(LUẬN văn THẠC sĩ) sử dụng phương pháp phỏng vấn nghiên cứu về động lực phát triển chuyên môn của giáo viên tiếng anh tại một trường trung học phổ thông

ĐÀO THỊ HUYỀN SECONDARY SCHOOL EFL TEACHER’S MOTIVATION FOR PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT – AN INTERVIEW STUDY Sử dụng phương pháp phỏng vấn nghiên cứu về động lực phát triển chuyên môn của

ĐÀO THỊ HUYỀN

SECONDARY SCHOOL EFL TEACHER’S MOTIVATION FOR PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT – AN INTERVIEW STUDY

Sử dụng phương pháp phỏng vấn nghiên cứu về động lực

phát triển chuyên môn của giáo viên tiếng Anh

tại một trường trung học phổ thông

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: Language Teaching Methodology

HANOI, 2014

ĐÀO THỊ HUYỀN

SECONDARY SCHOOL EFL TEACHER’S MOTIVATION FOR PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT – AN INTERVIEW STUDY

Sử dụng phương pháp phỏng vấn nghiên cứu về động lực

phát triển chuyên môn của giáo viên tiếng Anh

tại một trường trung học phổ thông

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: Language Teaching Methodology

Supervisor: Dr Lê Văn Canh

HANOI, 2014

course assessment or any award Whenever contributions of others are involved, every effort is made to indicate this clearly with appropriate acknowledgement and reference

I would also like to confirm my acceptance of the University‟s requirements relating to the retention and use of my thesis deposited in the library for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan, or reproduction of the paper

Ha Noi, June 2014

Dao Thi Huyen

continuous advice, unfailing support and encouragement throughout the study

I thank him for his systematic guidance, his insightful and constructive comments, and great effort he put in training me in the research domain Moreover, I am specially grateful for his generosity in facilitating my access

to precious source of materials, without which I could not have been equipped with sufficient theoretical knowledge to make this research possible

Secondly, I am indebted to my colleagues for their timely assistance I owe them my thanks for their enthusiasm in sharing their materials resources and inputting inspirational ideas so as to help me conceptualize the framework

of my study

Last but not least, I take this opportunity to send my heartfelt thanks to all of my family for their unconditional love and care which stimulated me at every stage of my personal and academic life Their encouragement and expectation grant me more energy and determination, and in some sense, enable me to this accomplishment

ABSTRACT

The study deals with the theories of the motivation for EFL teachers in participation in PD It is important that it is carried out to investigate the case

of EFL teachers at HaiAn high school

The researcher uses the methods such as interviewing closely EFL teachers to understand their attitude to professional development, and the participants all have positive attitude toward PD At the same time, the researcher studies the professional development activities that EFL teachers participate In accordance with the theory mentioned in chapter one, the EFL teachers all take part in the same formal and informal PD activities, especially the reflective practice Also, the participants are asked to talk about their opportunities and challenges for their professional development

The result shows that the EFL teachers have strong motivation for PD, although they have some certain obstacles in participation in this process The study also gives suggestions of measures to overcome difficulties when taking part in professional development

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

Chapter I : LITERATURE REVIEW 1

I INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Scope of the study 3

4 Research questions 3

5 Methods of the study 3

6 Overview of the study 3

II DEFINITION OF TERMINOLOGIES 4

Components of Motivation 5

2 2 Professional development 5

III WHY IS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT IMPORTANT? 8

3 1 Why do educators need professional development? Did they learn what they need to know in college? 9

