all the skills (such as those outlined in this chapter). For me, the real issue is how to teach it in its most effective way, either directly or indirectly, inductively or deductively. Knowledge of these two main approaches to the teaching of English grammar, the inductive and the deductive approach, will be suffcient for you to survive teaching grammar during your frst years. An inductive approach to teaching grammar is when language teachers encourage their students to devise the underlying grammar pattern of the lesson or when they try to fgure out the grammar rule by themselves. A deductive approach is teacher-led explanations of the grammar pattern in focus or when students are given the grammar rule by the teacher. Some teachers will use both 123

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approaches when teaching grammar, with more advanced profciency students encouraged to discover the rule rather than being told it which may be better for beginner profciency level students. Refection 76 • What do the ‘rules of a language’ mean to you? • What method do you think should be used to teach grammar—overt lessons in grammar or more communicative (covert) lessons, in which grammar is not emphasized and using (speaking, writing, reading and listening) the language is the focus? Explain your stance. • To learn English grammar, do you think it is necessary to know grammar terms (e.g., past progressive, passive, countable nouns)? • How important do you think it is to do grammar practice exercises in class to learn English? • Can you think of other approaches to teaching grammar that may be more useful to you?

Refecting on Assessing Grammar Over the years, I have noticed that some language teachers like to teach grammar because they suggest it is easier to test than, say, speaking or writing (see later on). I realize also that many other language teachers say their most common reason for teaching grammar is that it provides students with a system for analyzing and labeling sentences. Yet we still do not seem to be able to teach grammar rules to students beyond assessing their knowledge of the rule rather than the application of such rules. In fact, for many students, the systematic study of grammar is not even particularly helpful in avoiding or correcting errors, yet we still ‘feel’ that if we do not teach grammar overtly, then our students will make grammar mistakes. So, in this fnal section of assessment of grammar, rather than talk about how to test students’ knowledge of flling in the blank with the correct grammar structure, I will outline and discuss specifc guidelines for language teachers when preparing grammar lessons so that assessment will fow naturally from these lessons. • Know what type of grammar you want to teach in the lesson. I would suggest that language teachers follow descriptive rather than prescriptive grammar rules. Look at how people use the language in their 124

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everyday lives and see if it conficts with the rules you are teaching. Grammar rules will vary depending on such things as meaning, genre and register. Just look at your computer grammar check and see what it suggests you do regarding your use of grammar when you write— is it always correct? I think you know it is not. Also, remember that grammar rules will change over time, so what you see in a textbook should be constantly compared to what is used outside the classroom by society. • Time and plan your grammar lessons. Have a clear lesson plan to make a clear transition from one grammar activity to the next. You may want to consider presenting a grammar item in the middle of a lesson, but this all depends on which approach you take (inductive or deductive). For example, grammar-focusing techniques can be embedded in meaningful, communicative contexts. • Decide on how much grammar metalanguage you want to introduce in each lesson. Do your students need to know all the grammar terminology? That is a question only you can answer, and your answer will depend on your position about grammar in language learning. My suggestion would be to try not to overwhelm students with grammar terminology—bring the terminology in slowly like a foreign language. Indeed, looking at the suggestions presented earlier, language teachers should focus any assessment of grammar only on items they have taught in their lessons and encourage their students to focus only on these. Refection 77 • How do you (or should you) as language teachers assess grammar?

Conclusion A fundamental aspect of any language teacher’s job is to teach their students to become profcient in various skills of the target language they are learning. Of course, there are many methodology books about how language teachers should teach and assess the various skills, and I cannot hope to cover any of this in great detail in just one chapter of a book devoted to refective practice. That said, I would be remiss if I did not include some refection on the fve main skills language students need for 125

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success in the target language: writing, speaking, listening, reading and grammar. I also include refection on how teachers can consider assessing each of these as well. My aim is not to provide comprehensive coverage; rather, it is to get you started on refection in how you teach and access all of the competency skills our students need to become profcient in the target language.

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Activities Covered • • • • • • • • • • • •

Manager or Conductor? Organizing the Class Space and Time Diversity Mixed Abilities Learning Styles Classroom Climate Maintaining Order The Back-Row Distracter The Nonparticipant The Overexuberant Student Expecting the Unexpected

Introduction In the previous two chapters, we looked at how to plan a lesson and teaching and assessing fve different skills language learners will need to become profcient in the target language. Both of these chapters are really refection before action, or refection-for-action, and thus only half the battle for language teachers who must manage the whole process while they are teaching. As mentioned in these previous chapters, if lessons are planned well and you have decided on which skill or skills (i.e., a combination) to focus on, then language teachers must organize the classroom learning environment they want to foster so that everyone will know what is expected of them during these lessons. Indeed, careful planning of activities that maximize DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-9

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student-learning time, in which activities are meaningful and interesting, will probably mean that most students will not usually question your methods or engage in any kinds of disruptive behavior. This chapter will outline and discuss various aspects of classroom management such as managing or conducting, organizing the class, creating space and time, preparing for diversity, mixed abilities and learning styles, refecting on classroom climate and maintaining order with a specifc focus in the back-row distractor, the nonparticipant and the overexuberant student, as well as expecting the unexpected.

Manager or Conductor? You have made the lesson plans, and now you must face the reality of the classroom where you will attempt to put these plans into action. However, you must consider what will happen if things do not turn out as you had planned. For example, your students may not respond to your initial directions and may be tired and restless for any number of reasons; perhaps they had a diffcult previous class or are dealing with some personal issues. Teachers have to react to whatever is thrown at them when they walk into the classroom; this is sometimes called classroom management. Although this term is widely used in educational circles, usually to refer to how teachers use various procedures and techniques to ‘manage’ lessons, I think this reduction trivializes the complex process of teaching and what teachers actually do, which is shape a learning environment that supports effective learning of a second or foreign language while promoting respect for student diversity. Thus, given the wonderful range of diversity that language teachers meet every day in their classrooms, it is important that the learning environment be shaped (rather than managed) so that they can take full advantage of this linguistic and cultural diversity. Taking advantage of this diversity can be a challenging (but also very rewarding) task for the language teacher while they facilitate student learning in their classrooms. Thus, right from the start of this chapter, I would like to move away from the business connotation of the word management and explain a language teacher’s job more in terms of conductor of an orchestra. Refection 78 • What does classroom management mean to you? • Does it mean the same to ‘manage’ a class in face-to-face learning as in online learning? 128

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• If no, what are the main differences in each mode of delivery when it comes to classroom management? • Do you see yourself as a ‘manager,’ ‘facilitator’ or a ‘conductor’? {{What is your metaphor for a classroom? Finish the sentence: ‘A classroom is________.’ {{What is your opinion of the following teachers’ metaphors for the classroom (from Wright, 2005): {{A classroom is . . . • A greenhouse (‘protected environment,’ careful husbandry,’ ‘teacher is gardener, students are plants’) • A wrestling ring (‘struggle for knowledge,’ ‘ideas fght for attention,’ ‘teacher as referee,’ students as audience’) • A temple (‘place to site peacefully;’ ‘rituals;’ ‘teacher as priest, students as worshippers’) • A hospital (‘treatment of patients;’ ‘teacher–doctor, students– patients;’ organized, systematic prescription) • A tree (‘teacher is the tree and therefore the classroom;’ ‘students are birds and animals which shelter in the branches;’ ‘teacher sustains and nurtures and provides;’ parasites and creepers–troublesome students) • How can you shape the learning environment from the following: {{Support culturally responsive and inclusive classrooms for all students? {{Create a caring and respectful environment? {{Create fexibility when creating student groups, no matter the size of the class or the type of learners? {{Account for many different student learning styles?

Organizing the Class As already mentioned previously and in Chapter 6, lesson planning is the necessary frst step in managing a class, and this happens before you go into the classroom or enter an online teaching platform. Language teachers can plan the opening phase of the lesson, the instructional phase (the main part of the lesson) and how to end the lesson. Hence you should be well prepared to walk in and teach the class before you enter. Now you must meet the reality of the classroom. Plans have been made and you must put them into 129

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action. However, human beings, both teachers and students, do not always react the way we plan for them to react. For example, our students may be tired and restless for any number of reasons. They may have had a diffcult class previous to your lesson or they may have some trouble going on in their personal lives and/or if online they may be experiencing a myriad of other diffculties. Regardless of the cause, not every class will go according to your plan. Sometimes you will have to react to what you encounter, such as some students will not participate in activities, some will be diffcult to control, some will do all the work in a group while others will do no work, and yet other students will continuously shout answers without giving their peers a chance to answer. So, another important aspect of conducting a class is how you want to organize your classroom and the interaction you want to encourage in your class. For the most part, many language teachers organize their lesson so that their students can work alone, in pairs, in small groups, in large groups or as a whole class. It is always best, however, to balance how you control interaction in your classroom among students working alone, learning in groups (e.g., cooperative learning), and whole-class instruction by the teacher. This way, you can have more variety in class, and your students will not always get bored with the same approach to interaction. Refection 79 • Draw your ideal second/foreign language classroom. • Draw all the different ways you see students interacting in your class. • What is your opinion of creating an effective classroom climate from the following (from Senior, 2006: 81)? {{Communicate acceptance or, respect for and caring about students as human beings. {{Establish a businesslike, yet non-threatening atmosphere. {{Communicate appropriate messages about school subject matter. {{Give students some sense of control with regard to classroom activities. {{Create a sense of community among the students.

Space and Time When language teachers approach the issue of classroom management, they must consider how they make use of space (especially if this is faceto-face instruction) as well as how they will use time to maximize student 130

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learning throughout each lesson. In many instances, they (especially time) are defned by schools and authorities, and both have a powerful infuence on lessons. For face-to-face lessons language teachers must decide how to organize the desks, chairs, tables and the like in the room so that their students can comfortably interact with the teacher and each other. There is usually a whiteboard (and/or blackboard) at the head of the room and many teachers also have a desk in that position too. So, the frst aspect of space for a language teacher to consider in such classrooms it if their students will sit in rows, circles, semi-circles and/or groups (actually there are many other different permutations that can also be considered). Language teachers must also consider the time they allocate to the opening of each lesson, the period of instruction of the language skill or the like and the closing of each lesson. As mentioned in Chapter 7 on language planning, language teachers can plan for the timing of each different activity, but in real time different activities may run shorter or longer depending on many different things that can occur during the lesson. Although impossible to plan all the time of a lesson correctly for each lesson, language teachers can try to keep the pace of their lessons lively with not many lags between activities as the students may lose interest in the lesson easily. Of course, all this is changed if classes are held in online platforms where language teachers no longer have a sense of movement for themselves and their students, as both are confned to the screen of a computer. Language teachers can no longer physically move about their classroom in ways they could in face-to-face checking student engagement and understanding, and when they spot some disruption, can change the classroom dynamics quickly. This is very diffcult to do in online platforms, because the teacher is rooted to the screen and cannot even move to write on a whiteboard as quickly as in face-to-face classrooms. Connected with the limited tool set with face-to-face communications discussed earlier is the limited paralinguistic features that arise in an online format of communication that signal changes in lesson activities, lesson development, meanings and all other taken-for-granted seen teacher gestures, hand signals, and facial expressions diffcult to convey in an online format. This constricts the use of a language teacher’s time management in online lessons. For example, the ‘hand up’ icon is not as fast or effective as when a student puts his or her hand up in a classroom where the teacher can instantaneously ‘see’ who is asking a question. In an online format what invariably happens is that the teacher must fnd out ‘who asked that question’ and this slows 131

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the whole communication process. Indeed, setting and keeping time for activities and also keeping lesson momentum when teaching on online platforms is very challenging for teachers because they must be able to provide time for their students to complete them all without being able to physically observe all their actions. Nevertheless, language teachers must be able to manipulate a menu on a screen to interact with their students and as such allocation of space is very different from face-to-face and in online classrooms. Refection 80 • How do you allocate classroom space for your lessons? • How do you allocate classroom time for your lessons? • How do (or would) both of these change classroom management dynamics for online lessons? • Have you found yourself struggling to accomplish what you have laid out in your lesson plan? Where do you fnd you are using most of your time—the opening, the student work period or the closure? • Why do you think pacing is an important component of language instruction? • What are the factors that you think contribute to teacher’s lesson pacing being well-executed versus too slow or too fast?

Diversity Diversity in second language classrooms involves the mix of students we have in our classrooms in terms of backgrounds, for example, ethnic, religious, social class and frst language, sex, achievement levels, learning styles, intelligences and more (Farrell & Jacobs, 2020). It is important for language teachers to have a high level of awareness of cultural and linguistic diversity and to be sensitive to individual students—especially to the ways they interact with students, making sure that there is no discrimination. It is also important that language teachers be able to recognize (and change) examples of institutionalized racism if the language teacher wants to provide equality of opportunity for all the students. Language teachers may be surprised when they enter a language classroom and discover the range of students they must teach. How can a teacher facilitate the language development of such a diverse group of students? Taking advantage of this 132

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diversity can be a challenging but very rewarding task for the language teacher because we get to meet students from so many different ethnic, cultural, religious and socioeconomic backgrounds, which makes our job exciting. Refection 81 • What does diversity mean to you? • Do you see diversity in your classroom as positive or negative? • How do you think your students can be diverse when it comes to intelligence, cultural backgrounds and religion?

Mixed Abilities Not every school or every language teacher has the luxury of teaching classes of language students with the exact same profciency levels. In fact, it is near impossible to have all students in one class with the exact same profciency levels, but many schools test students on pre-entry to attempt to place them at least in one of four main levels such as beginning, elementary, intermediate and advanced. Regardless of these placement tests, many language teachers still fnd themselves assigned at the beginning of a new semester teaching a mixed group of language students in terms of their different learning styles, language aptitude, and previous educational experience. Such mixed-ability classrooms can be diffcult to manage when they are also multi-level if the students also exhibit different language skill levels as well. Many language teachers do not know where to begin their instruction in such classes and worry about the time it will take to teach the lower profciency level students as opposed to the more advanced profciency level students. They also worry about focusing on one group more than the other group and the resultant loss of interest and motivation among groups within the same classroom. This, of course, makes classroom management even more demanding for the language teacher to not only fnd materials and resources to teach and keep every student happy and engaged. For psychological reasons when I was a language teacher, I decided to expect this to happen in my language classes, and so I was prepared for students to enter with different abilities. This made me a more creative and fexible language teacher, I believe, because I had to be more strategic when planning each lesson and get to know 133

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each student in my classroom and his or her learning style. However, such planning for ‘differentiation’ of instruction can be very diffcult for novice language teachers because they have not yet built up a repertoire of teaching methods to choose from. Refection 82 • How would you plan to teach students at varied language profciency levels? • Have you taught or observed classes with multiple levels of language profciency? What are some of the challenges and the opportunities in such classes? • What concerns might students feel if they enter a class and sense that they are in a ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ level than their classmates?

