EFL Teachers Research Articles

Effects of psychological need thwarting during COVID-19 remote instruction on Chinese, math, and EFL teachers’ well-being and online teaching intentions

Effects of psychological need thwarting during COVID-19 remote instruction on Chinese, math, and EFL teachers’ well-being and online teaching intentions

Exploring a Collaborative Synchronous Online Learning Environment in an Initial Language Teacher Education Program

This qualitative study explores pre-service language teachers’ experiences in a collaborative synchronous online course in language teacher education program in Turkey. A course was designed to equip pre-service language teachers of English with the skills and knowledge necessary to effectively incorporate technology into their teaching and self-learning practices. Adopting a generic qualitative inquiry design, data were collected over 14 weeks from 63 pre-service EFL teachers through weekly reflection papers, online surveys, and face-to-face follow-up semi-structured interviews. The study found that technology-enhanced collaborative online course had a positive influence on participants’ engagement, interaction, and professional development with participants perceiving the course experience positively. The findings suggest that collaborative online courses, when they are effectively taught, can be a valuable professional development opportunity in initial language teacher education programs.

Investigating Preparatory Year Saudi Students’ Preferences Towards Different Feedback Methods to Improve Their Writing in EFL Classrooms

This research aims to determine the most effective type of feedback for enhancing the writing skills of the students of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in Saudi Arabia. The study investigates preparatory year students' attitudes towards different feedback types, direct comments, indirect suggestions, and metalinguistic feedback. By analyzing the effectiveness of these feedback methods, educators can improve EFL education in Saudi Arabia. The research employs a mixed methods approach, involving interviews with seven teachers and a questionnaire administered to students. Findings from previous studies on feedback effectiveness were reviewed to provide insights for instructional practices. Ultimately, the study intends to provide valuable insights into the feedback methods employed in the EFL writing classes in Saudi Arabia. The findings show that teachers tend to prefer indirect feedback, while 75% of male students favor direct feedback and 66.7% of female students prefer metalinguistic feedback. However, indirect feedback was ranked as the second favorite type by both male students, who accounted for 15%, and female students, who accounted for 20%. Overall, indirect comments appear to be the most effective as they allow students to reflect on their mistakes and discover the correct answers, enhancing their learning experience. To establish more reliable and valid results, the researchers recommend repeating the study with a larger sample of participants.

The Impact of Vocabulary Clustering on Facilitating Vocabulary Development Among Saudi EFL Learners

The current study sought to investigate how organizing new vocabulary through semantic, ‎thematic, or unrelated sets could affect the learning process among Saudi EFL learners. The ‎majority of EFL teachers and materials writers seem to introduce and cluster new words according to a ‎particular type of semantic relationship (e.g., vegetables, body organs, car parts, or house parts) or a thematical relationship (e.g., a hotel room reservation, visiting a doctor's clinic, going to the post office, or at the train station). ‎Participants in the current research were 149 EFL students from the Preparatory Year Program (PYP) at Al-Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University (IMISIU), Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The design of this study was a pretest-treatment and posttest-delayed post-test. Two ‎types of clustering of new vocabulary were explored: semantically related sets and semantically ‎unrelated sets, which were constructed to identify how organizing new vocabulary could affect ‎the learning process among Saudi EFL learners. The findings of the study showed that both semantically ‎related (SR) and semantically unrelated (SU) sets ‎ seemed to help in learning new words. Nonetheless, ‎those new words behaved differently one week after the treatment. Moreover, the SR group scored significantly better on both delayed tests than ‎their ‎counterparts. Furthermore, the study's outcomes failed to indicate any interfering effect of ‎teaching and studying semantically relevant terms simultaneously in an actual classroom setting.‎ This study concluded with recommendations for teaching and learning programs to ‎develop ‎students' conceptual understanding of organizing new vocabulary that affects the learning ‎process among Saudi EFL learner’s context.‎

Reflective practice as a tool for teacher education: a comparison between individual and peer reflection of Iranian EFL teachers

Reflective practice as a tool for teacher education: a comparison between individual and peer reflection of Iranian EFL teachers

Exploring the use of self-assessment in Chinese primary school EFL teaching: teachers’ perspectives and practices in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Jiangsu

Exploring the use of self-assessment in Chinese primary school EFL teaching: teachers’ perspectives and practices in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Jiangsu

Building a community of practice around a community of inquiry: an examination of EFL students' perceptions of a virtual internship

In response to the new policy of English department, the internship program has been shifted to virtual programmes. As part of this initiative, the university has collaborated with other educational sectors to offer a virtual English as a Foreign Language (EFL) internship programme aimed at training individuals as EFL teachers. The aim of the study was to investigate student perceptions of dynamic social structures and communities of practice in technologically mediated environments, particularly in relation to virtual internships. The authors recognised a gap in research regarding how EFL students create meaningful learning experiences and how they build their practical knowledge in mediated communication environments. Quantitative and qualitative research methods were used. 50 students comprised the study subjects. The data were collected from multiple sources: interviews, students’ reflections, and community of inquiry and practice survey instruments. The findings revealed that an unprepared virtual environment led to social anxiety and challenges related to real-world work experience. The study suggests that evidence-based interventions in technologically mediated, virtual learning environments can help to resolve study findings with this goal: fostering a sense of belongingness and community that can promote effective remote interactions between learners and their teachers to ensure that internships serve students best.