3 2 Why do new educators need extra support? 10

IV PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITIES 11

V FACTORS AFFECTING TEACHERS‟ PARTICIPATION IN PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT 13

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 16

CHAPTER II: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 16

2 1 The setting of the study 16

2.2 Participants 16

2 Data collection instruments 16

2.1 Interviews 17

2.2 Procedure 18

CHAPTER III: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 19

1 Data analysis approach 19

2.1 Teachers‟ perceptions of the importance of PD 19

2.2 Teachers‟ self-reported PD activities they often participated in 20

2.2.1 Formal PD activities 20

2.2.2 Informal PD activities 22

2.2.3 Reflection on their teaching 24

2.3 Teachers‟ self-reports on the opportunities and challenges for their PD 25

3 Discussion 26

3.1 Factors affecting EFL teachers in PD 29

4 Summary of the chapter 30

PART C: CONCLUSION 32

CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION 32

1 Recapitulation 32

2 Conclusions 32

3 Implications for teacher professional development 33

4 Limitations of the study 35

5 Suggestions for future research 36

REFERENCE 37 APPENDIX 1 I

PART A: INTRODUCTION Chapter I : LITERATURE REVIEW

I INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

Everyone is continually developing as a person and, every day in the workplace, we are always learning Tomorrow will be different from today and we all need to be prepared for change Whether you think your role is changing or not, you need to be prepared for the next development

opportunity so you don‟t miss out

Professional development has become a major focus in EFL teacher education programs worldwide since it is undoubtedly beneficial and essential for professional growth and more effective teaching In the paper presented at the first General Teaching Council for Northern Ireland Annual Lecture in Belfast in March 2006, Geoff Whitty for Institute of Education, University of London states that: Contemporary education reform – including marketisation and centralization, but also a new emphasis on the involvement of a wider range of stakeholders – has resulted in a period of significant change for teachers It has also raised for new questions: for example, what is teacher professional development? How should we understand the roles of teachers? What professional development activities are available and accessible to teachers, and what are the factors affecting teacher‟s participation in those professional development activities? The purpose of this thesis isthus to refocus on our attention on teachers‟ views, especially on urgency of providing teacher professional development that change teachers behaviours

in ways that lead to improvement in students‟ performance In addition to calling attention to the ongoing need for effective teacher professional development, I will describe characteristics of high quality professional development and make a case for an unconventional approach to professional

development that, unlike “one-shot” workshop and inservice days, allow teacher to acquire and practice new skills over time

While the end result of all education reform should be student improvement, every reform initiative, if it is to succeed, must begin with recognition of the importance of teachers in raising student performance (Ferguson, 1991; Armour-Thomas, Clay, Domanico, Bruno, & Allen, 1989)

In other words, “student achievement is the product of formal study by educators” (Joyce and Showers, 2002, p.3) We cannot expect students to change what they do if we are content for teachers to continue doing what they have always done As an old adage puts it, “If you do what you‟ve always done, you will get the results you‟ve always gotten.”

This thesis firstly presents the theoretical issues about the roles and nature of EFL teachers in professional development Chapter I – Introduction

To clarify these issues, the definition of terminologies is mentioned in chapter

II The next chapter is the presentation of the objectives, aims, methodology used for the research and its findings The conclusion which includes some comments and recommendations is presented in chapter IV

In consideration of these problems, as an English teacher, I really want

to clarify the topic here with my knowledge and my supervisor‟s guidance to analyze, understand the situation of teaching and learning English at HaiAn high school Thanks to it, I will find out lessons, experience for myself and make a small contribution to enhancing the effectiveness in teaching this subject

2 Aims of the study

The major aims of the study are:

- to gain understandings of secondary school teachers‟ motivation for professional development; and define what is meant by motivation

- to discuss some common professional development activities

- to identify factors that affect either positively and negatively teachers‟ motivation for professional development

3 Scope of the study

Given the rationale and the aims of the study, it is necessary to limit the study to the areas which are manageable Benefits of teacher professional development create the effectiveness of students‟ learning which focuses on two factors: developing teachers‟ motivation in participation in PD and factors affecting this process The subjects under the study are at HaiAn High School

4 Research questions

The study attempts to find the answers to the following research questions:

- What are EFL teachers‟ attitudes to professional development?

- How motivated are they for professional development?

-What are the common professional development activities secondary school teachers participate in?

- What factors that affect teachers‟ motivation for professional development in the secondary school context ?