Learning Styles Second language learners have different and diverse learning styles, but some teachers and the learners themselves may not be aware of these different styles. Four main types of learning styles that have been identifed are verbal, visual, logical and hands-on. For example, some students may be more verbal than other students, so they can be given more work to do with words such as speaking, writing essays, researching or using the Internet. Yet other students’ learning styles may favor a more visual approach, so they can be given assignments such as drawing and painting, making storyboards (as opposed to writing a story), making videotapes and taking photographs. Others of your students may be logical in approach and should be given puzzles, equations and other problem-solving assignments. Some of your students may be more hands-on in approach to their learning, so these should be given assignments that get them moving, such as role-plays and experiments. Refection 83 • Do you think your students all approach learning the same way? • Do you think that each second language learner in your class has a different learning style? • Can you identify any different learning styles for students? 134

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Classroom Climate Teaching is a relational act because it is difficult, if not impossible, to separate the people (teachers and learners) from the act (teaching and learning). If teaching did not involve relationships, and teachers acted like well-oiled machines, then classrooms would be very boring places. This is why teachers can be viewed by their students as being entertaining or boring, or approachable or distant, and/or students can also feel supported, ignored or mistrusted by their teachers. Thus, every language classroom has a ‘climate’ of some sort, which is the tone set by both teachers and students. This tone or ‘atmosphere’ is easily recognized by the students and each teacher would like to have a positive classroom climate. It is interesting to consider that when students perceive that the classroom climate is not so welcoming, their teachers do not often know why. I believe that much of this can be avoided if language teachers plan to set up a climate that they consider to be welcoming and promotes learning for all students inclusively. Of course, not all language teachers are the same and so will have a different approach to managing their classroom climate, with some liking a relaxed approach while others may want a more focused, brisk approach to classroom procedures. A lot will depend too on the language teacher’s personality as each teacher will inevitably reveal their personality characteristics while teaching, and as such will find ways to weave these personal attributes into their teaching. Awareness of these for the teacher is a most important first step, because they must mold their characteristics with those of their students to create a supportive learning environment for all. We all have had teachers in the past who were friendly and bubbly and some who seemed less cheerful or friendly, but regardless we all knew deep down if they cared about their students and were attentive to students’ learning needs. Indeed, for language teachers, the relational investment involved in creating a positive classroom climate means that they must constantly monitor how their students are feeling and evaluate if they need assistance (e.g., give advice and guidance) with their learning. In order to be able to build such caring classroom environments where they assist their students’ learning and give advice while attending to their problems, language teachers must be able to build trusting and caring relationships with their students as the semester progresses. 135

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Refection 84 • Most language teachers have a good idea of the sort of ‘atmosphere’ they would like to have in their classrooms. What is yours? • What type of honesty would you bring to your classroom interactions with your students in terms of welcoming vs. exclusiveness and/or directness vs. indirectness?

Maintaining Order Language teachers can sometimes struggle with maintaining order and keeping students on task when teaching a large class and/or when teaching very young learners. Sometimes in language classes, especially large, mixed-ability classes (see earlier), some students can be off-task and as a result may distract other students. If not checked, this can develop into a bigger problem if the teacher has not planned how to deal with such issues beforehand and how to deal with them on the spot as well. This can also be a real dilemma for language teachers in their frst years, because as for many other issues, they may not have had any time to build up a repertoire of skills about how to handle off-task students. So, it is best that language teachers make clear at the beginning of each semester what is acceptable behavior and unacceptable behavior in their classes that will allow for constructive teaching and learning. For example, language teachers will have to decide how they will deal with lateness, undone homework, the permissible use of the students’ L1 during lessons (some say this is not an issue) and how they will make up any missed classes. In addition, teachers must decide how they will deal with unacceptable behavior in class so that each student is aware of the consequence of breaking whatever rules the teacher and students have agreed on. Refection 85 • • • •

How do you or will you maintain order in your language lessons? What are appropriate classroom rules for you as a language teacher? How will you enforce them? What concerns do you have when it comes to implementing rules in the classroom? • What are some reward systems you have tried or seen? What were some of their benefts and/or distractions? 136

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• What does ‘discipline’ mean to you? Do you consider it part of your role as a teacher? • Why is it important to have a pre-planned approach to discipline in the classroom? • Lewis (2002) has come up with the following cases that challenge language teachers to deal with off-task behavior. How would you deal with each case (see also the three activities that follow for more on each of these)? {{The back-row distracter: The same student sits at the back and distracts other students. {{The nonparticipants: The same students do not participate in class activities. {{The overexuberant student: The same student always shouts out answers or dominates the class.

The Back-Row Distracter Following on from the refection presented earlier is the question of what do you as a language teacher do when the same student sits at the back and continues to distract other students? This can be very disconcerting for most language teachers; especially if you are a novice teacher, you want to be liked by all your students, and, if you publicly reprimand the student, you may think you are damaging the class atmosphere. If you do nothing, though, you can lose control of your own class. So, you have to do something, or else you may lose respect from the whole class. Some interesting methods suggested by Lewis (2002) include the following: stare at the disruptive student while continuing to speak, stop speaking and stare at the disruptive student and/or talk to the disruptive student after the class and lay down the law that this behavior will not be tolerated. Perhaps you could go further and say to ask the student to leave the room if he or she continues to disrupt your class because it is everyone’s class and not his or hers. You could also have a class discussion on how to behave and emphasize that misbehavior hurts everyone and so is a waste of time. If you are teaching in a school district in which this is a big problem, why not videotape the students who are causing trouble and invite the parents of the students who are trying to learn to watch the tape and decide what action they want to take. 137

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Refection 86 • What is your opinion of the methods, discussed in the previous section, for solving this dilemma? • What other methods are possible?

The Nonparticipant Another dilemma for many language teachers is how to handle the issue of some students not willing or unable to participate in class activities (the nonparticipants, as Lewis [2002] calls them previously). Language teachers could adapt a rule such as, if they do not want to learn and they are not disrupting you or other students, then leave them alone. However, I would establish certain norms of behavior for these nonparticipants, such as not letting them put their heads down on the desk to sleep, as this sends the wrong message to other students. Additionally, you can talk to the nonparticipant student and ask what is bothering him or her. It may also be an idea to videotape the nonparticipant (although legal issues may then arise so permission within the school and the student may prohibit this) and to show this to the parents of the nonparticipant (if the student is a young learner), the parents of the students who want to learn and, of course, the principal before you ask the student to leave the room. Although many novice teachers tend to blame themselves if every student is not learning, usually you fnd that it is not you at all who is to blame; if you consult other colleagues, you may fnd that the same students are either disruptive and/ or not willing participants in other classes. Within language classes, the nonparticipant student issue can be diffcult to address because there may be many reasons for the student’s stance that could be personal, cultural and/or many more. Therefore, it is best to try to discover why the student is not participating in your class. Refection 87 • How would you approach the issue of nonparticipating students in your class? • What may be the personal and/or cultural reasons for some students not participating? • Would you approach the student and, if so, how would you approach the nonparticipating student? 138

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The Overexuberant Student A common issue in many language classes is what to do when the same student, the overexuberant student (Lewis, 2002), always shouts out answers without waiting for others to participate or generally dominates the class? This is not an easy dilemma to deal with, because you do not want to kill any of the exuberance, especially if telling the student to be silent defates and demoralizes him or her into a permanent silence. Of course, more group work can lessen this problem, too. I know one experienced ESL teacher who performed a SCORE (seating chart observation record) of her class doing group work to plot the lines of communication in each group which demonstrated the one overexuberant student always talking and then showed this to him after the class. She then explained that other students also need to talk, and this seemed to work, as the student measured his participation more after that. I have found that a quiet talk after the class works to inform the student that there are others in the room who need to practice their English just like him or her, and that all must have a chance to answer. Refection 88 • Have you had experience with an overexuberant student in your class? • If yes, what did you do? • If no, what would you do if this student were in your class?

Expecting the Unexpected Managing or conducting classrooms for language teachers is a complex process at the best of times, because the makeup of our students may be very different than in other educational settings. This makeup includes students from many different cultural backgrounds, different home languages that have different expectations of communication competence within their home communities from those of the school community. They may also have different ideas about appropriate personal space and body language movements as well as posture and facial expressions from those advocated in the target language community. So, language teachers must be able to manage all these complexities on a daily basis without much background knowledge except for the perspective that they should 139

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expect the unexpected in their daily lessons. Indeed, as Schön (1983: 18) points out, practitioners are always dealing with “situations of complexity, uncertainty, instability, uniqueness and value confict,” or “indeterminate zones of practice” (Schön, 1987: 6). Perhaps the reason many of us have been teachers for many years is that we recognize and even embrace the unpredictable nature of language classrooms, and that is why we do not need to ‘manage’ our classrooms; rather, we need to ‘conduct’ the class and try to make ‘music.’ There is no one method of ‘managing’ or ‘conducting’ your classes, but I believe that as you get to know your students and as you build your repertoire of dealing with the various events that occur in your room, you will be able to come up with your own ways of managing learning in your class. Refection 89 • I began this chapter with the suggestion that language teachers can consider the metaphor of teacher as conductor (of an orchestra) rather than the more technicist term manager. What is your opinion of this now? • Do you agree that language teachers should expect the unexpected? • If yes, how can you expect the unexpected? • If no, why not?

Conclusion Perhaps one of the most daunting aspects of language teaching is how to take care of your classroom during lessons, called classroom management. Although language teachers in training can learn lots of theories about second language learning, develop understanding of how to approach lesson and unit design and study how assessment features into instruction— and how to control their classroom—once they enter real classrooms, they either doubt or fully realize that they have not really been prepared to how manage their classrooms. It is clear that the very term ‘classroom management’ encompasses a broad array of skills that clearly connect teachers’ instructional and interactional decisions with student behavior— classroom management does not just happen, it is actively created and continuously improved. In this chapter I have also introduced the notion that language teachers can conduct their lesson, and there are many techniques that teachers can use that are usually effective at bringing about effective 140

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learning. Some of these include reviewing procedures for organizing the class; creating space and time; preparing for diversity, mixed abilities and learning styles; refecting on classroom climate and maintaining order; as well as expecting the unexpected. Rather than viewing classroom management as a problem, language teachers have a unique opportunity to celebrate the diversity within their classrooms with the mix of different cultures, abilities, and learning styles as they create learning opportunities for all to fourish while learning the target language.

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Activities Covered • • • • • • • •

Classroom Communication Classroom Interaction Teacher Questions Feedback Grouping Non-Verbal Communication Classroom Communicative and Interactional Competence Collecting Data

Introduction Classroom communication, that is face-to-face communication and interaction between teachers and students, is shaped by moment-to-moment actions and interactions within that classroom (Johnson, 1995). Indeed, understanding the nature of classroom communication and interaction is one of the most important aspects of learning to teach, especially if we are to become effective language teachers (Walsh, 2015). Teachers tend to follow established patterns of communication and interaction while they teach, but these are, for the most part, held subconsciously, and many teachers remain unaware of how the communication and interaction patterns either help provide opportunities for learning, or block such opportunities. Classroom communication is very complex, yet it is central to all classroom activity and because of its rapid fow, teachers may fnd it diffcult to understand exactly what is happening in their lessons. Another complication for language teachers is that the language of instruction is 142

DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-10

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used not only as a means of obtaining new knowledge, but it is also the end goal of most lessons. This chapter explores how language teachers can refect on classroom communication and interaction by examining teachers use of questions, feedback, non-verbal communication, communicative and interactional competence and how to collect and refect on classroom communication data or information.

Classroom Communication Has anyone (especially friends who are not language teachers) ever mentioned that you may ‘talk like a teacher?’ A strange question to ask you can be your frst impression. However, have you ever examined your own communication patters outside your teaching when interacting with your friends and/or family? Here are a few questions to refect on: • • • •

Do you feel the need to initiate conversations with your friends? Do you feel the need to keep the conversation going when it lags a bit? Are you uncomfortable with silence in conversations with your friends? Do others think that you tend to control conversations and even evaluate them? • Do they think you feel as if you have to provide feedback to them after they respond? Affrmative responses to these questions are some indications that you may talk like a teacher even when you are not in a classroom because you are probably subconsciously still in teacher communication mode. One of these indications could be your use of ‘evaluation’ in conversations with your friends; for example, if in a conversation about a movie you saw with several friends, you may subconsciously respond to many of their opinions about the movie with a ‘good’ or ‘very good’ each time one ends their conversation. Most people do not monitor their communication patterns in real life, and so you as a teacher are in good company. However, for teachers, understanding classroom communication and interaction, and how these differ from ‘normal’ communication can help you provide more learning opportunities for your students. Generally, classroom communication follows a pattern, and the most usual (or unmarked) in many classes regardless of subject content and that 143

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is initiation, response, and evaluation, or IRE (Johnson, 1995): the teacher initiates something (I), a student or students usually respond (R) and then the teacher usually evaluates (E) the student response—the IRE sequence. The following example illustrates this unmarked underlying communication structure that can be found in a majority of language classrooms: 1: Teacher: What time is it?

[Initiation]

2: Student: It’s 2 p.m.

[Response]

3: Teacher: Good. It’s 2 p.m.

[Evaluation]

In Turn 1, the teacher asks the students for the time and wants the student to supply the actual time and the contracted it’s for it is. The student responds in Turn 2 with the correct contracted form it’s, and the teacher positively evaluates the response in Turn 3 with good (see also later for more on good), and repeats (with emphasis on it’s) the student’s earlier response. This brief exchange shows how a teacher uses language to manage and control classroom communication. Outside classrooms, it is unusual to fnd participants in everyday conversations evaluating responses to solicits; rather, participants usually acknowledge such solicits (hence your nonteaching friends may say you talk like a teacher!). Variability also exists in classroom communication, called marked (unusual) patterns, and can take many forms, such as student initiations and teacher responses followed by student evaluations or students performing all three IRE moves (Mehan, 1979). It should be noted too that some other classroom discourse specialists have a slightly different structure in which a teacher engages in an initiation, there is a student response and the teacher provides some feedback (instead of evaluation), or IRF (Sinclair & Coulthard, 1992). As I write this book in the midst of the COVID-19 worldwide pandemic, I note that most classroom communications and interactions have been forced onto online platforms, and this has generated a whole new set of issues, competencies and expectations for both language teachers and their students to deal with. Moorhouse, Li, and Walsh (2020) point out that language teachers need at least three key competencies: technological competencies, online environment management competencies and online teacher interactional competencies. For example, they need to understand the different platforms they use and how to manage interaction within these. In addition, because it is more diffcult to keep students interested in an online mode, teachers need to develop online classroom management 144

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given the restrictions of the number of students visible at any one time, as well as their ability to manipulate their own cameras and the longer times between specifc interactions than in face-to-face interactions. Language teachers must also be aware of the tendency to talk a lot to fll in any periods of silence, thus becoming teacher-centered instruction. As Moorhouse, Li, and Walsh (2020) discovered many teachers described themselves talking to an ‘empty room,’ or in a ‘dark cave,’ which felt like ‘a one-sided experience’ or ‘monologue.’ Teachers can provide longer wait times and specifc questioning techniques to elicit responses in these online lessons. Indeed, all these new competencies are being developed in real time as I write this book. Refection 90 • • • • • •

How are patterns of communication set up in class? Who has decided these patterns of talk? What are the effects of these patterns of talk on student participation? How do these patterns change? How do the students (and teachers) learn them? For what purposes would you choose a teacher-initiated IRE style communication system in your classroom? • How has the forced move to online platforms because of the COVID-19 pandemic changed classroom communication? • What are the main differences with interactions in a face-to-face classroom and online lessons?

