جستجوی مقالات مرتبط با کلیدواژه « professional development » در نشریات گروه « ادبیات و زبان ها »

English proficiency as the content knowledge for English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers determines their instructional quality. However, previous studies have not focused on the significance of this knowledge in support of Teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) on technology adoption in teaching. Therefore, this study aims at finding out the correlation between TPACK and technology applications, and how technology applications link to teachers’ English proficiency levels. The study adopted a quantitative method, and the data were collected using two questionnaires in Likert scale, one for TPACK and another for technology application. Teachers’ English proficiency levels are determined using the content knowledge dimension of TPACK. The questionnaires were completed online by 74 English pre-service teacher graduates who had participated in a national teacher certification program involving real teaching practice. The data were analyzed using the Spearman correlation coefficient to determine the correlation between TPACK dimensions and technology adoption and ordinal logistic regression analysis to find out the effect of teachers’ English proficiency levels on technology applications. The results show that most TPACK dimensions correlate to technology applications with the level of correlations between 0.26 (weak) and 0.47 (moderate). English proficiency has been found to affect technology applications only among teachers who regularly used technology in teaching. Teachers with high English proficiency used technology in teaching 3.06 times more frequently than those whose English proficiency was low. Therefore, it is recommended that English proficiency development be inscluded in teacher professional development to ensure that teachers use technology in teaching

Teachers' professional learning plays an important role in their attempt to change their teaching practices; however, few studies have been conducted on how teachers prepare themselves for the vast initiatives in ameliorating students' outcomes. This study aimed to explore EFL teachers’ perceptions toward their professional learning practices and their professional developmental orientations that contribute to the process of their professional learning. To this end, 30 Iranian EFL teachers selected through purposive sampling participated in this qualitative phenomenological study. The data was collected through semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews, and narrative inquiries to ensure the trustworthiness criteria of the data. The thematic analysis of the data revealed three themes of professional development programs, collaborative learning and experience-based learning. The result showed that only a few teachers were satisfied with the school-based professional learning programs, indicating that revision in the educational system was required to develop teachers’ professional learning. Meanwhile, effective learning occurred through collaboration among the teachers and the mutual learning between teachers and students, hence, leading to participative decision-making and teachers' reflective practice. Overall, participants mentioned students' outcomes as a key level of teachers' professional learning. This study has important implications for policymakers, school administrators, and teacher educators.

The aim of the present mixed-method study is investigating the role of SE instruction in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers’ PD. To do so, 30 EFL teachers and 150 of their students in different high schools in Zanjan, Iran were selected as the participants of the study. The convenience (availability) sampling procedure was used to select the participants. The students were asked to fill out the the teachers’ PD survey, and the questionnaire of SE was filled out by the teachers as the pretest. Then, the teachers received in-service training for SE with a specified syllabus. At the end of the training period, which lasted 5 sessions in a 1.5-month course, the students completed the teachers’ PD survey, and the teachers filled out the SE questionnaire again as the posttest. To analyze the results of the questionnaires as the quantitative data, a paired-samples t-test was employed. In the qualitative phase, an in-depth interview was held with the 30 teachers concerning their ideas towards the effects of SE instruction on their PD, and the collected data was analyzed through content analysis technique. The findings of the study revealed that the EFL teachers’ SE significantly affected their PD based on the results of the questionnaires and in-depth interviews.

Lesson Study (LS), as a professional development approach, motivates teachers to develop skills making them aware of the dynamics of students’ learning during a lesson. This study investigated Iranian EFL teachers’ perceptions of the role of (LS) in their professional development. To this end, five Iranian secondary school EFL teachers took part in the study. Four instruments including a semi-structured interview, diary writing, observation field-notes, and Telegram© notes were used to collect the data. The teachers participated in a (LS) program conducted in 12 face-to-face 90-minute sessions. A thematic analysis approach (Braun & Clarke, 2006) was used to analyse the interview data. The data obtained through diary, observation, and Telegram© platform were subjected to content analysis (Miles & Huberman, 1994). Five major themes were emerged including behavioural and psychological effects, collaborative development, raised awareness about pedagogical practice, concerns about LS, and changes to teaching practice. The analysis indicated that lesson courses developed the teaching performances of the participants. The findings call up Iranian EFL teachers and practitioners to pay due attention to the function of LS in teacher growth and teacher development.

atisfaction are two important variables affecting teachers’ performance and effectiveness. Many studies have focused on the relationship or the effect of professional development with or on teachers’ job satisfaction. Few studies have also studied the effects of teachers’ job satisfaction on their professional development practices and activities. These studies show that there is a two-sided, bidirectional relationship between professional development and job satisfaction, which means that the two affect each other and are dependent on each other. In this regard, the self-initiated sense of professional development can create levels of job satisfaction that are under the control of teachers, independent of any external factor. After discussing these two concepts, the present article highlights the strategy for achieving such satisfaction.

Teachers' continuing professional development (CPD) is currently an engrossing area worldwide. Nevertheless, despite the growing range of literature concentrating on certain aspects of CPD, there is a paucity of literature addressing a measurement scale to know where teachers are standing and act as a motivating role. The purpose of this study was to construct and validate a new scale for measuring EFL Teachers' CPD. This scale is considered pristine because of the added characteristics of Dynamic Assessment (DA) as another aspect of improving teachers' CPD. The present study further sought to establish the validity and reliability of the questionnaire, as well as add more value and precision to the pre-existing inventories available. Moreover, in this study, the developed scale was validated through piloting the items, and the factor analysis confirmed the five-factor questionnaire. With reference to the final results, the questionnaire was found to be reliable, having internal consistency by performing Cronbach's Alpha analysis. Cronbach's alpha of .91 indicated a high internal consistency. The CPD questionnaire was validated via exploratory factor analysis to establish a new validated scale to evaluate teachers' current level of CPD. The results are discussed in the context of language teaching, and based on that, authorities and administrators should be attentive to the results. Future studies can use a mixed-method approach to evaluate teachers’ CPD by employing a questionnaire and interviews.