5 Methods of the study

Because the primary purpose of this study is to gain understanding of the phenomenon under investigation, the main methodology used is qualitative Specifically, data for this study were merely obtained by means of face-to-face interviews

6 Overview of the study

The study is organized around three parts:

Part I – Introduction – provides the rationale for the study and sets up

the aims, scope, research questions and methods of the study

Part II – Development – consists of three chapters:

- Chapter 1: Literature review_ is concerned with the literature review

of the study

- Chapter 2: Methodology _ describes the study population, the research design as well as data gathering instruments

- Chapter 3: Results and discussion _ analyses and discusses data

- Chapter 4: Findings and implications_ presents findings and implications Limitations and suggestions for further research are also provided

Part III – Conclusion – summarizes and makes a conclusion to the main points which have been explored in the study, gives out recommendations to develop the effectiveness of teacher professional development, some suggestions for future research and the limitation of the study

In everyday usage, the term motivation is frequently used to describe why a

person does something For example, you might say that a student is so motivated to get into a clinical psychology program that she spends every night studying (http// Psychology.about.com)

Components of Motivation

There are three major components to motivation: activation, persistence and intensity Activation involves the decision to initiate a behavior, such as enrolling in a psychology class Persistence is the continued effort toward a goal even though obstacles may exist, such as taking more psychology courses in order to earn a degree although it requires a significant investment

of time, energy and resources Finally, intensity can be seen in the concentration and vigor that goes into pursuing a goal For example, one student might coast by without much effort, while another student will study regularly, participate in discussions and take advantage of research opportunities outside of class

2 2 Professional development

In workplaces, professional development refers to the acquisition of

skills and knowledge both for personal development and for career advancement Professional development encompasses all types of facilitated learning opportunities, ranging from college degrees to formal coursework, conferences and informal learning opportunities situated in practice It has been described as intensive and collaborative, ideally incorporating an

consultation, coaching, communities of practice, lesson study, mentoring, reflective supervision and technical assistance

Professional development is a broad term, encompassing a range of people, interests and approaches Those who engage in professional development share a common purpose of enhancing their ability to do their work At the heart of professional development is the individual's interest in lifelong learning and increasing their own skills and knowledge

Teacher professional development

Professional development is defined as “the process of improving staff skills and competencies needed to produce outstanding educational results for students” (Hassel, 1999)

The “professional” in professional development implies expertise, pursuit

of advanced training, and maintenance of currency in an evoking knowledge base (Four &Eaker, 1998)

Teacher professional development is the process of teaching teachers new strategies to improve the quality of instruction

Student achievement is linked to numerous factors, but quality teachers are one of the most important components of students‟ success If a school district‟s teachers do not have the tools they need to teach students effectively, their students will suffer To teacher effectively, teachers need access to ongoing teacher professional development This professional development enables teachers to improve their own education through

seminars, workshops, and classes

Through teacher professional development, teachers learn new teaching strategies to improve the quality of instruction This allows them to make changes in the way they teach their students, incorporating innovative teaching methods in the classroom It teaches them how to work with a variety of learning styles, since not all students learn the same way It also

helps teachers change their day-to-day teaching methods, encouraging them to accept new methods based on accurate education research

Professional development usually takes place when school is not in session Most teacher professional development occurs in the evening, on

schedule professional development days throughout the school year During these days, students are dismissed early from school or have a day off from school This provides teachers, teaching assistants, and administrative staff the opportunity to participant in training and workshops

Teacher professional development is sometimes criticized because it sometimes does not provide teachers with the time, information, and activities they need to make changes within the classroom For this reason, some professional development involves training throughout the school year Mentors and coaches who are considered experts in new teaching methods

or teacher planning time This can help teachers use what they have learned in

a real-world setting, building a bridge between new concepts and classroom instruction

Effective teacher professional development is designed to strengthen teachers‟ knowledge of content It is based on research and provides data that such new teaching methods culminate in improved student achievement Teacher professional development should also closely align with a particular state‟s standards and the curriculum used by the school district

Professional development should ideally be created by teachers with the support of those who work in the field of education research All professional development should provide teachers with the necessary resources and support to implement changes in teaching strategies

Finally, professional development should provide teachers with the time they need to understand the new teaching methods and incorporate them in their teaching

In short, the professional development process can be illustrated by the three track circle below

III WHY IS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT IMPORTANT?