Classroom Interaction In their seminal study, “I Treat Them All the Same,” Biggs and Edwards (1991) examined the interactions of fve teachers (all white, majority teachers) working within multiethnic classes (of mostly Panjabi children, the largest minority group) in the United Kingdom. Specifcally, the researchers were interested in looking into the underachievement of ethnic minority children (EMC) by trying to identify patterns of language behavior that may have placed them at some disadvantage and that could be mediated through language. Generally, they discovered that all fve teachers interacted more frequently with white children than with the EMC while not realizing these classroom communication patterns existed in their classrooms. 145

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The teachers said that they found it easier to relate to the white children because they could expand classroom communications directly through the comments and questions that they used in everyday speech, be it in the classroom or in their homes. However, the same teachers could not understand how the EMC children communicated. This misunderstanding could have stemmed from the fact that these children all came from a cultural background that included informal or experiential learning, usually characterized by little direct verbal interaction, in which skills tended to be acquired through observation and imitation and where immediate verbal feedback (including evaluation and criticism) was rare. In addition, there was little pressure for systematic testing at various stages in the learning process within their cultural backgrounds. However, when placed in the English school system, the students were faced with a classroom communication style that included more direct verbal instruction in which skills tended to be acquired through drill and practice rather than observation and imitation and where there was a greater emphasis placed on giving feedback to the students and checking directly for understanding (tests). It is important to recognize and remediate examples of institutionalized racism so that we can provide equality of opportunity for all children, many of whom come from backgrounds and experiences that are very different from the majority. We must consider that our students’ ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic backgrounds may be very different from those of the majority in our schools. Consequently, there is an important need for teachers to be able to recognize, understand and refect on how communication patterns infuence their students’ learning (positively or negatively). Language teachers, because they have all of the power and authority to direct classroom interactions, control for the most part who interacts with who and this unique status in the classroom, allows the teacher to orchestrate (Breen, 1998) interaction to facilitate learning. Teachers can provide maximum opportunities for language learning, as Sert (2019) noted, when interactional practices are fne tuned to pedagogical goals, and thus teachers, he notes, should become more aware of the importance of classroom interaction in relation to learning. This becomes even more important when language teachers move to online teaching where different interaction expectations are required such as the use of ‘breakout rooms’ where students can interact in small groups rather than within each classroom in face-to-face instruction. Moorhouse, Li, and Walsh (2020) propose that online language teachers make use of the Virtual 146

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Flipped Classroom approach in which students are provided with materials before the lessons by watching asynchronous video content, as this allows teachers to have more interactions in live lessons. Thus, language teachers, whether in face-to-face or in online environments, should refect on how patterns of communication and interaction are set up in their classes, and how these patterns of communication either provide or block opportunities for all students to learn—regardless of their gender or cultural, ethnic, linguistic or religious backgrounds. Refection 91 • Do you think the patterns of communication and interaction that exist in your classroom are providing maximum opportunities for your students to learn? If so, how do you know, and what evidence do you have to back up your claims? • Review a videotape of yourself teaching to determine your personal teaching action zone. • Do you tend to look to one side (right/left) more than to the other? • Do you tend to nominate learners of one gender more than those of the other? • Do you tend to nominate learners of one ethnic background more than those of another? • Do you tend to nominate only learners whose names you remember? • Do you tend to nominate mainly students at the front or the brightest students? • If you have moved to online teaching, how has your interaction with students changed from your face-to-face teaching experiences? • Do you treat them all the same in face-to-face teaching and online teaching? • What is your understanding of the Virtual Flipped Classroom approach? • Do you think the Virtual Flipped Classroom approach can help lessons become more student-centered rather than teacher-centered?

Teacher Questions Two of the most common ways in which teachers communicate with their students during class is by asking (and answering) questions and by providing feedback. Teachers use questioning at the beginning of their classes to 147

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establish who controls the interaction, what the topic is for that class and who is expected to speak. Many teachers also use questions during the course of the class to constantly check their students’ understanding of the particular concepts they are teaching at that time. In fact, teachers use questioning as the most frequent means of communication in their classrooms. Forrestal (1990) discovered that almost 60 percent of the total time a teacher talks in class involves the use of questioning of some sort, and most questions teachers ask their students are those to which the teacher already knows the answers (sometimes called display-type questions, such as in the previous subtitle—of course, the answer is 4). Walsh (2015) notes that display question, although it can be useful for eliciting responses, checking understanding and/or guiding learners towards a ‘required’ response, can also shut down learning because it promotes more mechanical classroom interactions. Thus, he suggests that teachers ask more genuine questions during lessons, and these are called referential-type questions. Such type of open-ended questions according to Walsh (2015), leads to more natural discussions and responses, but ultimately it all depends on the lesson objectives of each lesson. For example, many grammar-focused lessons use display questions to check for quick understanding that the students are following, and for discussions, more referential type questions are more appropriate to generate more practice speaking. If asked though, many teachers have no idea how many questions they ask in each class or what type of questions they favor in their classes, or indeed the function of questions in their lessons. This is problematic because unless teachers become more aware of how and why they use questioning during their classes, this strategy is unlikely to be an effective aid to instruction. We must also consider what happens after the teacher asks the question, and how long he or she waits for a student to answer is also an important refection for teachers. Good questioning behavior requires allowing students suffcient time to think about and to respond to questions. Rowe (1974) reported that the teachers she observed waited less than one second before calling on someone to respond. Furthermore, even after calling on a student, they waited only about one second for a response. Such teacher behavior does not make sense, because teachers minimize the value of their questions by failing to give students time to think. In language teaching, Walsh (2015) notes that wait time is a very important tool for many teachers, and he suggests this tool should be consciously considered to involve more students in classroom interactions. Walsh (2015) notes that extended wait 148

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time in language lessons can increase the number of learner responses and can also result in more complex answers from learners. Indeed, wait time becomes even more important in online teaching environments in which students will need even more time to provide responses because of the lack of instantaneous interactions that are the norm in face-to-face lessons. As such, language teachers in online environments will have to be even more strategic when asking questions and waiting for their students to respond. Refection 92 • • • • • • • •

How many questions do you ask in class? What kind of questions do you ask? How many display questions do you ask? How many referential questions do you ask? How do you know how many and what kind of questions you ask? What is the function of your questions in your classes? Do you plan your questions before class? How long should teachers wait for their students to respond to a question? • How long do you wait for a student response after asking a question? • How does teaching online change the way teachers ask questions? • How long should teacher wait for students to respond to their questions in online environments?

Feedback Feedback is a prominent feature of all classroom communications, and giving feedback is very important for language teachers (Wong & Waring, 2009). By providing feedback to students, teachers are generally communicating one of two things: they like the response, or they do not like the response. In other words, feedback provides students with a measure of their current progress and tells them whether or not they need to improve in any way. Regardless of their age group, students are very savvy; they quickly learn how to read a teacher and the particular ways in which he or she provides feedback. Generally speaking, when people provide any kind of feedback in communication, they are giving the speaker the information that they are listening to what is being said, and it can be verbal (such as ‘OK’ or ‘Really!’) or nonverbal (such as a nodding of the head or a smile). 149

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This process of giving and receiving feedback is ongoing and can be positive (such as in the examples mentioned previously) or negative (such as a frown); when negative, the intent is to change the behavior or direction of the communication. Not many teachers realize that ‘OK’ can have many different meanings, yet it is the most frequent comment teachers use after student responses in class (Fanselow, 1992). The following examples of different feedback using ‘OK’ (adapted from Fanselow, 1992) illustrate some different meanings of ‘OK:’ • Teacher to student in hall of school: “Take off your hat!” • Student in hall to teacher and peers: “OK.” Possible Meanings: First meaning: “If you say so.” Second meaning: “Yes, sir.” • Teacher: “How many elements are there in water?” • Student: “Two?” • Teacher: “OK.” Possible Meanings: First meaning: “I heard you.” Second meaning: “I’m going to the next student.” The point here is that many teachers may not be aware of not only how they use ‘OK’ in different ways, but how they provide feedback generally and how they sometimes confuse giving feedback with evaluating students. Similarly, a teacher responding with ‘very good’ can have an unintended effect of closing opportunities for learning, because it can signal that the topic has ended and there will be no more discussion (Wong & Waring, 2009). Thus, Wong and Waring (2009) suggest that feedback symbols such as ‘very good’ be used sparingly and that teachers accept learner’s correct responses in less evaluative ways, such as saying ‘all right.’ If learners provide incorrect answers, they maintain that teachers can ask them ‘are you sure?’ to delay or ask for repetition or pursuing with questions such as: ‘Why do you say that?’ Teachers provide feedback to students with some different purposes in mind, such as providing information for both teachers and students, providing advice for students, providing students with motivation and providing feedback that can lead to student autonomy (adapted from Lewis, 2002). Feedback is one way for teachers to tell their students what they 150

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are doing well and what they need to improve on. Feedback from students tells teachers how individual students and the class as a whole are doing so that they can adjust their instruction accordingly. Thus, feedback provides an ongoing form of evaluation for both teachers (of their teaching) and students (of their progress), which is in addition to the information provided by the regular end-of-term grading system. Connected to the valuable information that feedback provides for both teachers and students is the follow-up of specifcally advising students as to how they can improve their learning if it is deemed a problem. Teachers can follow up their feedback with suggestions for specifc learning strategies that the students should incorporate into their learning; if possible, the teacher should model these strategies rather than just explain them. Depending on how it is presented, feedback can provide motivation for students by encouraging them to stretch their abilities to the fullest. However, feedback, as we all probably know from our own school days, can also be de-motivating when it is presented in a demeaning manner in which the student is humiliated in some way. Feedback should encourage students of all abilities by providing specifc pointers on how they can improve their learning. Teachers should give some indication or acknowledgment every time students respond to a question; otherwise, they will not bother to respond in the future. If students are motivated to excel as a result of the feedback we provide, then they can become more autonomous learners. Surely this is one of our most important teaching objectives: that our students will no longer need our feedback because they have progressed to the point where they have become independent learners because we want our students to one day ‘stand on their own.’ Refection 93 • Do you notice any patterns in how you provide feedback? • Do you use praise as feedback? • If yes, how often do you use praise? Do you use praise too little or too often? • What kind of praise do you use—do you say good or excellent or something else? • Do you use ‘OK’ as feedback, and how many different ways do you use it? • Do you use ‘very good’ frequently? 151

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• How do you deal with sensitive students when giving feedback? • What do you do if a student provides the wrong answer? • Do you ignore the wrong answer (temporarily or permanently), correct the error of fact but not the form (or vice versa), prompt the speaker to fnd the error, ask someone else to fnd the error, correct and explain the error (each teacher will defne errors according to his or her subject matter) or do something else entirely? • Does the type of feedback you provide refect your beliefs and philosophy of learning and teaching?

Grouping Whole-class grouping is probably the most common classroom learner arrangement—the students usually sit in rows, and the teacher is located at the front of the room. This type of learner grouping has both positive and negative effects on student learning. From a positive perspective, whole-class learning may actually be a more effcient way of instruction in situations in which teachers have to deal with very large classes and have a limited time to teach a specifc curriculum. Indeed, when the whole class is together, it can promote a sense of security among slower learners because they can rely on the faster learners to provide group answers until the slower learners catch up. Whole-class grouping also has some negative effects on student learning. Harmer (1995: 243) called whole-class grouping “lockstep” learning and explained: “All the students are ‘locked into’ the same rhythm and pace, the same activity . . . the traditional teaching situation, in other words, where a teacher-controlled session is taking place.” In this arrangement, the teacher controls all of the communication and the class, regardless of how many students are in the room, is seen as only one group. In such an arrangement, students have few opportunities to interact with the teacher or with each other because of the amount of control the teacher asserts, not to mention that the seating arrangement (in rows) makes interaction unnatural. When teachers use a whole class grouping arrangement, they are assuming (although I do not think most teachers are consciously aware of these assumptions) that all students proceed at the same learning pace; however, we also have students who are slower and have different learning styles and use different learning strategies than the main group. All this may 152

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be lost and hidden to the teacher because he or she is probably monitoring the whole group and not individual student reactions. Another type of interactions that are popular in classrooms are small group or pair work learner arrangements. Such arrangements mean that teachers encourage learner autonomy and collaborative learning in their classrooms (Farrell & Jacobs, 2020). Learner autonomy involves “learners being aware of their own ways of learning, so as to utilize their strengths and work on their weaknesses” (Farrell & Jacobs, 2020: 10–11). Pair work provides opportunities for learner autonomy in that our students can learn how to access the quality of their own work within the pair or group; this lessens the threat of assessment being based solely on teacher evaluations. Thus, students working in pairs and groups can become self-dependent and self-motivated to learn because the teacher is no longer in total control and no longer solely responsible for student learning. In addition, in order to enhance learning in pairs, students need assistance from their peers that would not be available in whole-class activities, and this also calls for more collaboration with these same peers. Collaborative learning, also known as cooperative learning, consists of learners engaging in group activities that enhance student– student interaction. For this to happen, the teacher must support the pairs rather than abandon them with the hope that meaningful dialogue will just happen if you put the students together. Jacobs and Farrell (2019) also note that technology can facilitate even more interaction in large groups of language students with, for example, the use of Google groups and/or Facebook pages for group collaboration. However, when teaching online, large groups in various online platforms like Zoom, Microsoft Teams or Google Classroom may provide some challenges when attempting to engage using 2-D images on screens, given that the groups are not physically together, and multimodal cues (gesture, facial expression) are either missing or reduced (Moorhouse, Li, & Walsh, 2020—see next section on non-verbal communication). Refection 94 • Under which classroom conditions do you favor whole-class grouping? • Some educators maintain that in whole-class groupings, learning occurs through interaction, and as a result, the teacher should be a facilitator assisting the learners rather than directing them. Do you think the teacher should facilitate learning or direct/control learning? Explain the reasons for your answer. 153

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• Do you think small groups of three or pairs working together are better and why? • Do you think small groups promote collaboration or disruption? Do they promote learner autonomy? • If you have conducted group or pair work in your class, record communications in each type of group setting and transcribe it to determine what types of language are generated within the groups and pairs. Then compare interaction in both groups. This can be shared with the students too. • How does teaching on online platforms change the way teachers group students? • How do you think teachers need to set up group work, move students in and out of breakout rooms and develop discussions in such an online environment?

