Farhat, A. (2022). The Impact of Professional
Development on Teachers' Automaticity of Practice. In D. Bullock (Ed.), IATEFL
2021 Virtual Conference Selections - 54th International Conference (pp.
40-42). IATEFL.
Introduction
Professional development has
always been a concern for educational institutions, and much effort is put into
it as a result. Ongoing professional development has often been conducted in
the form of training sessions. However, one-shot training sessions do not
ensure that teachers acquire the practices introduced during these sessions, and
thus the content of these sessions does not necessarily become part of the
teachers’ in-class performance unless they are continuously prompted and
reminded of these practices. In this study conducted in a small private school,
language teachers (English and Arabic) took part in a three-hour session where
they were introduced to seven games[1] (language
activities) that encourage oral and written communication:
- Guessing Game
- Describe & Draw
- Paper Conversation
- Show & Tell
- Surveys
- Chain Story
- Dictogloss
During Training
Each game was introduced to
the language teachers during the training session. First, the framework of the
game was explicitly communicated to the teachers. Then they practiced the game.
After the practice, each teacher was requested to reflect on the activity: how
it might be used in their classes, how it could improve their students’
language, how is it different from/is similar to other language activities they
do in their classes.
After the training
After the training, the participants
were asked to apply one of the seven activities in their classrooms, record
that activity, write a reflection on how the activity went in the class and
then submit to the trainer a recording of the activity and the reflection on it.
The teachers had access to the training session notes and recording of the training
session on the school website, and the trainer was available to provide any
support needed in the implementation on the new activities in their classrooms.
Findings
Teachers’ Reflections
Teachers reported to have
enjoyed the newly-introduced activities and to have found them useful in their
language teaching. They also reported that they implemented the activities and
that they were easy to use, requiring little resources.
Choice of Game/Activities
Studying the recordings of
the teachers, it was found that nine of the ten teachers chose Show & Tell
as their activity; one teacher chose the Describe & Draw activity.
Delivery of Games/Activities
The activities, as recorded
by the teachers, seemed to slightly resemble those as given in the training
session. One teacher abided by the protocol of Show & Tell as given in the
training session but omittetd key points, such as the type of questions to be
asked to the speaker by the audience.
Discussion
Self-reported data (reflections)
are not always indicative of classroom success and actual classroom
performance.
The majority of the teachers
chose Show & Tell as the activity to use with their students. This activity
was in fact a speaking activity that the language teachers already commonly
used in their classrooms from grades k – 8. It is clear here that the teachers
chose an activity that they were familiar with rather than choose a new
activity that was introduced to them during the training session. Moreover, the
delivery of this familiar activity did not change much; the protocol as
introduced in the training session was not abided by.
The choice of activities
along with their delivery shows that it is not easy to change practices of
practitioners as they are enfossiled in their performance due to long practice
with no modification. This explains why teachers continued to perform the
activities as they had done them all along before the training. In addition,
teachers tend to rely on activities that they are accustomed to even after
being exposed to training. That is evident in the teachers choosing Show &
Tell rather than any of the other six new activities.
Implications
Teachers need to be given
ample time to practice newly introduced practices before they are expected to
start implementing them in their classrooms. Moreover, they need to be provided
with sufficient, constructive feedback on their practices to help them improve these.
In this study, the teachers were able to watch the video recordings of their
selected activities and reflect on them. They had they had the opportunity to compare
how they delivered the activity with training session notes on that activity
and assess their performance; i.e., they were able to check where they abided
by the activity protocol as given in the training and where they did not.
Link to presentation recording.