On the website www.learningforward.org, Stephanie Hirsh indicates that professional development refers to many types of educational experiences related to an individual‟s work Doctors, lawyers, educators, accountants, engineers, and people in a wide variety of professions and businesses

participate in professional development to learn and apply new knowledge and skills that will improve their performance on the job

Many fields require members to participate in ongoing learning approved

by the profession, sometimes as a requirement for keeping their jobs Professionals often also voluntarily seek new learning

In education, research has shown that teaching quality and school leadership are the most important factors in raising student achievement For teachers and school and district leaders to be as effective as possible, they continually expand their knowledge and skills to implement the best educational practices Educators learn to help students learn at the highest levels.As Thomas Guskey (2000, p4) states, “One constant finding in the research literature is that notable improvements in education almost never take place in the absence of professional development.” PD is key to meeting today‟s educational demands

Many people may not be aware of their local school system‟s methods for improving teaching and student learning Professional development is the only strategy school systems have to strengthen educators‟ performance levels Professional development is also the only way educators can learn so that they are able to better their performance and raise student achievement

3 1 Why do educators need professional development? Did they learn what they need to know in college?

College and university programs cannot provide the extensive range of learning experiences necessary for graduates to become effective public school educators Once students graduate, meet their state‟s certification requirements, and are employed, they learn through experience As in all

professions, new teachers and principals take years to gain the skills they need

to be effective in their roles The complexity of teaching is so great that third of teachers leave the profession within three years (Ingersoll, 2003) Even experienced teachers confront great challenges each year, including changes in subject content, new instructional methods, and student learning needs Educators who do not experience effective professional development

one-do not improve their skills, and student learning suffers

In short, professional development provides ongoing opportunities for educators to continue to improve their knowledge and skills so they can help students achieve When educators learn, students learn more Anyone concerned about students‟ futures will want to support a cycle of continuous professional development.(Professional development.A Proccess Not an event.)

3 2 Why do new educators need extra support?

New teachers juggle an overwhelming number of unfamiliar issues, such

as classroom management, instruction, curriculum, school culture and operations, test preparation and administration, state standards, parent relations, and interaction with other teachers Left to themselves, they may develop counterproductive behaviors With extra support, however, new teachers learn more effective practices to apply to daily challenges Additional support also helps district retain new teachers and set them on the path to becoming effective educators Many school systems provide mentors and induction programs for novice teachers These programs are required in many states for teachers to earn a professional license Most importantly, research shows that new teachers who received intensive mentoring had a

significant effect on student achievement after as little as two years (Strong, Fletcher, &Villar, 2004; Serpell& Bozeman, 1999)

IV PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITIES

As PD varies from different educational traditions and contexts Teachers‟ PD, in a general term, means teacher learning in an ongoing way

PD implies the improvement of the school as well as the professional advancement of individuals; in other words, PD can embrace personal development (individualized learning) and staff development (the collegiality

of group learning/ co-learning) „ (Bell, 1991a)‟ On this point, Day (1999) gives a similar but useful definition about professional development, stating that: professional development consists of all natural learning experiences and those conscious and planned activities which are intended to be of direct or indirect benefit to the individual, group or school and which contribute to the quality of education in the classroom (Day, 1999:4)

Thus professional development encompasses all activities that cater both for the individual needs of teachers and for the institutional needs of the whole school (Bell, 1991) The teacher, the school and the students thus benefit from such a process of professional development (Bell, 1991)

century, traditional approaches to PD such as formal courses or one-off seminar are criticized for their shortcomings of being unable to get teachers prepared for the new role of knowledge facilitator rather than knowledge transmitter (e.g Darling-Hammond, 1998: Lieberman, 1996) Instead, two theoretical perspectives lead the alternative approaches to PD which support

teachers learn more effectively (Kwakman, 2003) These two perspectives include cognitive psychological and professional development perspective