Non-Verbal Communication So far, we have only focused on spoken communications in the classroom and how teachers can refect on and assess these communications to see if they are providing or blocking opportunities for student learning. Of course, there is another type of communication that occurs in all classrooms is nonverbal communication. As Stevick (1982: 163) put it: “If verbal communication is the pen which spells out details, nonverbal communication provides the surface on which the words are written and against which they must be interpreted.” It is important for teachers to be able to control their own nonverbal communication and to be able to read their students’ nonverbal signals in the classroom. Nonverbal communication can be focused mainly on kinesics and proxemics. Kinesics deals with gestures, posture, touching behaviors, facial expressions and eye behaviors. Proxemics deals with space and seating arrangements (closely linked to group and pair work discussed earlier) and examines who interacts and responds more verbally and non-verbally in classrooms and where the teacher is placed during these interactions (or the ‘teacher’s action zone;’ see Chapter 6). We must be cautious when interpreting the meaning of nonverbal behaviors because they may have multiple meanings (as do many of the words we use) depending on where they are used (context), how they are used and who uses them. For the latter, a detailed knowledge of the person may be required before we can conclude the meaning of the 154

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nonverbal behaviors he or she may use. For online lessons, interaction and paralinguistic features used to communicate are different from face-to-face classroom instruction. As noted in the previous section, teachers cannot see all of their students in some online platforms (especially if they turn their cameras off) and students cannot see each other either, all leading to different lesson distractions such as having to stop to nominate someone to talk if there is a PowerPoint on screen at the same time. Thus, teachers have to develop more awareness of online paralinguistic cues their students use in these very limiting circumstances. As a result, Moorhouse, Li, and Walsh (2020: 12) note, that the “management of learning is perhaps even more crucial given the lack of physical and human props and the need to manage a virtual environment.” Refection 95 • Review a video recording of your teaching and notice what kinds of gestures you use. What kinds of facial expressions do you use? • Have you ever asked your students to mimic your use of gestures, and if yes, what did this reveal to you about your use of gestures? • Have you ever asked your students to mimic your facial expressions, and if yes, what did this reveal to you about your use of facial expressions? • What is your classroom space philosophy? • Draw the layout of your current classroom. Did you infuence this layout? • Now draw a design for your ideal classroom. • What are the main differences between your present classroom and your ideal classroom? • What are the main differences related to non-verbal communication in face-to-face lessons and the multimodal cues (gesture, facial expression) when teaching online? • How can teachers develop strategies for dealing with such multimodal cues when teaching online?

Classroom Communicative and Interactional Competence Some language teachers assume that all the participants in a classroom know how to communicate and interact and that their interactions 155

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are mostly smooth. In other words, we teachers assume that all our students have some kind of classroom communicative competence. Johnson (1995: 160) defines classroom communicative competence (CCC) as, “students’ knowledge of and competence in the structural, functional, social, and interactional norms that govern classroom communication.” Johnson (1995) further suggests that teachers must define their students’ CCC, establish it and extend it. It is very important for the students to be able to understand established patterns of classroom communications so that they will be able to follow what the teacher expects from them. In terms of communication interactional competence (CIC), Walsh (2015), suggests it is ‘teachers’ and learners’ ability to use interaction as a tool for mediating and assisting learning’ (Walsh, 2015: 130). As Walsh (2015) notes, when teachers can extend CIC, they provide more learning opportunities for their students. When students know what they are supposed to do each day without having to spend too much time working this out each day, they can better focus what they are supposed to be learning. This focus on CIC was also highlighted by Walsh (2015) when he maintained that teachers and learners need to develop this if they are to work effectively together.

Refection 96 • What do/can/should you, as a teacher, expect of your students in terms of classroom communications (e.g., asking questions, answering questions, speaking in whole-class groups, in small groups, following instructions)? • What do/can/should you, as a teacher, expect of yourself when giving instructions, asking questions, answering questions, setting up groups, engaging in nonverbal communication, giving feedback, giving praise and so on? • What do you think a student can/should expect from a teacher when dealing with classroom communication and interactions? • What do you think a student can/should expect of himself/herself when considering various aspects of their classroom communications and interactions?

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• How do you establish that all your students have knowledge of and competence in the structural, functional, social and interactional norms that govern your classroom communication?

Collecting Data This chapter has so far outlined and discussed the importance of both language teachers and students being aware of the importance of classroom communication and interaction competence, in both face-to-face and online environments to enhance language learning. The book maintains that by engaging in refective practice, language teachers can generate their own data by recording their lessons and can analyze and interpret them, thus becoming more aware of the presence of these competencies in their classrooms. As Walsh (2015) notes, we can only get a real understanding of the complexities of classroom communication and interaction when we have a precise representation of what is really occurring. The most important type of precise or concrete classroom communication data a teacher should collect is a recording of the communications and a record of this recording in the form of a written classroom transcript. If we rely on our memory of classroom communications and events, we may miss some important data because we all have selective memories. Recordings and transcriptions are the best concrete evidence we teachers can get about our work. We can collect this type of concrete data by placing an audio recorder or video recorder in our classroom. If students break up for group or pair work, place the audio recorder in the middle of one of the groups because it may be impossible to record what each group is saying. Once the classroom communication data has been collected, the teacher then needs to transcribe the recording; this can be the most painful part of the whole process because it can take a long time to transcribe a one-hour class. Keep the transcript as simple as possible by naming each participant and then numbering each move (when someone speaks a turn) and keep to the original wording as accurately as possible (do not change it to make it more readable). It may not be necessary to transcribe the entire recording; teachers can decide what aspect of the classroom communications they are interested in knowing more about. Fanselow (1987) suggested that transcriptions be made at certain intervals or at special events that the teacher wants to investigate. For example, teachers may only be interested

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in refecting on the impact of their verbal instructions in their classes, so all they need to do is listen to and transcribe those parts of the tape that show the teacher giving instructions and then the turns immediately after this (for about fve minutes) to see what impact these instructions have had on their students’ learning. Other topics could include the type and frequency of teacher (and student) questions, how tasks are set up in their classes or the type of language in use in group discussions (if teachers of English language learners wish to focus on this aspect of classroom communication). As noted, transcribing takes a lot of time; some have said it takes six to eight minutes to transcribe one minute of recording. After transcribing classroom communication, the teacher can analyze and interpret the data. Many different methodological frameworks have been developed for analyzing and interpreting classroom discourse. The method for analyzing classroom communication that I prefer is the one devised by Mehan (1979) for his ethnographic work—specifcally his suggestion of the IRE structured pattern of classroom communication. This IRE pattern has been used by educational researchers as the most typical pattern of classroom communication. After making interpretations about the communications that exist in their classes, teachers can decide if they want to make any variations in the patterns that they have discovered. In this way, teachers can take more responsibility for the decisions they make about their classes. Teachers can also share the transcribed data with their colleagues and even their students. Knowledge about classroom communication patterns can help teachers make more informed decisions about teaching so that all students can experience a truly effective learning environment. As Walsh (2015) notes, by studying their own classroom communications and interactions, either recorded and/or transcribed, language teachers can not only improve their professional practice but also provide more learning opportunities for their students. Refection 97 • Record (audio and/or video) your classroom lesson(s). • Listen to, and/or watch the recording. • Make a transcript of the recording or parts of the recording depending on the part of the class you are interested in refecting on. • Using the transcript (or part of the transcript) you have prepared from a lesson, analyze your classroom communications and interactions: 158

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code the transcript with the IRE coding system. {{What is the underlying communication structure in your class as a result of the IRE coding? {{Do you notice any variations from the usual teacher-controlled IRE sequence? {{Did you fnd any places where your students were initiating? If so, did you notice many evaluations (or none) by you the teacher or the other students? {{What percentage of the time were you talking, and what percentage were your students talking? Are you comfortable with the results? {{What percentage of the time was your speech in the form of a question? To what percentage of your questions did you already know the answers? {{Examine your giving of instructions and your students’ reception of these. {{How many questions did you ask? What kind of questions did you ask and why? {{What other classroom communication and interaction features are you now aware of in your classroom?

Conclusion Classroom communication and interaction differs from normal everyday communication in that its main purpose is to instruct and inform. Classroom communication may seem to be haphazard, but in many cases, it is highly regulated and ritualized. Refecting on the patterns of classroom communication in a language teacher’s lessons can provide useful information that can help to further legitimize actions and confrm preconceived insights. As language teachers, the only real concrete evidence we have that a lesson has occurred is a recording and transcription of the communication that represents the moment-to-moment communications between the teacher and students and between students themselves that occurred during the lesson. That is, teachers must gather concrete data about the communications that exist in their classrooms and then use the information garnered from this data to make informed decisions about their teaching. After collecting (recording) and transcribing the classroom communications, the teacher can then analyze and interpret the data. 159

11

Teaching Portfolios

Activities Covered • • • • • • •

Refection and Direction Types Contents Subject-Matter Knowledge Planning, Delivery and Assessing Instruction Professionalism Refection

Introduction Language teaching is a multifaceted profession in which language teachers do a lot more than just teach. Among other things, they are involved in planning instruction, regularly updating their knowledge on teaching, preparing teaching materials, collaborating with colleagues in different ways, assessing student learning and assessing their own teaching. Each of these activities is an important dimension of the teacher’s work and in reviewing and planning his or her professional development; a teacher needs to look at his or her practice as a whole. A teaching portfolio is an excellent instrument for accomplishing this, since it is a collection of documents and other items that provides information about different aspects of a teacher’s work. Each language teacher’s portfolio will be different because it contains a collection of information about that teacher’s practice. Teacher portfolios offer a way for language teachers to make sense of all the different aspects of what it means for them to be teachers of language because the contents will represent their story of their 160

DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-11

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professional development within their professional worlds. Indeed, the very process of compiling, developing and analyzing a teaching portfolio helps language teachers tell their story and allows themselves and others to see their professional accomplishments and strengths all in one location. The portfolio outlines the language teacher’s skills and abilities and efforts and achievements, as well as the various contributions to his or her peers, school and community. This chapter outlines and discusses various aspects of the value for language teachers at all levels of experience compiling and refecting on the contents of their teaching portfolios.

Refection and Direction Why should language teachers compile a teaching portfolio some may ask? Two words symbolize valid reasons for compiling a teaching portfolio: refection and direction. As a refective device (which is the main focus of this book), a teaching portfolio can offer a language teacher a chance to look at and into himself/herself as a teacher, as if looking into a mirror. A teaching portfolio thus allows a teacher literally to see how they have evolved as a teacher over time. According to Costantino and Lorenzo (2002: 5): “the process of refecting and documenting what they [teachers] know and are able to do is highly empowering and contributes to [a teacher’s] self-confdence.” Thus, language teachers who compile a teaching portfolio are seen as controllers of their own professional destiny for the most part because they are taking more responsibility for their selfrefection and development, not to mention their own self-assessment. The process of teacher portfolio development requires the language teacher to seek answers to the following questions: who are you as a teacher? What do you do in the classroom (and outside that is related to teaching)? Why you do it? Where you want to go professionally? How do you plan to get there? As a source of direction, a teaching portfolio can act as a starting point for further development as the language teacher creates a plan for the future and sets goals about how to reach those goals. After reviewing the evidence collected over time, language teachers can refect on where they were, where they are now and, most importantly, where they want to go. In order to answer these questions, teachers must become refectors of their own practice. In fact, language teachers can ‘tell’ their story by compiling and refecting on their teaching portfolio. Indeed, another two metaphors, 161

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the ‘mirror’ and the ‘map,’ may also help answer why language teachers should assemble a teaching portfolio. The mirror metaphor captures the refective nature of a developmental portfolio, as it allows teachers to ‘see themselves’ over time. The ‘map’ metaphor symbolizes creating a plan and setting goals. It should also be remembered that a teaching portfolio is not a one-time snapshot of where the learner language teacher is at present, although that can be a good starting point; rather, it is an evolving collection of carefully selected professional experiences, thoughts and goals. The portfolio as a ‘mirror’ allows teachers to ‘see’ their development in terms of their philosophy, principles, theory and practices over time. The teaching portfolio as a ‘map’ symbolizes the creation of a plan for where language teachers want to go in the future. Compiling a teaching portfolio is an excellent means for providing structure for language teachers who want to engage in self-refection and self-assessment and can act as a catalyst for discussions about assessment with their supervisors and development with colleagues and peers. After reviewing the evidence collected over time, language teachers can get a greater professional sense of where they were, where they are now, and, most importantly, where they want to go. Refection 98 • What is your understanding of the metaphors ‘refection’ and ‘direction;’ ‘mirror’ and ‘map’ in terms of compiling a teaching portfolio? • What image(s) do you have for yourself as a language teacher (before compiling your teaching portfolio)? • What direction do you want to take as a teacher (again, before you compile your teaching portfolio)? • What artifacts (objects) best represent you as a teacher (what you do)?

Types There are many different types of teaching portfolios but three main types of teaching portfolios that are of interest to language teachers are the working portfolio, the showcase portfolio and the critical incident portfolio (Costantino & Lorenzo, 2002). Language teachers use a working portfolio in order to document growth and development toward performance standards that may have been set within the institution or at the state or national level, mainly for evaluative purposes. The materials included in this portfolio are 162

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intended to refect a work in progress and growth over time; they are not intended to be polished documents. Another type is the showcase portfolio in which language teachers collect various materials and exemplary items that best represent the language teacher’s accomplishments. Some learner teachers compile this showcase portfolio to use when applying for jobs and/ or for applying for promotion within the school they are teaching. These can also be used for useful dossiers of information about themselves to share with colleagues and school administrators for whatever reason. Language teachers can refect on critical incidents that occur inside (Chapter 6) and outside the classroom (Chapter 2) and compile various examples of these within a teaching portfolio and show how they have gained further insight into the philosophy, principles and theories that underpin their perceptions about their practice (if they occurred in the classroom) or what they have learned about themselves professionally from personal critical incidents. Language teachers can use these critical incident portfolios to engage in collegial conversations with colleagues and administrators and discuss which incidents (classroom and personal) they found to be particularly provocative and illuminating and why. Teaching portfolios can be written electronic and used in online blogs. When written, usually language teachers compile all the different items and present them together in a folder of some kind so that they are presented as a whole rather than as separate entry pieces without any connection. These can also be digitized and placed in electronic format for people to read on a computer screen or the like. Indeed, another type of electronic portfolio was adopted in Europe called the European Portfolio for Student Teachers of Languages (EPOSTL) as a self-assessment tool (Mirici & Hergüner, 2015). EPOSTL portfolios are used to encourage learner language teachers to refect on their competences and on the underlying knowledge which feeds this competence. Learner language teachers can also engage in discussions with their peers, cooperating teachers, mentors, and/or teacher educators as they facilitate their self-assessment because EPOSTL is an instrument which can help chart the progress of learner language teachers. This use of electronic portfolios allows learner language teachers the time and space for refection on their achievements as they give them the opportunity to regularly track their own progress and as a result can determine individual goals for their own learning situations. Blog-based teaching portfolios can help scaffold refection for learner and experienced language teachers because they can obtain continuous feedback and support from peers 163

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and mentors. In addition, all discussions and resources can be stored and retrieved at any time, thus providing a powerful tool for the professional development of language teachers and so are an excellent mechanism to promote individual and collaborative refective practices. Refection 99 • What items would best represent you as a language teacher in your working portfolio? • What items would best represent you as a language teacher in your showcase portfolio? • What items would best represent you as a language teacher in your critical incident portfolio? • Why type of portfolio would you be most comfortable using from written, electronic and/or blog based and why? • Can you think of other types of portfolios?