An ecological approach to understanding the agency of novice EFL teachers without initial teacher education background

ABSTRACT Existing research extensively explores challenges faced by novice teachers with initial teacher education (ITE) backgrounds, whereas those without ITE exposure (non-ITE backgrounds) remain less investigated. Utilising the ecological model of teacher agency, this study examines the affordances and constraints encountered by English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers with non-ITE backgrounds during their first year at 12 Chinese state junior high schools. Thematic analysis of interviews with 21 purposively sampled participants reveals that non-ITE backgrounds pose constraints, such as limited pedagogical knowledge, perceived inadequacy by peers with ITE exposure, and professional identity crises. However, significant affordances were also identified, including broad knowledge bases from diverse academic backgrounds and varied internship experiences, high intrinsic motivation, and robust innovation capabilities. Implications for teacher education programmes and school administration are discussed, highlighting the need for tailored support mechanisms to address the unique challenges and leverage the strengths of teachers without ITE backgrounds.

Unraveling University EFL Teachers’ Feedback Beliefs in Teaching English Argumentative Writing

ABSTRACTTeachers’ beliefs about feedback can affect both the way they provide feedback and its effectiveness in improving students’ writing proficiency. However, research remains scant on belief–practice relationships. This study attempted to fill the gap by investigating such relationships with a sample of 112 Chinese university EFL teachers in teaching argumentative writing. Data were collected through a writing feedback beliefs and practices questionnaire, an argumentative writing teaching beliefs questionnaire, and semi‐structured interviews. The participants were selected using convenience sampling from six universities in Northern China. Quantitative data were analyzed through confirmatory factor analysis, multiple regression, and repeated measures ANOVA to examine the characteristics of these teachers’ writing feedback beliefs and the relationships between the beliefs and relevant practices. Qualitative data from the interviews were analyzed thematically to gain deeper insights into the belief–practice relationships. Results indicated that most teachers believed their feedback was crucial for improving students' argumentative writing, particularly regarding communicative purposes, discourse organization, linguistic expressions, argument construction, and rhetorical techniques. However, a discrepancy was noted between teachers' feedback beliefs and their practices, especially concerning linguistic expressions. These findings highlight the need for targeted support to better align teachers' feedback beliefs with their practices for more effective teaching of EFL writing.

Applications and Research Gaps of LLM-based English-as-a-foreign-language Education

English as a Foreign Language (EFL) education is crucial in today’s globalized world. With the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Large Language Models (LLMs) over the past few years, educators continuously investigate how to use them to improve EFL educational methods. This article reviews the studies on integrating LLMs with EFL speaking and writing education from 2020 to 2024. It separately summarizes current LLMs’ strengths and weaknesses in improving EFL learner’s skills and learning motivation. This research demonstrates a promising future of applying LLMs in EFL education because of their strong abilities of immediate feedback generation and no-stress communication environment creation. However, they also find their shortages like superficial incorrect feedback. The research gaps in these areas are also analyzed based on these articles, which include uneven participants, the lack of differentiated investigation on samples with different ages and education levels, and the lack of research on various LLMs.

Exploring Students’ Flipped Learning Experiences in an Undergraduate English Debate Course: Qualitative Insights for Innovative EFL Teaching in China

Exploring Students’ Flipped Learning Experiences in an Undergraduate English Debate Course: Qualitative Insights for Innovative EFL Teaching in China

Teaching grammar to elementary level Saudi EFL learnersTeaching Grammar to Elementary Level Saudi EFL Learners: Blending Theory and Practice

Grammar as a system of language has been a central component of most EFL teaching programmes. Modern day approaches to teaching grammar are premised on its potential in developing the discourse competence of the students in social, academic and professional contexts. The present study was designed to involve a theoretical review of the teaching of grammar in EFL contexts as well as an observation of a real-time classroom teaching to see how theoretical underpinnings were realized in actual practice. The observer’s report and the teacher’s post lesson reflections revealed that a contextualized focus on form, meaning, and use was crucial in helping students to comprehend the target grammar for its meaning making potential. The findings are expected to be useful to EFL practitioners as well as researchers interested in exploring further areas of grammar instruction from a practical perspective.