Cognitive psychological Perspective Student learning and teaching are the same from cognitive psychological perspective (Borko and Putnam, 1996; Putnam and Borko, 2000) Teachers are assumed to learn like what students do in which teachers are considered as constructors of knowledge who learn actively in a self-directed way Such kind of learning occurs when interacting with the learning context and it is strongly affected by prior knowledge individual earner (Borko and Putnam, 1996) In other words, this kind of learning is situated and influenced by the interplay of the individual‟s existing knowledge and the learning environments Thus, teacher learning takes place when favorable learning environments are provided in which teachers are responsible for their own learning (Bransford, Brown and Cocking, 1999) whereas staff developers play

an important role in creating favorable learning environments for teacher learning

Professional development perspective Instead of emphasizing the provision of favorable environments for enhancing teacher learning, from professional development perspective, it stresses that teachers have to learn how to teach for understanding where they ought to learn new conceptions of content and pedagogy and take on new roles (McLaughlin, 1997) Hence, the working context is understood to be the best place for teachers to acquire competencies that they need to fulfill their new roles through practice (Hargreaves, 1997; Kwakman, 2003; Retalick, 1999) The working context for teachers can be the daily teaching context, including classrooms, school clusters, and other forms of communities such as

partnership with universities, networks, etc In other words, teacher learning occurs at the workplace in which their learning is situated and closely aligned with teachers‟ work in classrooms and schools (Garet, Porter, Desimone, Birman, and Yoon, 2001; Huffman, Thomas, and Lawrenz, 2003; Sparks and Loucks-Horsley, 1989), and it can be at individual level and collaboration level (Kwakman, 2003)

In conclusion, according to the “Why does professional development matter, issued 2005” teacher PD activities are grouped into these typical models below

- Individual reading / study / research

- Study groups among peers focused on a shared need or topic

- Observation: teachers observing other teachers

- Coaching: an expert teacher coaching one or two colleagues

- Mentoring of new educators by experienced colleagues

- Team meeting to plan lessons, problem solve, improve performances, and/ or learn new strategy

- Faculty / grade- level or departmental meetings

- Online courses

- College, university courses

- Workshop to dig deeper into a subject

- Conference to learn from a variety of experts through the country/ area/ world

- Whole – school improvement programme

- Proprietary programme by private venders

V FACTORS AFFECTING TEACHERS’ PARTICIPATION IN

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Few studies were conducted to examine factors affecting teachers‟ participation in PD activities over the decade in different countries Kwakman (2003) conducted an empirical study about a number of factors affecting teachers‟ participation in PD in the Netherlands In her study, three factors, personal factors (i.e professional attitudes, appraisals of feasibility, appraisals of meaningfulness, emotion exhaustion, loss of personal accomplishment), and task factors (i.e pressure of work, emotional demands, job variety, autonomy, participation) and work environment factors (i.e management support, collegial support, intentional learning support) were used to examine the effects on teachers‟ participation in PD As a result, of these three factors, personal factor seem to be more significant in predicting teachers‟ participation in PD activities than task and work environment factors However, this study may over-generalize the factors may be understated (e.g family factor) and not context-specific to other situations or cultures

Another study conducted by Lee (2002) identified a number of factors facilitating and inhibiting effective professional development, „ relevant/ realistic content‟ was the most important factors were „ presenter with recent experience‟ (9%) and „ based on practice‟ (9%) The details of the results are listed in Table 1 He also examined factors inhibiting effective professional development The most commonly cited factor that inhibits effective professional development was „insufficient resources to implement learning‟ (21%), whilst the least frequently cited factor was „ school not supportive of PD‟ (13%) (see Table 2) Some other factors related to PD providers, including contents, formats, and presentation of PD activities, should be considered in affecting teachers‟ participation in PD activities, and they should be supplementary to the factors in Kwakman‟s(2003) study as

mentioned above.To sum up, the above studies examined a number of factors that affect teachers‟ participation in PD activities This study takes an exploratory approach to further explore the factors affecting teachers‟ participating in PD in Hai An high school context

