Advances in Research on Language Teacher Cognition: An Introduction to the Special Issue

Abstract

An oft-cited conceptualization of teacher cognition couches it as “the unobservable cognitive dimension of teaching—what teachers know, believe and think” (Borg, 2003, p. 81). While the term “unobservable” in Borg’s definition implies, or even emphatically states, that a hidden body of knowledge, beliefs, and thoughts informs teacher behavior, this hidden dimension was “un-observable” in early conceptualizations of teaching (Borg, 2019; Burns, et al., 2015). Dominated for long by the process-product interpretation (Dunkin & Biddle, 1974), teaching was primarily viewed in terms of observable instructional behaviors (e.g., wait time practices, patterns of questioning) that were judged with regard to how effectively they influenced student achievement outcomes (Verloop, et al., 2001). Language teacher education also followed suit and as posited by Gatbonton (1999), formerly a major share of the theoretical base for language teacher education came from studies of overt classroom behaviors. However, teaching was subsequently recognized as cognition-backed and knowledge-informed performance. As best reflected in Borg’s (2019, p. 2) words, although teaching involves observable behaviors, it “is not a purely behavioral enterprise; in the same way that icebergs have an exposed surface beneath which lies a significant hidden mass, teachers’ behaviors are also powerfully shaped by a complex range of unseen influences”. [First Paragraph]