Blended Learning for Skill Development in EFL Teacher Preparation

Background: Blended learning, which integrates online and face-to-face instruction, is increasingly essential in teacher education, especially for English as a Foreign Language (EFL). Gap: Research is limited on its specific effectiveness in building EFL pedagogical skills. Aim: This study examines whether blended learning better supports teaching success for EFL prospective teachers than traditional methods. Results: Blended and face-to-face methods equally boost educational success, but the blended approach better prepares future teaching skills. Novelty: This study reveals blended learning's unique value in EFL teacher preparation. Implications: Institutions should adopt blended learning to enhance adaptive teaching skills for modern classrooms. Highlights: Blended learning enhances teaching skills by combining online and face-to-face methods. This approach uniquely prepares EFL teachers for modern, adaptive classrooms. Institutions should integrate blended models for effective teacher development. Keywords: Blended Learning, EFL Teacher Training, Pedagogical Skills, Educational Success, Hybrid Teaching

Nurturing Beginning EFL Teachers’ Sense of Plausibility in Teaching Through Formal Coursework: A Qualitative Case Study

Nurturing Beginning EFL Teachers’ Sense of Plausibility in Teaching Through Formal Coursework: A Qualitative Case Study

Exploring EFL Teachers’ Epistemic Agency and Its Influencing Factors in an AI-Integrated Context through the Double Stimulation Model

Exploring EFL Teachers’ Epistemic Agency and Its Influencing Factors in an AI-Integrated Context through the Double Stimulation Model

From problem-crumbling to innovation: The design of a comprehensive professional development training programme to enhance creative competence among TEFL educators

This paper explores creativity in English language teaching through a multiple-case study action research-based continuous professional development (CPD) training programme. It introduces a professional creativity framework for EFL teachers, fostering pedagogical innovation through a blended course delivery. The study, involving seven EFL (English as a Foreign language) teachers, employs a triangulation of methods and data sources, including action research, surveys, Think Aloud Protocol (TAP), reflective diaries, and semi-structured interviews. The research sample consists of primary and secondary EFL teachers. The CPD training integrates creativity into English lessons, enhancing professional creativity for EFL teachers. The findings shed light on the relationship between professional development and creative endeavours, highlighting the need for interventions to boost self-awareness and self-efficacy among TEFL teachers. The study underlines the significance of individual and group tasks, reflective practice, and technology-enabled communities of practice. Additionally, it offers a descriptive overview of diverse TEFL teacher creativity profiles, contributing to understanding this specific creativity domain and suggesting avenues for future research.

THE IMPACT OF PEER COACHING ON MOROCCAN EFL TEACHERS: ENHANCING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT, MOTIVATION, AND REFLECTIVE PRACTICE

This study explores the effects of peer coaching on Moroccan EFL teachers' motivation, self-efficacy, and professional growth. Teachers' opinions and experiences with peer coaching are investigated through focus group talks. Peer coaching is considered a useful instrument for professional development, promoting reflective teaching methods and boosting teacher confidence, according to the findings. However, time constraints and inadequate training were mentioned as obstacles. We noticed that novice and experienced teachers differed in their excitement. Peer coaching can improve teacher development in Morocco and other similar educational situations, according to the study, provided that it receives institutional support.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/soc/0796/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

Constructing a self-management competence model for EFL teachers: A perception-strategy evaluation

Achieving goals and aspirations as well as managing emotions, thoughts, and behaviors in various situations are the key components of self-management competence as specified by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL). Utilizing this definition as a foundation for this qualitative investigation, the study initiated to explore the perceptions and strategies of EFL teachers regarding their self-management competence in the classroom. The maximal goal was to construct a model tailored for EFL teachers. For this purpose, 19 Iranian EFL teachers, selected through convenience sampling, were interviewed via a semi-structured written interview and four focus group sessions. The interviews served to elicit participants' perspectives on the relevant topics. The data analysis method involved three rounds of grounded theory coding - open, axial, and selective coding - to uncover the key elements of the model for EFL teachers' self-management competence. This process revealed three crucial self-management perceptions: emotional, behavioral, and classroom performance management and three primary categories of strategy: self-directed emotion-regulation, student-directed emotion-regulation, and self-awareness strategies. Notably, the centrality of emotional perception and regulation within the findings underscored the significance of the emotional dimension in self-management competence for EFL teachers. These outcomes hold promising implications for improving the psychological well-being of prospective EFL teachers.

The Motivational Divide: EFL Teachers’ Beliefs About Student Motivation

The Motivational Divide: EFL Teachers’ Beliefs About Student Motivation

Enhancing Emotional Intelligence of Adult Learners in Online EFL Teaching: Insights from Vietnamese Educators

This study investigates the strategies employed by Vietnamese EFL teachers to enhance emotional intelligence (EI) in adult learners within online learning environments. Utilizing a qualitative research design grounded in Mayer and Salovey’s model of emotional intelligence and Knowles’s theory of andragogy, the study involved semi-structured interviews with ten EFL teachers from two Vietnamese educational institutions. The thematic analysis of the interview data revealed several key strategies: reflective practices, interactive activities, technology integration, personalized feedback, collaborative learning, integration of real-life scenarios, self-awareness activities, development of emotional vocabulary, and creation of emotionally supportive environments. The findings illustrate a multifaceted approach to enhancing EI in online language education, highlighting the innovative adaptation of traditional classroom strategies to the digital realm. The study’s unique contribution lies in its focus on the Vietnamese context, providing insights into how cultural nuances shape online teaching strategies for EI enhancement. The implications of these findings are significant for the field of EFL education, suggesting the need for holistic teaching approaches that integrate emotional competencies alongside linguistic skills.