Contents Although I alluded to the different types of teaching portfolios presented earlier in terms of that they could contain, I did not outline and discuss the details of such contents. In this section I address the contents of a teaching portfolio regardless of what it will be used for, and language teachers can consider what contents best represents who they are as language teachers for their particular portfolio. Indeed, there are many materials and documents a language teacher can choose to include in a teaching portfolio, however, having too many documents can make any review a diffcult task for the language teacher and others to review. Therefore, each language teacher must choose carefully only those items that are crucial for their purposes. Generally, a language teaching portfolio might include such general items as lesson plans, student records, student projects, audio and/or videotapes of representative lessons, student evaluations and annual evaluations from supervisors and letters of recommendation from professionals in the feld. One thing to remember is that the portfolio in not a one-time compilation of everything that represents you as a teacher because it is always changing just as you are evolving as a teacher. Thus, it is best to consider any contents as an evolving collection of carefully selected professional experiences, thoughts and goals. This collection is often accompanied with the language 164

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teacher’s written (or oral-recorded) refection and self-assessment of the collection itself and future plans for their professional development. It is always best to consider how you will organize the contents of your teaching portfolio because they contain a variety of teaching artifacts and many different written documents, and all are best supported by your (written) explanation of the contents and the meaning of the portfolio as a whole for you. You can explain the goal for you to compile your portfolio in the frst place (although you may have been required to do this in your teacher education program) and why you included all the different items. Costantino and Lorenzo (2002) maintain that teachers can organize their teaching portfolio with introductions, artifacts, explanations, refections and conclusions. You can open your teaching portfolio with an overview of the portfolio and the rationale for including the all the different items as well as a brief introduction for each different section. This is followed by a description of the different artifacts that include such items as your philosophy of teaching your principles of teaching, representative course outlines, representative unit and lesson plans and other items you think you should include. Each artifact will also need to be explained briefy about what it is exactly and why you included it. Because one of the main reasons for compiling a teaching portfolio is to encourage refection, you will need to refect on the meaning of the contents for you. After this written refection, each teaching portfolio should have some kind of conclusion that be a refective essay that provides a general summative meaning of the portfolio as you continue to evolve as a language teacher. Refection 100 • Have you ever compiled a portfolio of any kind? If yes, please explain what kind of portfolio you compiled and what were the reasons for compiling it. • Have you ever compiled a teaching portfolio? If yes, please explain what kind of portfolio you compiled and what were the reasons for compiling it. • Possible contents of a teaching portfolio include the following items: lesson plans, student projects, class newsletters, videotapes, annual evaluations and letters of recommendation. • How long would it take you to compile these components of a teaching portfolio? 165

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• Can you think of any more items that you could include in your teaching portfolio that tell the story of your efforts and skills as a teacher? List them. • Many scholars maintain that the following materials—subject-matter knowledge, planning, delivery and assessing instruction and professionalism—should be a part of any teaching portfolio regardless of the specifc purpose for creating it; what is your understanding of each of them? I treat each of these in the separate sections that follow.

Subject-Matter Knowledge This frst section of the teaching journal outlines what you know about the subject you teach and how this impacts the classroom (context) you teach in. Documents that relate to your knowledge of the subject matter might include artefacts such as highlights of some signifcant series of lessons you delivered and what their impact were in terms of your students’ learning and for your future instruction. This can include how you compared teaching and assessing a series of reading classes using top-down compared to bottom-up processing and the difference is assessment of both in terms of your students’ comprehension (see also Chapter 8 for more ideas on teaching the skill areas). You can also write a research paper on how you experimented with different methods of teaching and assessing and what you learned about the subject matter and your overall teaching. You can also include an overall description of the different courses you conducted and how you designed them for your classes and why. Also, if you were involved in any curriculum development, you can include what your role was and what you learned from this; if you teach from a set curriculum, you could include any investigation you made about how it was set up, by who and for what reasons. If you have delivered any workshops, seminars or conference papers related to teaching the subject matter, you can include these descriptions as well as your refections on the experience you gained from being involved in their delivery. You can also include any refective journal entries related to your teaching (e.g., the different methods and activities you used) of the subject matter that highlight your knowledge of the subject and how it has informed your instruction (see also Chapter 5). For learner language teachers and novice teachers who may not have such teaching experience to refect on the subject matter they teach, the contents 166

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may be different but would include a copy of your qualifcations as well as a list of courses you have taken in your teacher education program that are related to the areas/subject you teach. These can include any language teaching methodology and related courses in the program and how these have infuenced how you approach your initial teaching experiences. You can also include any related reviews of teaching methodology books about teaching the skills from any course papers you may have been required to write. Your supervisors may have also commented on your expertise and knowledge of the subject matter you learned and perhaps taught during the practicum (see Chapter 12 for more on teaching practice), and these can be included as well. If you do not have any course papers you can use, then you can write an overall refective essay about your approach to teaching each of the skill areas and the principles you will use when you commence teaching in your frst year(s). Refection 101 • What documents best represent your subject-matter knowledge and why? • Which documents from those outlined earlier would you specifcally use and why? • Can you think of any other documents you would include in this section regarding your subject-matter knowledge? • Which documents would you use from your teacher education courses if you are a novice language teacher just starting off your career and why? • Write a refective journal about your knowledge of the subject matter you teach or will be required to teach from your current perspective.

Planning, Delivery and Assessing Instruction The planning, delivery and assessing instruction section of the teaching portfolio refects who you are as a language teacher and your principles and theory of practice as a language teacher. Documents compiled for this section that really show evidence of your professional effectiveness and competence include a statement about your philosophy, principles 167

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regarding language teaching and learning, what you plan to do and what you actually do in the classroom (lesson plans, audio/video of a class, and student works examples), and what others think about your classroom work (supervisor’s evaluation, peer observation reports). You have already gathered a lot of information for each of these areas from completing the refective activities presented so far throughout this book and you can choose which ones are best to place in this section. For example, a statement of your principles (see Chapter 3) outlines your refections of your beliefs and values about teaching and learning a language and your conceptions of language teaching and what has infuenced your approach to language teaching. Detailed lesson plans can also serve as evidence of a language teacher’s professional performance and competence as part of his or her evaluations, and for any future job applications. Indeed, many language teachers are sometimes asked to include lesson plans, along with other materials, as part of a portfolio to support their annual performance evaluation. In addition, language teachers applying for new jobs might be asked to submit lesson plans as part of their job application so that employers can get a sense of their organizational skills and teaching style. You can include a focused report on your approach to classroom management (see Chapter 9) that can include a description of your beliefs and approach to classroom management, a written report by a peer or supervisor about how effectively you managed lessons, a description of any critical incidents directly related to classroom management and how you handled them, as well as any comments from your students about how you effectively managed lessons. Refection 102 • What documents best represent your planning, delivery and assessing instruction and why? • Which documents from those outlined earlier would you specifcally use and why? • Try to assemble the following documents as part of your planning, delivery and assessing instruction: {{Sample lesson plans. {{Examples of teaching materials that you have prepared {{Samples of student work.

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of students’ evaluations’ and/or feedback of your lessons (formal or informal). {{A videotape and/or audiotape of you teaching a class with a written description of what you were teaching and your refection of that class. {{Photographs of you teaching your class. {{Photographs of your classroom with students engaged in a learning activity. {{Classroom observation report from a peer, supervisor and/or an administrator. {{Self-evaluations of lessons you have taught. {{Student achievements in outside examinations (any language test). • Try to include any other information garnered from your refective activities in the other chapters of this book.

Professionalism This fnal section of the teaching portfolio, professionalism, shows who you are as a language teacher, not only in the school or institution in which you teach but also in the wider community. This section also outlines your commitment to your professional development and as such, the section will include a statement of your development plans, as well as documents that confrm your current standing in the profession (e.g., your resume, copies of degrees, etc.). Typical documents language teachers can include to represent their professionalism would be a detailed professional development plan that will include what you plan to achieve professionally in the near future such as attending certain conferences, seminars and in-service courses that can upgrade skills, researching certain topics (action research projects) that can make one a more effective teacher and upgrading technical skills. You can also include a refection on how you think you have developed since you began teaching, any classroom research you conducted, a list of courses, seminars, workshops and conferences you attended as well as any professional organizations you belong to. If you are a more novice language teacher, you can include a sample of any papers, journal reports and/or book reviews related to language teaching you have written recently. Some language teachers may also want to include some information about their relationships with 169

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their colleagues in their current teaching context that includes outlines of ways they were involved in successful collaborative partnerships, accounts of any mentorship of colleagues or contributions to colleagues’ development in the school through delivery of workshops or other demonstrations. Refection 103 • What documents best represent your professionalism and why? • Which documents from those outlined earlier would you specifcally use and why? • Try to assemble the following documents as part of your: {{A current resume. {{A list of membership of professional organizations. {{A description of any leadership positions held such as head of department, curriculum development unit and committees. {{Copies of degrees, certifcates, honours and awards held. • Write your autobiographical sketch that outlines some of the realities, dilemmas, joys and rewards of your teaching life (see also Chapter 2). • Compare this with another teacher’s sketch of his or her life story. • Now that you know the three main areas/sections of a teaching portfolio (knowledge of subject matter; how you plan, deliver, and assess instruction; and professionalism), it is time for you to compile your own teaching portfolio. I suggest you compile your working portfolio frst and then move into a showcase portfolio. • Now compile your critical incident portfolio.

Refection When all of the information in the teaching portfolio outlined in the previous section is gathered and compiled in one place, it can provide a full picture of the language teacher’s journey from the teacher education program from the start during coursework, through teaching practice (see Chapter 12) and graduation and beyond into the early years of teaching (see Chapter 13). Much of the contents of the teaching portfolio can be found in the various refective activities you already completed in the previous chapters of this book, and you can choose which information you want to use for your portfolio. When all of this information is compiled, 170

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it begins to tell your story of who you are, who you have become and who you want to be as a language teaching professional. With all these refections compiled in one place in your teaching portfolio, you can now consider using the contents as a basis for discussion with your peers, a supervisor for the purposes of evaluation, and/or for promotion and job interviews. The creation of a teaching portfolio can provide language teachers with a structure and a process for documenting and refecting on their professional competence. No doubt many teachers will note that assembling the contents for a teaching portfolio takes a considerable amount of time, thus it should be viewed as an ongoing long-term endeavor, with new features being added as needed and when they become available. So, moving forward with teaching journals language teachers should consider setting realistic goals when deciding the contents of the portfolio. For example, if the portfolio is going to be part of a language teacher’s appraisal, then the purpose and contents of the portfolio can be discussed with the appraiser to fnd out what they would consider to be essential to include. When appraisal is not involved, discussion with a peer, with a mentor or with other language teachers who have developed portfolios would be helpful. That said, when language teachers compile and refect on the contents of their teaching portfolios, they will be pleasantly surprised at the amount of information they never realized before about their professional journey as a language teacher. Not only is this refection useful for your own selfreview, but it can also develop collegiality in a school or institution if used for evaluation purposes as it shares the burden of evaluation more between administrators and teachers and leads to self-renewal. Refection 104 • Now that you have compiled your teaching portfolio, how do these contents represent you as a language teacher? • How do you think it provides a rich picture of your strengths and accomplishments that you had not considered before? • Do you think it is useful for language teachers to read each other’s portfolios? • If no, why not? • If yes, what form of response would be useful when reading someone else’s portfolio? • If no, why not? 171

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• If yes, discuss the contents of your teaching portfolio with a colleague and/or with your supervisor.

Conclusion Teaching portfolios can provide language teachers with opportunities for self-refection and self-assessment and self-renewal. Compiling teaching portfolios encourages language teachers to take more responsibility for their professional development because it showcases their efforts, skills, strengths and abilities as well as their achievements and future plans. When shared with colleagues, supervisors and/or administrators, they can promote and encourage peer collaboration within a school and community. Many language teachers have reported that they feel immensely empowered as a result of compiling their teaching portfolios because outline their particular professional teaching journey. The analogy of a traveler on a journey is applicable to preparing teaching portfolios; just as travelers start off with a map to plot their journey, they must also decide their point of departure, the course they will take and their destination, a professional teaching portfolio encourages teachers to think about their starting point, direction and goals for the future that include the practicum (Chapter 12) and the early career years and beyond (Chapter 13).

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Activities Covered • • • • • • •

Microteaching Field Placement Teaching Context Cooperating Teachers Identity Development Discourse Development Evaluation

Introduction Most language learner teachers undergo some kind of practice teaching within their education programs with the idea that they can practice some of what they have learned and see what they can apply. Some language teacher educators are adamant that most of what learner teachers are given in these programs can provide a solid basis for their initial teaching experiences during this period of practice teaching and in the early years (see Chapter 13). Teaching practice during this practicum period can be very useful for language teachers as they gain more experience about real classroom while observing more experienced teachers as they engage in lesson planning and adapting materials and assessment methods, as well as actual teaching practice with real students. Learner language teachers can develop their initial professional identity development, learn about teaching contexts, how to engage with co-operating teachers and mentors as they learn how to create effective language lessons and create positive learning environments. However, the application of theory that learner teachers from DOI: 10.4324/9781003178729-12

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language teacher education programs are provided is not always readily transferrable into actual teaching practices, thus learner language teachers will need support from their language teacher educators during the period of the practicum to help them make connections between theory and practice (for more on this see Farrell, 2022). Thus, as the contents of this chapter outline, the practicum experience should include a focus on the application of refective strategies and activities that include microteaching, classroom observations of other teachers, and classroom teaching during feld experiences.

Microteaching Microteaching experiences for learner language teachers are usually conducted with teacher education programs and involve giving teachers the experience preparing short, focused lessons to their peers and/or, if possible, a small group of real language students. During these short lessons, the learner teacher can practice teaching and assessing a particular language skill (see Chapter 8) that includes a lesson plan (see Chapter 7) while refecting on the makeup and management of the ‘students’ (see Chapter 9), and the nature of the classroom interaction and communication that occurs (see Chapter 10). Whereas feedback is usually provided by teacher educators, in refective microteaching experiences feedback can be provided by peers as well as the learner teacher himself or herself by writing in a teaching journal (see Chapter 4) and/or dialoguing with peers (see Chapter 5) and what he or she perceived to go well, or not well, and why, before the teacher/supervisor provide feedback. Indeed, learner language teachers can be encouraged to gather evidence about their microteaching experience at this stage of their development so that they can articulate their experiences clearly and make evidence-based comments about what they accomplished. Refection 105 • Have you ever experienced microteaching, either in the role as a ‘student’ or a teacher? If yes, give the details about how it was set up and what you think you achieved in both roles. • If not, try to get experience teaching a short ten-minute lesson on one of the skill areas outlined in Chapter 8 (or any other focus you prefer) and also prepare a lesson plan (see Chapter 7). 174

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• Refect through writing in a teaching journal (see Chapter 4) and/or dialoguing with peers (see Chapter 5) on the following areas you already learned in this book: {{What do you think your ‘students’ learned? How do you know? {{What did you do well? {{What did you not do so well? {{The nature of classroom management during your lesson. {{The nature of the classroom interaction and communication that occurs. {{What did you learn about your teaching? {{Anything you would change now upon refection after the lesson?

