Understanding our ELT environments (contexts) : a starting point for developing appropriate ELTE goals Martin Wedell

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Understanding our ELT environments (contexts)
a starting point for developing appropriate ELTE
goalsMartin Wedell
School of Education
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Conference title

• English Language Teacher Education in a Diverse
  Environment-
• explicitly acknowledges that ONE set of goals
  for / one model of English language teacher
  education unlikely to be suitable for all
• If we do not understand the main features of the
  environment, hard to establish appropriate
  goals, and so to plan and provide appropriate
  English Language Teacher Education (ELTE).

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Conference themes

• The Institutional Environment
• A range of more or less multilingual -
  multi-grade - multi-level - multi resourced
  English classrooms .
• The Socio-Economic Environment
• a range of more or less mainstream/marginalised
  communities in different areas , with English
  playing different roles in local economic
  development different English skills
  perceived to be needed for local employability
  different awareness /understanding of terms like
  global citizenship .
• The Home Environment
• different areas of the country with different
  language profiles (English L2-L3-L4?) and
  different linguistic priorities, able to assume
  differing degrees of support from parents and
  local community

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Understanding diverse educational environments

• to be able to understand the main features of
  any educational environment / context, one needs
  to be able to describe it in a more or less
  systematic manner. How?
• Environments suggest PLACES
• If one asks teachers to describe their
  contexts - a physical PLACE
  (classroom/school) is what they tend to refer to
  first.

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Other core components of any educational
context

• As well the main features of the PLACE, any
  description of an educational context has two
  further core components
• These are
• the beliefs, expectations and behaviours of
  PEOPLE, both those working in the PLACE, and
  also some of those those in the environment that
  surrounds it.
• AND, since both places and peoples beliefs and
  behaviours change over time, the point in (
  chronological) TIME at which we are describing
  it.

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Describing contexts

• PEOPLE IN A PLACE AT (point in) TIME
• How can we investigate these three key components
  of any environment, to help us identify the main
  features influencing how English teachers think
  and behave in ELT classrooms in that
  environment?
• and so become able to establish appropriate
  goals for our ELTE?

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A framework for describing an educational
context (Wedell Malderez 2013)
Any educational context (environment) Any educational context (environment) Any educational context (environment)
Visible aspects of a context of PLACE P E O P L E Invisible aspects of a context of PLACE
Classroom P E O P L E Classroom cultures-group dynamics
School/Institution P E O P L E Institutional cultures
Village-Town-City P E O P L E Local expectations of/attitudes to education
Region P E O P L E Regional educational cultures
Country P E O P L E Socio-political belief systems and their national educational culture
Part of the world P E O P L E Balance of power and philosophical positions
_________(at a particular point in TIME________ _________(at a particular point in TIME________ _________(at a particular point in TIME________

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influential features of ELT environments
More Visible More invisible
Classrooms and schools that are more or less Multi-lingual Multi-level Multi-grade And that eg have larger or smaller classes are situated in more or less well resourced parts of the region/country Teachers- leaders- communities in different places with/-different norms regarding eg education knowledge learning classroom roles and behaviours And so different perceptions of eg Importance of English in the local environment Desirable skills that local learners need how to support teaching and learning of English

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Some possible goals for ELTE (Malderez and
Wedell 2007)

• Good teachers?
• Good teaching?
• Teaching professionals?
• Reflective practitioners?
• Technicists?
• OR
• Gurus? ( Sharma 2012)

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Good Teachers

• Focus on the person as a teacher - helping a
  person to become a teacher
• Trainees initial focus develop their TEACHER
  identity
• Non-teachers focus personal qualities
  knowledgeable, dedicated, patient, kind,
  humourous, as/more important than what the
  teacher does

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ELTE for good teachers

• suggests a curriculum that recognises the need
  to provide trainees with opportunities to
  develop, eg
• Confidence in their teacher identity
• Ability to understand learners as individuals
  whose feelings about their learning experiences
  will affect their attitudes to learning English.
  
• Interpersonal skills relating to/advising
  learners
• Ability to make their classrooms positive
  learning environments

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Good teaching

• Focus on the activity of teaching. Do we think
  it is
• A craft?
• A science?
• A complex open skill many possible options to
  choose from at any point in the process of
  teaching- good teaching needs personal
  flexibility, creativity and ability to cope with
  the unexpected

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ELTE to develop good teaching

• suggests a curriculum that would need to include
  
• A craft opportunities to learn from experts
• A science opportunities to understand
  thinking underpinning the method/approach and
  how to use it in the classroom in the expected
  manner.
• A complex open skill - opportunities to
  observe, practice, discuss experiences of, both
  the parts and the whole of the skill
  through for eg
• experiences of teacher educator modelling
• opportunities to try out micro teaching,
  classroom observation and teaching

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Professionals

• Professionals in most societies
• Have high social status and good pay
• Are accountable for what they do
• Belong to a professional body
• Have professional training after their initial
  degree
• Keep themselves up to date in their field
• Are autonomous, and expected to use their
  knowledge and skills to make appropriate
  decisions in different situations

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ELTE to develop Professionals

• Suggests a curriculum that would try to provide
  trainees with opportunities to eg
• Become autonomous, through being given (some)
  personal responsibility for their learning, and
  chances to develop flexible decision-making
  skills in real settings.
• Become well-informed, through providing access to
  up-to-date knowledge/contacts in their area of
  learning, and of how to access such
  knowledge/contacts in future
• Understand who they are accountable to, and in
  what ways.
• AND recognise the need for a coherent system of
  further training /updating throughout teachers
  careers.

