ELT formation course program and pre-service teachers’ perceptions of self-disclosure

Abstract

Teacher self-disclosure, simply defined, is the intuitive understanding of private feelings, thoughts or experiences between interlocutors. It is revealing information about yourself to others. This revealing is believed crucial in developing a fully intimate relationship between teachers and students which might give cause for students’ engagement, class participation and might boost their foreign language learning. The purpose of this study, therefore, is to investigate the perception of appropriateness of teacher self-disclosure of the pre-service language teachers in Turkish context and to compare whether there is a significant difference between teachers’ beliefs who attended a pedagogical formation course program and who did not. The data was collected from 140 ELL junior students and 77 pedagogical formation course students at a Turkish university through the appropriateness of teacher self-disclosure scale. Compared to the related studies for the appropriateness of pre-service teachers’ perceptions of self-disclosure, the study presents some important similarities but also differences in terms of the topics used in the questionnaire.