Field Placement Although I outlined and discussed microteaching in the previous section, not every language teacher education program offers such refective experiences for their learner teachers, and they are directly placed in another school or institution where they can gain experience teaching ‘real’ language students. There are lots of variations of how these experiences are set up in different countries, with some learner teachers thrown in immediately to teach without much guidance from their cooperating and/or mentor teacher, while other experiences are limited to just observing their cooperating and/ or mentor teach during the whole placement. What invariably occurs is that most learner language teachers have both experiences, with initial observations followed by a some of their own actual teaching experience. Unlike the microteaching experience, more people usually are involved with the learner language teacher, such as cooperating teachers and/ or mentors (see later) and their institution supervisors and sometimes more people from a school district, all with different expectations and responsibility. This makes it diffcult for the learner teacher to focus their refections on what they think important as they attempt to please all the other people involved. It would be best for learner teachers, then, to discuss the process and their ability to refect with those who will be involved so that they can have a true developmental experience rather than just attempting to ‘pass’ a course to please these people. Indeed, some language teacher educators conduct a teaching practice ‘input’ session lasting from two to three hours, in which learner teachers discuss expectations 175

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and look at corpus data from a teaching practice feedback session and analyze this so that they can all try to create a more balanced disposition to the imminent teaching practice experience (Farr, 2015). Thus, there should be some regular dialogue between all involved in the placement location about the experiences of the learner teachers so that they can have a successful experience. As Farrell (2022) has recently pointed out, such dialogue should be based on the systematic refections of the learner teacher including evidence from his or her actual classroom teaching experiences and actions. Refection 106 • Have you ever experienced a feld placement practice teaching experience? If yes, give the details about how it was set up and what you think you achieved. • If not, what would you expect to experience during such a feld experience on teaching practice? • Do you think you will be able to apply all you have learned during your teacher education program? If yes, why? If no, why not? • How would you go about researching the site of your placement? • Do you think you think you will be able to experiment with some of your own ideas during teaching practice? If yes, what would you like to try out? If no, why not? • What kind of feedback do you expect during your feld placement experience?

Teaching Context The practicum can offer learner language teachers experience in many different contexts for their practice teaching, such private schools or public institutions with mixed-level learners, or institutions offering courses in EAP (English for academic purposes), ESP (English for specifc purposes), ESL or EFL (English as a foreign language). Thus, each teaching practice context is complex, offering different experiences for different learner language teachers. During their teacher education courses, learner language teachers were prepared in disciplinary knowledge (knowledge related to language, linguistics, pedagogy) and pedagogical content knowledge (knowledge related to teaching such as curriculum planning, teaching the skill areas, 176

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assessment) with the assumption that the disciplinary knowledge, although it is not intended to have practical applications to the classroom, is important for language teachers to have when they begin teaching. In addition, it was assumed that the pedagogical content knowledge can help deliver the content from the disciplinary knowledge to their students. However, the successful implementation of this professional knowledge (disciplinary and pedagogical) is not guaranteed in a real classroom during teaching practice because not all teacher education programs emphasize every aspect of this professional knowledge for teachers in training. So, as they attempt to apply the professional knowledge, they learned in their teacher education programs, learner language teachers soon begin to realize that each context has something different to offer and presents different challenges to overcome, including discovering what the ‘hidden curriculum’ is in order to be able to function in a particular school context. As Richards and Farrell (2011) note, whatever the context learner language teachers will not only need to develop the various pedagogical skills of teaching, but also all about the school and community where they will engage in teaching practice (see also feld placements in previous section). These norms of practice that occur both inside and outside the classroom include the curricula to be followed, the expected classroom routines within that context, as well as the culture of the school and how to interact with various school personnel including the students. Refection 107 • If you could visit your school placement site before you commence the practicum, what questions would you ask about your placement and who would you ask them to? • Richards and Farrell (2011) suggest that learner teachers ask specifc questions during the preliminary visit, such as: {{How is the school organized in terms of the administration? {{Does each department in the school have a head and are there any level coordinators or skill coordinators? {{Are level coordinators in the school based on each skill area such as a reading coordinator, a writing coordinator, or are they based on profciency levels such as Level I coordinator or Level II coordinator? {{What is the role of the coordinator? {{Do I attend all staff meetings? 177

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I have any recess and/or lunch duties? {{Do I have to go on feld trips with the students? {{What resources would be available to me in terms of computers (is there a computer room where I can go to use the computers) or photocopying, and are there any other resources I could use? {{Who should I go to for photocopying during my teaching practice? {{Where will I be based during my teaching practice? Will I be in the main teachers’ room, or is there a separate location for student–teachers? {{How many other student–teachers will be placed in the same school with me, and will they be located near me during teaching practice? {{What are the main school rules that I should know about, and which ones should I be sure to monitor when I interact with students? {{What are the school’s expectations of student–teachers? {{Is there a dress code for teachers? {{Are there any rules specifc to speaking English in class that I should be aware of? {{When will my practice teaching take place and how often? {{Will I be dealing with anyone other than my co-operating teacher? {{If I have any problems, who should I go to for advice? {{What discipline procedures should I follow when dealing with students? {{Who will be giving me overall feedback about my teaching practice performance? • Would you ask these same questions, or would you change any? Explain your answer. • Other information may be more diffcult to obtain because it is part of the ‘hidden curriculum’ of the school, such as unstated values, rules, expectations and norms of practice that operate in the school. How do you think you can learn more about the hidden curriculum of the school where you will do your teaching practice? • Richards and Farrell (2011) point out that, depending on the nature and duration of your teaching practice experience, you should try to get information about the following kinds of issues in order to understand the school’s practices and other aspects of the school culture. Try to get answers to the following questions: {{What are the school’s expectations of student–teachers? {{Is there a dress code for teachers? 178

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there a dress code for students? {{How have learners in the school in the past reacted to having a student–teacher teach them? {{When will my practice teaching take place and how often? {{Will I be dealing with anyone other than my co-operating teacher (see next section)? {{What sort of problems might I encounter during my teaching practice? {{If I have any problems, who should I go to for advice? {{If I am sick, what are the school procedures I should follow? {{What discipline procedures should I follow when dealing with students? {{Do I have to do any extracurricular activities such as sports and feld trips? {{Do I have any involvement with parents? {{Who will be giving me overall feedback about my teaching practice performance (see evaluation to follow)?

Cooperating Teachers During most feld placements, learner teachers are usually provided with an established teacher from that school/institution who will guide them through the placement. This teacher, usually called a cooperating teacher, either volunteers or is ‘chosen’ by the school administration to facilitate the learner teacher’s experiences throughout the placement but especially within their own classroom, where they will offer both observation and teaching practice. Sometimes this ‘cooperation’ can go awry if not organized properly or if the cooperating teachers sees the learner teacher as a substitute for them to take a break and thus abandons them completely. Although some learner teachers may welcome such freedom, it really goes against the spirit of collaborative refection in which the learner teacher can learn from this more experienced colleague. Therefore, when the learner teacher meets his or her cooperating teacher for the frst time, they should all discuss expectations of the cooperating teacher has in mind (see also Farr, 2015 noted earlier). Then the learner teacher should also have an opportunity to discuss what he or she expects to experience from the cooperating teacher during the period of the practicum. 179

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Refection 108 • What do you expect from your cooperating teacher during the practicum? • What are your expectations of the cooperating teacher during the practicum? • What questions would you ask your cooperating teacher at the frst meeting? • Which of the following questions (adapted from Richards & Farrell, 2011) would you consider asking during that frst meeting with your cooperating teacher and why: {{What are the cooperating teacher’s expectations for me during the practicum? {{What kind of working relationship does the cooperating teacher like to have with me? {{How does the cooperating teacher think I should prepare for practice teaching? {{What are some things I should anticipate while working with the cooperating teacher? {{Will the cooperating teacher allow me to observe and teach his or her lessons? {{If yes to both parts of the previous question, how does the cooperating teacher expect me to teach his or her classes? {{Will the cooperating teacher observe me while I teach these classes? {{What kind of feedback will he or she give me during the practicum?

Identity Development There is a big difference for a learner teacher among taking courses, microteaching and feld placements in terms of shifts in professional identity as the teacher becomes socialized into the profession. When language teachers enter teacher education programs, they can imagine the type of professional identity they will have as a fully qualifed teacher when staring out in their early career years (see Chapter 13). In between, their identity as a learner teacher has already been shaped by who they are including their age, gender, race, ethnicity and experiences while in the school system and beyond in education that we visited in Chapter 2 (see especially life history, personal critical incidents and feelings about teaching). Their personal 180

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biography continues to evolve as a learner teacher, and teaching practice will further shape and infuence their professional identity as a language teacher. During teacher practice, language teachers can further consider how their philosophy, principles/beliefs/values (see Chapter 3) are refected (or not) in their teaching as they continue to be socialized into the profession of language teaching. As noted in Chapter 3, the ‘teacher-as-person’ is at the center of the act of teaching; thus, it matters who the teacher is in terms of their professional identity. Awareness and understanding of one’s identity are crucial to knowledge of the scholarship of language teaching, and it really starts to matter for their frst time for many language teachers during their teaching practice when they stand in front of a real class for the frst time as a ‘language teacher.’ Unfortunately, until recently, this crucial aspect of learner language teacher identity development has been, as Franzak (2002: 259) has noted, “best seen as a by-product of teacher education programs rather than a targeted outcome.” Indeed, Kanno and Stuart (2011) maintain that language teacher learning is not so much the acquisition of the knowledge of language teaching methodology and skills as it is the development of a teacher identity. Thus, learner language teachers for the most part, have been left on their own when it comes to awareness of their professional identity, its origins, negation and development many times as they begin interacting with other professionals for the frst time. For many learner language teachers, this need to ‘position oneself’ can come as a shock because the ideals that they may have built up in their initial teacher education courses can suddenly seem very distant when they must take on roles that they may not have considered during their initial education courses. At this stage of the development of their professional identity during teaching practice, language teachers can refect on their ‘actual self,’ or who they are now, their ‘future self,’ or who they want to be as language teachers, and their ‘ought self,’ or what identity they think is expected from them as learner teachers by those around (cooperating teachers, supervisors, peers). Refection 109 • What is your ‘actual self’ in terms of your professional identity? • What is your ‘future self’in terms of your professional identity? • What is your ‘ought self’in terms of your professional identity? 181

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Discourse Development Just as learner language teachers are socialized into a professional culture with shared values and standards of conduct in terms of their identity development, so too are they socialized into ‘talking the talk’ with the development of various sets of discourse skills in terms of their development and use of language effectively during teaching practice. This discourse development takes place mostly within their classrooms during teaching practice, but it also takes place outside the classroom when communicating with students, colleagues and others within the institution/school in which they are placed. In terms of instructional discourse development, language teachers can get full experience with aspects of classroom communication that they may have studied within their teacher education courses and especially the common IRE interactional structure (introduced in Chapter 10) where the teacher initiates something (I), a student or students usually respond (R) and then the teacher usually evaluates (E) the student response. Teaching practice can help learner language teachers develop different permutations of this IRE structure and refect on the effect of such changes in terms of the interactions in their classes as well as student learning. Another aspect of discourse skill development for learner language teachers is where they use language not only to direct and shape their lessons, but also as model of the kind of language their students are learning. This is because in language lessons, all discourse is both a means and an end in terms of content. In addition, learner language teachers get experience proving comprehensible language for their learners with the use of appropriate speech at an appropriate level that all the students understand. Learner teachers are surprised at frst that their everyday use of idioms may not be appropriate for their language lessons and not provide appropriate input for such lessons because they are too complex for their students to understand. Another aspect of discourse development occurs outside the classroom where learner language teachers must engage in ‘backstage discourse’ (Vaughan, 2007) that involves what Richards and Farrell (2011) call ‘talk the talk’ or being able to use the professional language associated with language teaching, such as learner-centered instruction, learner autonomy, task-based teaching and so on, and is equally signifcant for learner teachers to be aware of. Thus, teaching practice can help learner language teachers develop how to use language effectively both during classroom lessons and outside the classroom as a mark of professional teaching competence that continues in their early career years (see Chapter 13). 182

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Refection 110 • What have you observed about the discourse skills of a language teacher from observing your cooperating teacher? • How does he or she: {{Model language use? {{Make discourse comprehensible? {{Use questions (how many, what type)? {{wait after asking questions? {{Engage in topic management? {{Repair tasks? {{Communicate non-verbally? {{Give feedback? • How does your cooperating teacher open his or her lessons, initiate activities and close his or her lessons? • You will probably have to review and audio and/or video of your lessons to answer how you did the following while on teaching practice: • How did you provide an opening and closing to your lessons? • How did you modify your language and discourse to make it more comprehensible to the learners while you were teaching? • How did you: {{Make use of questions? {{Engage in topic management? {{Repair tasks? {{Communicate non-verbally? {{Give feedback?

Evaluation One constant experience of most teaching practice experiences is that all learner language teachers will be evaluated in some manner. Traditionally, most such evaluations are conducted in a top-down manner by supervisors without consulting the learner teachers about the evaluation process. What invariably happens is that language teacher educator– supervisors (and/or cooperating teachers) enter the learner teacher’s classroom unannounced armed with checklists about pre-determined notions about what ‘good’ or ‘bad’ teaching is (see also Chapter 9 on classroom observations) and proceed to ‘evaluate’ the learner teacher’s 183

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teaching in a few visits. Such type of top-down, judgmental evaluations are of no assistance to the learner teacher’s development and in fact can be detrimental because the feedback is only from the supervisor’s perspective as checked off on an evaluation sheet. Is it any wonder, then, that many learner language teachers try to produce ‘canned’ lessons in an attempt to cover all the written ‘behaviors’ that are being checked off on the checklist? Such evaluations do not have to be only for summative purposes such as screening out unsuitable teacher candidates, they can also be for formative purposes where learner teachers can engage with the supervisor in collaborative refective dialogue (see Chapter 5) so that the learner teachers can grow from the evaluation. Such a participatory, collaborative approach to language teacher evaluation during teaching practice means that the language teacher educator/supervisor, cooperating teacher and learner language teacher all share the burden of evaluation in which the learner teacher is given more responsibility to be active in their own refections, monitoring and evaluation, a process that is, according to Roberts (1998: 305), “the only possible basis for long-term change.” Such self-evaluations under the supervision of the language teacher educator/supervisor and cooperating teacher can be facilitated through different mediational refective tools already introduced throughout this book such as dialogue, writing, critical friends, critical incident analysis, audio–video-based observations, as well as the all-encompassing teacher portfolio refection outlined and discussed in the previous chapter. Refection 111 • Why do you think learner language teachers would teach ‘canned’ (or plastic) lessons when being observed with a checklist? • Do you think that teacher evaluation can and should be a shared responsibility between learner teachers, teacher educators, cooperating teachers and other stakeholders? If yes, how can this sharing of responsibility be achieved? If no, why not? • Are you willing to take on more responsibility for self-refection and self-assessment and communicate this assessment to your supervisors? • What refective activities that you have read so far in this book do you think can best promote such self-refection and self-assessment? • How do you think you can best report your self-refection and selfassessment to your supervisors? 184

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Conclusion Teaching practice (microteaching and especially feld placements) is the frst real teaching experience for many learner language teachers and the place where they can experience the joys and problems most language teachers must deal with each time they teach. Teaching practice can help learner teachers see what content from their teacher education programs can be put into practice and which content is not so suitable for their context. Learner language teachers experience the diversity of their learners in terms of their different cultural, linguistic and educational backgrounds, motivations that are impossible to cover in teacher education courses. In addition, learner language teachers get their frst experiences of socialization into real teaching in which they must collaborate with their cooperating teachers, develop their professional identity as well as their discourse skills and eventually be evaluated at the end of their practice.