This sociocultural theory-based study investigates how professional development activities mediated novice EFL teachers in their teaching careers. Four volunteer novice teachers in their two-year probation time participated in the study. Each novice teacher wrote a narrative every month in a semester and was interviewed at the beginning and end of that semester. Data from all the narratives and interviews disclose that the institutional context with much teaching workload, mandatory research, and involvement in administration-related work provide the affordances for the novice teachers to internalize their understanding of the duties of English lecturers and drive to practice those duties. Besides, the professional development activities in teaching, researching and others are reported to lead to growth in the understanding, experience as well as confidence level of novice teachers. From the findings, implications are put forward to how to provide support to mediate the professional growth of early-career teachers.

The present study aimed to develop our understanding of various aspects of EFL teachers’ perceptions of professional development in Iran using mixed-methods design. After a review of current literature and questionnaires, in the qualitative phase of the study, interviews were conducted with 12 EFL teachers and teaching experts. The data obtained from the interviews was subject to content analysis and the results revealed 4 major themes. In the quantitative phase, based on the findings of the qualitative phase and the supporting literature, a 74-item questionnaire was constructed and administered to 250 participants, after pilot testing and reviewing of the items. The quantitative data was analyzed through Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and a 4-factor structure was identified. After modifications in the questionnaire, the final version of the questionnaire was administered again to the participants and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) confirmed the construct validity of the EFL TPPD questionnaire and the four components. The results revealed that professional development activities, benefits, needs and barriers are the major dimensions of Iranian EFL teachers’ perceptions of professional development. The proposed model can have theoretical and practical contributions to EFL teacher professional development.

Though foreign language is a common subject matter in all public and academic education programs, teaching it is not similar to teaching other subject matters due to the fact that the foreign language itself is the medium of instruction and communication rather than learners’ first language. As a result, foreign language teaching becomes a challenging attempt compared to other subject matters. The present paper tries to discuss some of these less cited challenges and suggest solutions for them based on research. Specifically, four main challenges related to the issues of language proficiency, learners’ accent, the teaching of foreign language culture, and professional development are highlighted and discussed.

The present qualitative research sought to investigate EFL teacher educators’ experiences and attitudes toward critical thinking and its role in teacher professional development. The adopted design was a case study and the theoretical framework was the theory of transformative learning (Mezirow, 1978). For the data collection purpose, 30 EFL teacher educators participated in in-depth interviews. The  whole procedure of  the data collection was audiotaped for further reference in data analysis. The interviews were transcribed to familiarize with the data and the transcribed interviews were member checked with the participants. The collected data were analyzed through reflective thematic analysis. The data analyzed paved the way for generating three themes: cognition, metacognition, and personal growth/self attainment. The findings of the study comprise a number of implicatios for both theory and practice. One aspect of our contribution is that the notion of critical thinking can be conceived as more than cognitive and metacognitive one; it should be conceptualized as possessing both facets as well as other possible subsets. Beyond that, we suggest that critical thinking should be conjectured as being both a process and a product.

Self evaluation is developing a greater self-awareness about the nature and impact of one’s performance which provides opportunities for professional growth and development (General Medical Council, 2010). It is distinctly emphasized in Islam and its followers are advised to take some time periodically to evaluate their deeds. The present study aims at finding evidence that self evaluation has been taken into consideration in Islamic religious texts. It is also focused on how being inspired by self evaluation developed in Islamic religious texts can improve the quality of teachers’ job. To this end, verses of Quran and traditions were looked into with respect to self evaluation. Meanwhile, the recently developed approaches to self evaluation were explored to find out the relationship between the two outlooks and the contribution they might potentially have to develop self evaluation particularly among teachers. The findings show that self evaluation is considered as one of the basic tenets of Islam and within its framework, humans are the best evaluators of themselves. Teachers, walked through the whole self evaluation process by numerous Quran verses and traditions, are called to be consistent and spiritually motivated in order to do consequentially valid self evaluation. Self-evaluator teachers are urged to avoid bias, arrogance, pride, and self-enhancement, and make upward comparison to develop professionally. The findings of this study have implications for teacher development and teacher education. They can also be employed by English teachers as well as syllabus and textbook designers in the sense that they can take self evaluation developed in religious texts into account in EFL contexts.

 The goal of this research was to find out more about the professional development needs of Iranian translation teachers, taking the role of gender and education degree into account. In line with the objectives of the study, a qualitative research method using content analysis was applied. To do this, 15 male and 15 female Iranian EFL teachers with MA and Ph.D. degrees in different branches of English field including translation and TEFL were selected as the contributors in the research through purposive sampling from teachers teaching translation courses in different universities including Islamic Azad University, Kerman branch, and Shiraz Branch. A semi-structured interview, designed in six open-ended questions by the researcher through consulting the previous studies, was used to collect the appropriate data. The method utilized for data analysis included qualitative content analysis. According to the results, some professional development needs were extracted from interviews as knowledge of teaching methods, affective factors, evaluation procedure, good class communication, critical thinking, etc. Moreover, it was found that gender does not play a significant role in the professional development needs of Iranian translation teachers. However, the results confirmed that educational level plays a significant role in the professional development needs of Iranian translation teachers.