PART B: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER II: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

2 1 The setting of the study

Hai An high school is one of the newly-established schools in HaiPhong city It has a history of only 7 years of foundation In spite of the young age, it is famous for its efforts of good teaching and learning with the students getting many prizes in the exams of HaiPhong city every year The material conditions of the school are well-equipped, which also helps to create its success However, most of students are good at and like learning natural science subjects The school is trying to look for methods so that students are good at both natural subjects and social ones, especially English

2.2 Participants

There are 8 teachers of English, including the researcher, aged from 29

to 34 All of them graduated from universities The number of female teachers formed the majority (7 female teachers and 1 male teacher) All of them are enthusiastic with their careers and have at least 5 years of experience in teaching English

This case research involves only 6 teachers from the group of English, HaiAn high school These participants are chosen on a voluntary basis of the professional development When the researcher presented her research proposal and called for participation, six teachers volunteered to take part in the study and one afternoon per week we have an informal meeting to exchange ideas about the research area

2 Data collection instruments

Study on teacher learning to improve their professional development is to do a research of a complex phenominence in teacher activities: what knowledge

about the areas the teachers have, and how they gain the knowledge This involves both individualand social issues, which are both short- term and long- term Thus, while doing the research, the researcher is aware that no methodology is perfect.In this study interviewing was used as the sole instrument of data collection

2.1 Interviews

Frey and Oishi (1995:01) define a research interviewas "a purposeful conversation in which one person asks prepared questions (interviewer) and another answers them (respondent)" This is done to gain information on a particular topic or a particular area to be researched Interviews are a useful tool which can lead to further research using other methodologies such as observation and experiments (Jensen and Jankowski 1991:101) Interviews can have one of two basic structures They can be either structured (closed interview style) or unstructured (open interview style) Open-ended or unstructured interviews are defined by Nichols (1991:131) as "an informal interview, not structured by a standard list of questions Fieldworkers are free

to deal with the topics of interest in any order and to phrase their questions as they think best." This type of structure uses a broad range of questions asking them in any order according to how the interview develops (Breakwell, Hammond and Fife-Schaw 1995:231) Open-ended questions allow the interviewer, if they wish, to probe deeper into the initial responses of the respondent to gain a more detailed answer to the question (Wimmer and Dominick 1997:156) The richness of the data is therefore entirely dependent

on the interviewer They themselves, must judge how much or how little they should probe or say themselves

There are of course both advantages and disadvantages to this type of structure It is particularly useful as a pilot study, to test out what peoples

responses would be to a particular issue It may throw a completely different light on an issue that the interviewer had previously never considered

(Wimmer and Dominick 1997:139) Freedom for the respondent to answer how they wish to is important in giving them a feeling of control in the interview situation This version also has its disadvantages, namely in terms

of the amount of time needed to collect and analyse the responses (Wimmer and Dominick 1997:139) Due to the varied nature of the responses, it is necessary to use the content analysis technique to analyse it This is what takes the time Open questions used in this unstructured interview approach can cause confusion either because of the lack of understanding of the question by the informant or by the lack of understanding of the respondent's answer by the interviewer (Wimmer and Dominick 1997:140) Despite some

of these disadvantages, open-ended questions are very important Gray (1987) showed this when she studied women‟s relations to video technology It was found that women wanted to tell their stories therefore needing open-ended questions to enable them to talk freely (Jensen and Jankowski 1991:155)

2.2 Procedure

After explaining the purpose of the study to the teachers of English at Hai An high school, they all agreed to participate Then, the interviews were conducted with individual teachers All the interview questions were open-ended questions so that the participants were able to express their views freely All the questions focused on teachers‟ attitudes to PD, their motivation for participating in PD as well as the challenges they had in participating in

PD activities.The researcher took notes of the participant responses Each interview lasted approximately half an hour

2.3 Summary

This chapter has described in detail the background to the study, the research methodology the participants and procedures of data collection The