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Reflective Practitioners

• A view of Teachers as RPs.
• Suggests the need to focus on developing
  teachers (trainees) understanding of why they
  do what they do when they do it.
• emphasises the importance of the THINKING behind
  the teaching behaviour, and views teachers as
  people who think about their professional
  behaviour, and through such ongoing thinking
  continue to learn teaching.
• sees learning teaching as a process of lifelong
  learning.

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ELTE to develop Reflective Practitioners

• Suggests a curriculum that tries to provide
  trainees with opportunities to eg
• develop noticing and observing skills
• observe and experience teaching
• spend time, alone and with others, thinking and
  talking about what has been observed/noticed/exper
  ienced and its implications for their
  understanding of teaching and their future
  teaching behaviours.
• learn how to access other peoples thinking, now
  and in the future, literature networks -
  conferences and how to evaluate integrate-adapt
  or reject such thinking.

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Technicists

• A technicist is someone whose role is primarily
  to carry out plans devised by others.
• Education systems might see technicists as a
  desirable goal for ELTE where
• Human / material resources limited
• Emphasis within the system is on accountability
  and standardisation
• Trainees might also see being told exactly what
  to do as desirable in the short term, in helping
  them develop the confidence to feel like a
  teacher.

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ELTE to produce Technicists

• Suggests a curriculum emphasising opportunities
  to eg
• Learn about / thoroughly understand the thinking
  underlying the syllabus and the materials that
  they will be expected to use.
• Develop the behaviours and skills needed to
  cover the syllabus content , carry out
  whatever in-class activities that the syllabus
  expects and help learners to pass exams.
• BUT, if we acknowledge that teaching takes place
  in diverse environments, is a solely
  technicist goal for ELTE likely to prepare
  teachers adequately?

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Teacher as Guru (Sharma 2012)

• Teacher as a person who
• Constantly strives as a person and a teacher
  professional-reflective practitioner- a lifelong
  learner (of teaching)
• Has a commitment to the growth of students -a
  reflective practitioner- good teaching- good
  teacher
• Has a commitment to learning good teaching
  good teacher- reflective practitioner
• Has a concern for society professional - good
  teaching-good teacher-reflective practitioner

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ELTE to develop Gurus

• Suggests a curriculum that provides many of the
  learning opportunities previously discussed
• Learning in the training classroom
• Learning in the school classroom
• Learning through books and through contact with
  experts
• Learning through noticing what happens in
  clasrooms, and learning through trying out in
  practice
• Learning through thinking about issues alone
• Learning through discussion with colleagues and
  tutors
• Teacher Learning as an ongoing (lifelong)process

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ELTE for diverse environments

• If the aim of our ELTE is to prepare teachers
  to work in diverse environments,
• Then, before deciding on goals for the ELTE
  curriculum in a particular local or regional
  environment, teacher educators need to try to
  understand
• the main features of the visible and invisible
  context of English language education in schools
  and colleges in their environment.
• and use this understanding to develop
• ELTE curricula that will prepare trainee English
  teachers to be confident and effective in their
  (future) workplaces

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Understanding teacher education contexts- why
bother?

• The conference title, and ELT discourse today in
  India more generally (NCF 2005, NCF for Teacher
  Education 2009) suggest a desire to change (some
  of) what currently happens in the diverse
  classroom environments in which ELT in India
  takes place.

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• whether the desired changes become widely
  visible in Indian ELT classooms, will ultimately
  depend
• on what teachers do and think its as simple
  and as complex as that (Fullan and Stiegelbauer
  1991117),
• ELTE implicitly assumes that it can influence
  what teachers do and think. Its influence is
  likely to be greater if trainees can SEE that the
  ELTE curriculum they follow fits the working
  environments they (will) find themselves in.
• Understanding the main visible and invisible
  features of the teaching environment is thus the
  starting point for developing ELTE
  curricula.that make sense to Ts and so perhaps
  affect what they do and think.

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• References
• Fullan, M and Stiegelbauer. 1991.The new meaning
  of educational change. 2nd ed. New York Teachers
  College Press.
• Malderez A and Wedell M. 2007. Teaching Teachers
  Practices and proceses .London.Continuum
• Sharma A.K. 2012. Revamping Teacher Education
  issues for reflection. In Visions of Teacher
  Education in India Quality and regularity
  perspectives Vol 3. annex 3(i) . Delhi. Ministry
  of Human Resources , Department of School
  Education and Literacy.
• Wedell, M and Malderez A. 2013. Understanding
  language classroom contexts The starting point
  for change London. Bloomsbury

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• m.wedell_at_education.leeds.ac.uk