Developing into an effective Polish Teacher of English

The major aim of this work has been to explore the profile of an effective Polish teacher of English ten years ago and now. In particular, it has attempted to determine what competencies or kinds of professional knowledge distinguish this successful professional, as well as what personal teacher theories she seems to hold. In order to accomplish these goals, two interview studies were conducted, one almost a decade ago and the other recently. The results of the analysis of different spheres of an English language teacher’s professional competences may have significant implications for teacher education in Poland, and make it possible to identify these characteristics of the teacher that can foster their effective performance of the job. On a more general level, they also enable us to make some recommendations concerning the optimum preparation of potential candidates for becoming teachers of foreign languages in Poland. Due to the focus of this study, the tentative model to be presented here pertains to a profile of the effective language teacher in Poland. It is also important to keep in mind that the guidelines the present model offers are not necessarily applicable to another context, but to the Polish context at a time when the Polish educational system is still being affected by sweeping institutional and curricular changes.

INTRODUCTION 9 CHAPTER 1. A REVIEW OF STUDIES ON EFFECTIVE TEACHING 11 Introduction 11 1.1. The beginnings: the concept of good practice 11 1.2. The concept of successful teaching 13 1.2.1. The behaviourist approach 13 1.2.2. The cognitive approach 14 1.2.3. The communicative approach 15 1.2.4. The humanistic approach 16 1.2.5. Current concepts of successful teaching 17 1.3. Major studies of effective teachers 19 1.3.1. Highet’s qualities of a good teacher 20 1.3.2. Good teachers’ characteristics in Okoń’s articles on teacher personality 20 1.3.3. Taylor’s study 22 1.3.4. Teacher qualities identified by Ryan 22 1.3.5. Flanders’ styles 23 1.3.6. Bohucki’s study of teacher personality 23 1.3.7. Rosenshine and Furst’s correlates of effective teaching 24 1.3.8. Pupils’ expectations of teachers – Nash’s study 25 1.3.9. Achievement of objectives by effective teachers 25 1.3.10. Bloom’s list of effective teachers’ classroom practices 26 1.3.11. Ericksen’s essence of good teaching 26 1.4. Effective language teacher studies 27 1.4.1. Moskowitz’s analysis of outstanding teachers’ behaviours 27 1.4.2. A good teacher’s qualities as perceived by young adolescents 28 1.4.3. Politzer and Weiss’s research 29 1.4.4. Komorowska’s research on factors conditioning success and failure 29 1.4.5. Sanderson’s project on good language teachers 30 1.4.6. The need for change – Hawley et al.’s research on the effective teacher 31 1.4.7. Some contemporary studies of good language teachers 32 1.4.8. Effective language teacher studies – a summary 35 1.5. Studies of poor language teachers 36 1.6. Concluding remarks 38 CHAPTER 2. A PROFILE OF A LANGUAGE TEACHER’S PROFESSIONAL COMPETENCES 39 Introduction 39 2.1. Linguistic competence 40 2.1.1. Language proficiency 40 2.1.2. Subject matter knowledge 45 2.2. Methodological competence 47 2.3. Psychological competence 49 2.4. Pedagogical competence 51 2.5. Normative competence 52 2.5.1. Interactive knowledge 53 2.5.2. Causal knowledge 53 2.6. Experiential competence 55 2.7. Contextual competence 57 2.8. General competence 58 2.9. Teacher knowledge – a summary 60 2.10. Teacher competences vs. human wisdom 61 2.11. Concluding remarks 64 CHAPTER 3. TEACHERS’ PERSONAL THEORIES 65 Introduction 65 3.1. Fundamental concepts and approaches 65 3.1.1. A transmission approach 66 3.1.2. A constructivist approach 66 3.1.3. Teacher Development Approaches 67 3.2. Definition of personal theories 68 3.2.1. The term 68 3.2.2. Definitions of the term 69 3.2.3. Teachers’ personal theories: an overview 74 3.2.4. Teachers’ personal theories characteristics 76 3.3. Sources of teachers’ personal theories 77 3.3.1. Teachers’ own experience as language learners 77 3.3.2. Personality factors 78 3.3.3. Research-based teaching principles 79 3.3.4. Principles derived from an approach or method 80 3.3.5. Established practice 80 3.3.6. Experience of what works best 81 3.3.7. Origins of language teacher beliefs – a summary 81 3.4. Language teacher beliefs 82 3.4.1. Beliefs about language 82 3.4.2. Beliefs about curriculum 83 3.4.3. Beliefs about learning 84 3.4.4. Beliefs about teaching 85 3.4.5. Beliefs about the language teaching profession 93 3.4.6. Teacher beliefs – a summary 94 3.5. Metaphors as an aid to understanding teacher personal theories 95 3.5.1. Advantages of metaphor 95 3.5.2. Metaphors in teacher beliefs 96 3.5.3. Metaphors – a summary 105 3.6. Concluding remarks 106 CHAPTER 4. THE EFFECTIVE FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHER – NTERVIEWS 107 Introduction 107 4.1. Selection of teachers for the study 107 4.2. The objectives 109 4.3. The technique of data collection 109 4.4. Analysis of the data 111 4.5. Interview 111 4.5.1. Interview 1 112 4.5.2. Interview 2 116 4.5.3. ME as an effective teacher: the ‘change’ aspect 124 4.5.4. The profile of ME as an effective at present 133 4.6. Concluding remarks 133 FINAL REMARKS AND CONCLUSIONS 135 BIBLIOGRAPHY 138 APPENDICES 149