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Activities Covered • • • • • • • • •

Transition Your Classroom Your Colleagues The ‘Shock’ Overcoming the Imposter Syndrome Developmental Stages Getting Support Professional Roles Refection as Way of Life

Introduction They say that teaching is one of the professions that “eats its young” (Halford, 1998: 34). Indeed, a very dramatic statement to begin the fnal chapter of this book but a necessary refection for every novice language teacher about to embark on a career as a language teacher. The reason I make such an opening statement is that the average career length of most teachers in the U.S. is only eleven years, similar to the career length of a professional athlete but without having to endure the physical (and mental) demands of a sport and only if they do not sustain career ending injuries early into their careers. For teachers, the numbers are much worse when it comes to early career ‘retirements,’ where overall some 30 percent of all teachers leave the feld within their frst three years. When the opening statement is taken with these numbers in view, then language teacher educators should perhaps pay more attention to whole needs they are fulflling when preparing the 186

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courses and programs for their learner language teachers. Thus, this fnal chapter is important for all novice language teachers transitioning from their teacher education courses into their frst years of teaching so that they can prepare for some of what they will inevitably expect. Some of the changes they will experience will occur at the classroom level and with colleagues, as well as the shock of the whole transition itself. The chapter also discusses how novice teachers can overcome the imposter syndrome, obtain support, help themselves and continue to refect throughout their language teaching careers.

Transition When learner language teachers ‘graduate’ from their teacher education courses (and their teaching practice experience (see Chapter 12), most people, and especially the learner teachers themselves, assume they will be able to apply most of what they learned during this training. Well of course, you may say, if the contents you are being provided with in these courses were not useful, the teacher educators would not have included them. Just like graduating doctors who transition into hospitals and make use of their training, you would think that graduating language teachers would also be able to make use of their training as they transition into their frst year(s). Indeed, some learner language teachers do make such a smooth transition, but unfortunately, many more do not, with damaging results for them, their students, their colleagues, the school and the government agencies that may have funded their training. Some teacher educators have noted that much of the fault with transitional problems may lie in the content of these teacher education programs because they are not delivering content that learner language teachers can implement in real classrooms. Indeed, many language education programs (e.g., certifcate, master’s degree, etc.) do not know what their graduate teachers face when they transition because many do not follow up about how their graduates are faring in their frst years (Farrell, 2016). Much of what learner language teachers are given in their teacher education programs is washed away by the reality of their frst year(s) experiences as they are faced with many challenges directly related to their experiences of transitioning to a new context such as teaching in a real classroom setting, interacting with new colleagues and developing new support networks. 187

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Refection 112 • If you are a learner language teacher, what do you expect your transition from your teacher education program to your frst year of teaching will be like? • Do you expect it to go smoothly? If yes, why? If no, why not? • If you are a more experienced language teacher, what were your transitional experiences from your teacher education program to your frst years of teaching? • Do you think that language teacher education programs abandon their graduates when they have left?

Your Classroom Most novice language teachers are eager to get into their own classroom once they have experienced teaching practice in someone else’s classroom. They are eager to meet real language students and begin the professional career that they all trained for. Although novice language teachers may feel very confdent about their ability and ready to teach in a real classroom, some forget that they are in fact still in the process of learning to teach. What many novice language teachers also do not realize is that, unlike novice professional sports players (see introduction earlier) who are given time to adjust, language teachers are given a full teaching load with many lessons from their very frst day on the job. They are fully responsible for managing their own classrooms, developing and teaching effective language lessons and engaging in any school assessment practices. However, unlike most experienced language teachers who have already built up a repertoire of teaching skills, novice language teachers struggle to cope with this sudden surge of duties within their own classrooms, and many soon feel overwhelmed. Some schools may appoint mentors to help novice teachers, but in many cases (because of costs, etc.), these are informal relationships, and novice language teachers are left to survive on their own. When novice teachers begin to feel overwhelmed will all their new duties teaching many lessons, what sometimes happens is that some resort to employ teaching methods they subconsciously picked up when they were students and tacitly built-up images of what they consider to be ‘good’ and ‘bad’ teaching practices. This ‘apprenticeship of observation’ (Lortie, 1975), in which novice language teachers have spent many hours and years (ffteen or sixteen 188

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years) in or around classrooms in their role as students, begins to override any of the content they studied in their teacher education programs as they struggle to get by in real classrooms with real students. Refection 113 • Finally, this is your classroom. What was the biggest change for you as you entered your classroom for the frst time in your frst year/job of teaching? • Do you think it is fair to have novice language teachers teach the same load as their more experienced colleagues during their frst year? • Why do you think that when they struggle with this load, many revert to their apprenticeship of observation experiences where they can be infuenced by teaching methods their teachers used? • Do you agree that novice language teachers can still be infuenced by events that have occurred long before they commence their frst year? If yes, what are these infuences? If no, why not?

Your Colleagues When you were on teaching practice, you were introduced (hopefully) to some other language teachers in that school placement, but you may have felt that they did not view you or treat you as a real colleague, so now you are ready to meet your new colleagues and interact and collaborate with them, and you are most likely willing to learn from them about how to teach. At least that may be your initial reasoning; however, from the moment you walk into a new school to teaching on your frst day, you will notice that you are the stranger, because they all seem to know each other as they buzz around the staff room getting ready for their own lessons. This is a new world for most novice language teachers, as each school has its own culture that refects the school’s values and code of behavior and those of the individuals within that school. When you enter such a culture, you must quickly adjust to working with this new group of people who have an already established and well-defned daily routine with many of them unable (or unwilling) to help you ft in with the new group. Of course, many schools have induction programs that may outline the school codes of conduct and appoint mentors to help novice teachers adjust to their new environments. However, many novice language teachers may still feel isolated from their 189

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new colleagues because this process of professional (and social) adjustment to this new professional culture will take time. Thus making the transition from the teacher education to the real classroom and school culture with real colleagues is not any easy process, and the novice language teacher will inevitably suffer some ‘shocks’ along the way, the severity of which will depend on how well they were prepared (or not prepared) for the transition (I believe the contents of this book, and especially this chapter, will also help novice language teachers prepare for such a transition). Refection 114 • Now these colleagues are your colleagues. What did you notice about them the frst moment you walked into the school on your frst day? • How would a novice language teacher break into the professional world/culture of his or her new school? • If you are a more experienced language teacher, how did you break into the culture of your new school? • What values and standards would a novice teacher’s new colleagues have already established? • How do you want to be treated by your new colleagues? • As a more experienced language teacher, how were you treated by your new colleagues, and what advice would you give a novice language teacher about interacting with his or her new colleagues?

The ‘Shock’ As mentioned earlier, the transition from the teacher education program to the frst year of teaching is complex and can be a real shock (teaching and cultural) for many novice language teachers. Novice language teachers can experience such shocks because the ideals, aspirations and hopes they became a teacher for in the frst place are suddenly challenged, buffeted and perhaps replaced by the harsh realities of the reality of classroom life and the social and political contexts of their new professional worlds. As Rogers and Babinski (2002: 1) put it: “False expectations, shattered dreams, and serious attacks on one’s competence and self-worth—these are the all-too-common experiences of beginning teachers.” Thus, many novice language teachers who experience such a shock can begin to wonder if they made the correct career choice, because the shock has 190

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impacted their feelings of belonging to the teaching profession, which in turn negatively infuences their capacity to teach effectively during the frst years. Indeed, if the differences between their expectations and the reality of the frst years are negatively signifcant, then novice language teachers will struggle in the transition period, which in turn will lead to stress and burnout (see Chapter 2), which in turn adversely affects their teaching, leading to a negative outcome for their students and possible teacher attrition as some novice teachers give up. Indeed, evidence suggests that approximately 50 percent of people entering English language teaching leave the profession within three to fve years, and unfortunately, given the ‘business’ nature of the English language teaching industry, there are few actual studies on the number who leave (see also earlier note that many language teacher education programs do not follow-up on their graduates’ progress in the profession), what is clear is that the costs associated with teacher attrition, both human and fnancial, are enormous (Mattheoudakis, 2007). Consequently, it is clear that the transition shock is something that should be discussed and addressed within every profession, but especially the teaching profession, if we are to have any hope of putting an end to ‘eating our young’ (see introduction) as teachers quit the profession. Refection 115 • Do you think you will experience any shock when you transition from your teacher education program? If yes, what kind of shock? If no, why not? • As a more experienced language teacher, did you experience any shock when you began your teaching career? If yes, what kind of shock? If not, what prepared you for the real classroom? • What kind of ideals about teaching do you or did you have when you entered your teacher education program? • Do you think these ideals are/were realistic? • How do you think novice language teachers should be prepared for the reality of the classroom?

Overcoming the Imposter Syndrome Perhaps not so much a shock as a feeling, many novice language teachers report that they feel some kind of professional identity crisis while teaching in their frst years associated with feelings of being fake in some manner. 191

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Some novice language teachers report that they feel they are playing the role of a language teacher because they feel very unsure about what they are doing each day in the classroom and how they are interacting each day with their colleagues. This is sometimes called the ‘imposter syndrome’ in teaching. Within psychology, such a feeling describes a psychological state of people who think of themselves as intellectual frauds, as being unable to handle and internalize their success and, as a result, have a fear of being exposed as such (Gravois, 2007). Indeed, we may be surprised to learn that famous and infuential people we are familiar with as public icons have experienced feelings of inadequacy, even though they are famous and fully established, such as actress Kate Winslet or Alan Dye, who was Vice President of Apple (Shorten, 2013). I suspect a lot more language teachers also suffer in silence and possibly without being aware of why they have such a debilitating feeling of being inadequate as a teacher. However, I believe that language teachers who continuously engage in refective practices (such as the contents of this book) will not only better understand these largely undeserved feelings, but also eliminate them because they know they are making informed decisions throughout their practice. Refection 116 • • • •

Have you ever heard of the ‘imposter syndrome’? Do you think you suffer from this? Why or why not? How can language teachers overcome this feeling? Do you believe that engaging in refective practice can eliminate this feeling?

Developmental Stages As mentioned earlier, when novice language teachers begin to teach during their frst years, they inevitably encounter some challenges that they must overcome if they are to survive and succeed and thrive as a language teacher. These challenges (many of which are also outlined in the previous section) may seem so chaotic and diverse that it is impossible to prepare learner language teachers beforehand about what they will encounter. However, some researchers have developed some useful ‘stage models’ that outline a general sequence of concerns and challenges that many novice teachers 192

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will face during their frst years of teaching. Fuller and Brown (1975), for example, describe two general stages of developmental challenges for novice teachers. The frst stage is characterized by survival and mastery, while the second stage presents an either/or dichotomy of development: either settling into a state of resistance to change or staying open to adaptation and change of their practice. In the early stage, novice teachers are most concerned about their own survival as a teacher. Novice teachers’ idealized concerns (the ideal of teaching before experiencing the reality of teaching) are abruptly replaced by concerns about their own survival. They are also concerned about control of the class (classroom management) and the content of their instruction. In the later stage, novice teachers become more concerned about their teaching performance, and this includes noticing their perceived limitations and frustrations of the teaching context. After this stage, but much later on in the frst year as Fuller and Brown (1975) suggest, novice teachers become more concerned about their students’ learning and the impact of their teaching on this learning. Vonk (1989) also identifed two distinct phases in the professional development for novice teachers called, the ‘threshold’ phase and the ‘growing into the profession’ phase. The ‘threshold’ phase is where novice teachers transition from the teacher education program into full time teaching during their frst years. The ‘growing into the profession’ phase occurs during the following four years, and it is when teachers begin to focus more on their teaching skills and competencies and culminates with colleagues accepting the novice as a real teacher usually at the end of the ffth year. Maynard and Furlong (1995) have presented a more complex picture of beginning teacher development and suggest that novice teachers go through fve stages: (1) early idealism, (2) survival, (3) recognizing diffculties, (4) reaching a plateau and (5) moving on. Early idealism sees the beginning teacher strongly identifying with the students while rejecting the image of the older cynical teacher. The survival stage sees the beginning teacher reacting to the reality shock of the classroom and feeling overwhelmed by the complexity of the classroom. The beginning teacher wants to survive with quick fx methods. The next stage of development, according to Maynard and Furlong (1995), is where the beginning teacher gains an awareness of the diffculties of teaching and begins to recognize that teachers are limited in terms of what they can achieve. Now the teacher enters a self-doubt stage and wonders if he/she can make it as a teacher. Beginning teachers then enter a stage known as reaching a plateau, where they start coping successfully with the 193

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routines of teaching. However, they also develop a resistance to trying new approaches and methods so as not to upset the newly developed routines. They are focused on successful classroom management and not so much on student learning. These later change to more of a focus on the quality of student learning as the beginning teacher moves into a ‘moving on’ stage of development. Maynard and Furlong (1995) suggest that the beginning teacher needs a lot of support at this stage, or he/she will not be able to develop further as a result of possible burnout. Finally, another stage theorist, Lacey (1977), advocated that novice teachers move through three phases: the ‘honeymoon’ phase, the ‘crisis’ phase and the either/or dichotomy of ‘failure’ or ‘getting by’ phase. Refection 117 • If you are a novice language teacher, at what stage do you think you are at from survival versus mastery, to a state of resistance to change versus staying open to adaptation and change? • What stage are you at from ‘threshold’ phase to the ‘growing into the profession’ phase? • What stage are you at from ‘early idealism,’ ‘survival,’ ‘recognizing diffculties,’ ‘reaching a plateau’ and ‘moving on’? • What stage are you at from the ‘crisis’ phase, and the either/or dichotomy of ‘failure’ or ‘getting by’ phase? • If you are a more experienced language teacher, did you go through any of the phases/stages presented here? If no, what stages did you go through? • Do you think all novice teachers move neatly through each of these stages? Why or why not?

Getting Support Regardless of the different stages outlined in the previous section that many novice teachers may move through, what all the stage theorists and scholars agree on is that novice teachers must receive some kind of support especially in the ‘growing into the profession’ phase and before they reach the ‘failure’ phase. That said, another reality shock for many novice language teachers is that in many schools and institutions where they are initially placed, there may be little sympathy among the more 194

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experienced language teacher colleagues for the struggles of their early career colleagues because they often feel that they have paid their dues and that novice teachers must do the same as a badge of honor and ‘earn their spurs’ as language teachers. In many schools and institutions, too, different cultures may exist and novice language teaches face a dilemma of which one to join without much knowledge of any of them. For example, some colleagues in one school could be considers as buddies or mentors where they can help novice teachers navigate their frst years in that school. Other colleagues may have something of a standoffsh role and prefer to act more like peers and leave the novice teachers alone to develop themselves. One thing is for sure, if a novice language teacher fnds himself or herself in a school where teacher colleagues all pursue a culture of individualism (live and let live) as opposed to collaboration, this will not help the novice develop and may even damage him or her as well as the long-term interests of the school and its students. Indeed, all the research on the successful socialization and development of novice language teachers indicate that the single most infuential factor when they start to teach is their relationships with their colleagues during their frst years as teachers. Thus, it really is the school’s role to establish such a supportive environment for incoming novice language teachers where they have emotional support, where their professional development is encouraged and where they are encouraged to establish professional relationships with their more experienced colleagues (Farrell, 2016). As mentioned earlier, many schools offer induction programs, many of which include the giving of pamphlets that outline the school rules and regulations and other school documents that explain the school system to novice teacher as well as the appointment of a mentor to guide novice language teachers through their frst years. Although these induction programs can help new teachers to develop a support system and ultimately feel more supported throughout the early stages of their career, research has reported that the quality of these programs varies drastically by region and institution, from being highly involved to completely nonexistent. Most induction programs also include a mentorship component where an early career teacher will get paired up with an established teacher as a support resource for the early career teacher. Such an established teacher mentor can help novice teachers to adapt to the school and learn about their roles as teachers in that school. Any induction program with the inclusion of formal mentorship must be built on a clear understanding on all sides of exactly what processes of the novice language teachers’ 195

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learning it is intended to support and how this will be accomplished. From my own research with frst-year English language teachers, I can assure that each novice language teacher was yearning for support of any kind because they were for the most part ignored in the staff room from day one (Farrell, 2016). As was pointed out previously, even when they get some support, it can unfortunately be hit or miss, and as a result they may have to depend on themselves a lot of the time when responding to the conditions of the school environment and classrooms. Novice language teachers can become more proactive by drawing up a list of questions about the school and requirements for beginning teachers before they enter the school. These questions may include (but are not limited to) the following: • School: What is the organization of the school? Do I have a copy of the staff handbook, school rules and any other school brochures? Who is the non-teaching staff (clerical, computer and science technicians, librarians and photocopy helpers) whom I can ask for assistance? • Organization: To whom do I report directly? Does the school have an induction program for beginning or new teachers? Who is my mentor? How often should I meet my mentor? What are my duties during recess, lunch and after school? Do I have extra-curricular activities? Do I have to teach remedial classes? What is my timetable? Where are my classrooms? • Subject: What classes will I be teaching, and is there a written syllabus for each class? What are the required textbooks? What are the schemes of work I need to follow? How do I do assessment and record keeping? • Students: What proficiency levels are the students and what language skills have they attained? Who taught them previously, and can I talk to that person? How should I counsel and/or discipline my pupils? Some of these questions may seem obvious, but by posing them and attempting to get answers, beginning teachers can develop greater awareness for their own professional socialization and take more explicit responsibility for their own professional development.

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Refection 118 • What would you expect to see in an induction program in the school you are placed during your early career teaching years? • What guidance would you expect from a school appointed mentor? • How do you expect communications to take place between you and your school appointed mentor to occur during your early career years? • What do you think your role is as a novice language teacher to become a successful teacher in the school in which you are placed? • How would you go about getting answers to the proactive teacher questions about related to the school, the organization, the subject and the students? • Can you think of any more questions you think should be answered?

Professional Roles In the previous chapter, I addressed the notion of language teacher professional development and the tensions of the ‘actual’ self, the ‘ought’ self and the ‘future’ self. As you continue through your early career teaching years, your socialization into the teaching profession will continue, and part of your socialization will entail refecting on the various professional roles you take on or are given during these years. It is important for early career language teachers to consciously refect on the various roles they take on or are given to them by their institutions, colleagues or others, they can start the process of trying to fgure out who they are and who they want to become as they continue their teaching careers. Refection 119 • In my previous research with early career language teachers, I identify thirteen professional identity roles divided into three main clusters: Teacher as Manager, Teacher as “Acculturator” and Teacher as Professional, as outlined by a group of novice TESOL teachers that they assumed outlined briefy in Table 13.1 (from Farrell, 2022):

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Role

Teacher as Manager

Attempts to control classroom

Communication Controller Attempts to control communication and interaction Arbitrator

Offers feedback (positive and negative) in classroom

Motivator

Motivates students to learn; keeps students on task

Presenter

Delivers information

Teacher as “Acculturator”

Helps students to get accustomed to life outside class

Volunteer

Gives time outside class to organized activities

Friend

Befriends students (offering advice and support)

Care Provider

Plays a role of care provider for students

Teacher as Professional

Dedicated to work

Novice

New to teaching

Follower

Follows expectations of the administration

Unique

Is unique (differs from other teachers)

• Do you identify with any of the professional roles as a language teacher presented here? • What other professional identity roles do you envisage you will have in your early career years?

Refection as Way of Life You have reached the fnal refection activity in this book, and you are moving forward with your career as a language teaching professional. Throughout this book, you have been presented with many approaches, methods and activities that you have been encouraged to adapt as you explore your practice both inside and outside the classroom. I have mentioned that refective practice is not a one-off stepping back from your practice, although you can and should do at least that; rather, you should constantly be refecting on your practice throughout your career so that you do not plateau at any one time. If we blindly follow routines in our practice, we will succumb to plateauing and the resultant burnout, and 198

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of course we will suffer, but our students will suffer even more because we are not able to provide optimal opportunities for their successful learning of language. Everywhere I talk or write about refective practice for language teachers I am mindful of Oberg and Blades’ (1990: 179) words that refective practice “lies not in the theory it allows us to develop (about practice or refection) but the evolution of ourselves as a teacher. Its focus is life; we continually return to our place of origin, but it is not the place we left.” Thus, I see engaging in refective practice as a way of life for language teachers of all experience working in all contexts. Some newly graduated learner language teachers in their frst years may consider that they have been trained in all the latest teaching and learning approaches, methods and techniques, so there is no need for them to refect on their practice as ‘they know it all.’ I have heard this before, and many experienced language teacher professionals will understand exactly what I am saying and agree that it does not mean that learner novice teachers have been inadequately trained in their initial teacher education programs; rather, the call for ongoing refection is a response to the fact that not everything a language teacher needs to know can be provided at the pre-service level (or even in in-service workshops). In addition, with the explosion of the knowledge base of teaching in recent years and the fact that it is constantly changing with new theories and approaches, we will need to enter into a continual process of refection so that we can remain fresh. Language teachers who engage in a process of life long refective practice can maintain a deeper understanding of their practice, direct their professional growth, make informed decisions about their practice both inside and outside the classroom, and become proactive and confdent in their professional and possibly their personal life as well. Refection 120 • I began this book with an invitation to refect on your practice and in the very frst activity I asked you if you are a refective practitioner. As you have reached this stage of the book, I will ask you again: do you consider yourself to be a refective practitioner? • If yes, did reading and interacting with the contents of this book help you become a refective practitioner? • Try to give examples of how you are a refective practitioner from your recent work on the refection activities in this book. 199

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• Outline how you will incorporate some of the refection activities in your future refections on your practice as you move forward in your teaching career. • Richards and Farrell (2011) maintain that the key to moving forward as a language teacher interested in your long-term professional development is the ability to be able to refect consciously and systematically on your teaching experiences by continuously asking questions about your teaching such as: {{What kind of teacher am I? {{What am I trying to achieve for myself and for my learners? {{What are my strengths and limitations as a language teacher? {{How do my students and colleagues view me? {{How and why do I teach the way I do? {{How have I developed as a teacher since I started teaching? {{What are the gaps in my knowledge? {{What role do I play in my school, and is my role fulflling? {{What is my philosophy of teaching, and how does it infuence my teaching? {{What is my relationship with my colleagues, and how productive is it? {{How can I mentor less-experienced teachers?

Conclusion Teaching experience during teaching practice (see Chapter 12) will have provided many novice language teachers with a brief introduction to the realities of classroom language teaching. The transition from their teacher education program to their frst years will provide them with even more realities of everyday teaching in real classrooms with real students and real colleagues. Some of this can come as a shock to many novice language teachers who may not have imagined such realities because they differ so much from the aspirations and hopes they built up during their teacher education program. As they begin to move through their frst years, they may also suffer from a type of imposter syndrome where they feel they are playing the role of a language teacher rather than being a real teacher. All of these shocks and feelings of fakeness will soon pass, especially if novice language teachers are supported by the school offcially, with the 200

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appointment of mentor teachers to guide them smoothly through their frst years. In addition, novice language teachers can also take some initiative with their own development during their frst years by being proactive when asking questions about their roles to relevant people both inside and outside the school. As they move forward throughout their teaching careers, language teachers are also encouraged to see refective practice as a way of life in which they constantly engage in a continual process of selfrefection and self-renewal so that they can develop the resourcefulness and resilience to face whatever challenges (i.e., overcome plateauing) they may be faced with. I hope that you also fnd the contents of this refection activity book useful as you move forward in what I consider to be the most rewarding teaching career possible: that of a professional language teacher.

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Index

Ashcraft, N. 97, 98 Babinski, L. M. 190 Bailey, K. M. 108 bandwagons 29–30 Banga, C. A. 20 benefts of refection 9–10 benefts of refective practice 9–10 Biggs, A. P. 145 Blades, C. 199 Brophy, J. E. 81 Brown, O. H. 193 bumpy moments in teaching 91–92 burnout 2, 11–13, 20–21, 28 cautions 48–49 Clarke, A. 41 classroom climate 135–136 collaboration 55 colleagues 189–190 communication competence 155–157 communication in classrooms 142–145 communication in groups 71–72 community refection 34–35 cooperating teachers 179 Costantino, P. 161, 165 COVID-19 12–13, 144–145 critical incidents in teaching 46, 92 data collection 157–158 defnition of refection 36–37 Dewey, J. 23, 24, 29–34, 35, 36, 41, 42, 64 dialogue 55, 65–67

dimensions of refection 37–38 discourse development 182 diversity 132–133 diversity and communication 145–147 diversity in classrooms 132–133, 145–146 education reform 12 Edwards, V. 145 evaluating groups 75 expectations in classrooms 139–140 experience in classrooms 188–189 Fanselow, J. 88 Farrell, T. S. C. 42, 74, 104, 153, 176, 177, 178, 182, 200 feedback 149–152 feelings about teaching 18–20 feld placement 175–176 Forrestal, P. 148 Forster, E. M. 51 Franzak, J. K. 181 Freeman, D. 2 Fuller, F. F. 193 Furlong, J. 193, 194 Ghere, G. 11 Gkonou, C. 18 Good, T. L. 81 grammar 122–125 Gregersen, T. 20 grouping in classrooms 152–154 groups and time 73–74 207

Index Harmer, J. 152 Hatton, N. 35 identity development 180–181 implementation of refection 1–2 importance of refection 1 imposter syndrome 191–192 Ingham, H. 43 interaction in classrooms 145–147 Jacobs, G. M. 153 Jensen, L. 118 Jo-Hari Window 43–44 Johnson, K. 156 journals: audience for 56; purpose of 52–53, 57–58, 83–84; starting 54; subject-matter knowledge 166–167; types of 55 Kanno, Y. 181 Killion, J. 32, 33 Kumaravadivelu, B. 65 Lacey, C. 194 lesson planning: approaches to 98–99; creating 100–103; evaluating 107–110; implementation 105–107; and portfolios 168; purpose of 96–98, 110–111; and textbooks 103–104; and theory 46 levels of refection 38–40 Lewis, M. 137, 138 Li, Y. 144, 145, 146, 155 life history 14–16 listening 120–122 Liston, D. P. 28, 38 Lorenzo, M. 161, 165 Luft, J. 43 MacIntyre, P. 20 maintaining order in classrooms 136–137 Mann, S. 33, 65 Maynard, T. 193, 194 Mehan, H. 158 Mercer, S. 20 microteaching 174 Miller, E. 18 208

modes of refection 70–71 modes of refection in groups 70–71 Montie, J. 11 Moorhouse, B. L. 144, 145, 146, 155 moral agency, refection as 35–36 Murphy, J. M. 93, 94 non-verbal communication 154–155 novice teachers 7–8 Oberg, A. 199 observation: category instruments 87–89; etiquette 93–94; focus 89–90; by friends 84–85; purpose of 81, 94–95; qualitative 82; reactions to 79–80; recording 85–86; selfobservation 83–84 observation of teachers 79–80 online classrooms 144–145 organizing classrooms 129–132 Palmer, P. J. 9 personal critical incidents 16–17 philosophy 43–44 philosophy of teaching 3 plateauing in groups 75–76 portfolios: contents of 164–166; instruction 167–169; professionalism 169–170; purpose of 160–162; refection 170–172; subject-matter knowledge 166–167; types of 162–164 practice 46–47 practice teaching 173–174, 185 principles 44–45 Purgason, K. B. 106 purpose of refection 2 questions about teaching 22–23 questions for teachers 147–149 reading 2–8, 117–120 recognition of refection 25 refection as action 32–33 refection as process 30–32 refection as product 33–34 refection as way of life 198–199 refection in groups 66–67

Index refection self-assessment 8 refective dispositions 23–25 refective writing 55 Reiman, A. J. 36 responsibility 42 Richard-Amato, P. A. 106 Richards, J. C. 18, 99, 104, 115, 177, 178, 182, 200 Roberts, J. 184 Rogers, D. L. 190 role of teachers 128, 197 roles and responsibilities in groups 69–70 Ross, J. 20 routines 28–29 Rowe, M. B. 148 Schön, D. A. 31, 33, 41, 42, 140 Sert, O. 146 setting up groups 68–69 Smith, D. 35 Sommers, W. 11 speaking 115–117 spirals of refection 41 Stevick, E. 154 stress 13 Stuart, C. 181 students: abilities of 133–134; disruptive 137–138; learning styles 134; nonparticipating 138–139; overexuberant 139 support for teachers 194–196 sustaining groups 74–75 Tabachnik, R. 30 tailoring refection 48 Talbot, K. 20 teacher development 192–194

teacher evaluation 183–184 teaching action zone 90–91 teaching careers 186–187 teaching context 176–177 teaching journals 52–59 technology: in classrooms 81, 85–86; and communication 144–147, 153; and groups 67–68; and teaching portfolios 163–164; and writing 62 textbooks 103–104 theory 45–46 Todnem, G. 32, 33 transition to teaching 187–188, 190–191 trust in groups 72–73 types of groups 67–68 Ur, P. 106, 107 Van Manen, M. 37 Vonk, J. 193 Walsh, S. 33, 65, 144, 145, 146, 148, 155, 156, 157, 158 Waring, H. 150 Watson-Gegeo, K. 82 Wong, J. 150 Wright, T. 1, 129 writing: assessing 114–115; narrative 59–60; purpose of 50–52; research 60–61; teaching journals 52–59; teaching of 113–114; and technology 62 York-Barr, J. 11 Zeichner, K. M. 28, 30, 38

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