This research experiences a sign of the limitations and discouragement of teachers with respect to the choices which are restricted, or the scenarios they are subjected to in schools or in their classrooms, which demoralise their creative abilities as teachers.
The majority of research has been executed to link the importance of motivating the teacher to be part of the materials development, much like the study by Al-Dehan (1994), who researched teachers of secondary schools and their opinions regarding their participation in the development of the materials.
Al-Dehan (1994) demonstrated that the Saudi teachers highly needed to be included to participate in the development of materials and gave out suggestions with respect to motivating teachers in participating in the development of the materials.
This research similarly, revealed that teachers lack the exposure to be motivated to develop classroom materials, or even apply new strategies to pedagogy in the classes of EFL. PT1, PT3 and PT5 encountered a motivation during their teaching approaches in general, although none among the teachers was motivated to take part in the development of the materials.
PT3 has come across a fulfilling motivation from the school, as they promised to offer all equipment that is required and his supervisor also motivated him, but he did not mention the kind of encouragement that he specifically received:
“The school in general has encouraged me as they promised me that they would provide anything I need, the supervisor also always encouraging me whom he is different than other supervisors who are not”
PT2 stated that all the teachers including those who are in training and those in the MoE tend to be a demotivation to the teachers in schools:
“In my point of view, there is no encouragement for teachers’ education development whether through teacher training courses or school system or even the Ministry of Education”,
He assessed his statement through affirming the neglect he encountered while in school with respect to provision of a reliable place that is appropriate for language teaching:
“The school system prohibits providing a private place for language learning such as a language laboratory. This prevents the teacher from developing new pedagogical methods in schools.”
PT4 linked his discouragement to the limitation of his freedom he experiences as a teacher. He had feelings of being underestimated through the isolation from the appropriate knowledge he needed to make the questions for the exam, and the manner in which this limitation also put him aside for participating in the process of materials development:
“Teachers do not have the right to make questions from their own experience and teaching through the year. Therefore, if teachers do not have the right to make their own questions, it is vital that they do not have a place to be part of the materials development.”
PT1 stated that the old publishing of the present textbook is also a demotivation:
“I think the old publishing of the English book which is provided by the Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia discourages me to apply different approaches.”
He then proceeds to explain why he believes that the present textbook fails to recognise the differences at the individual level and that it is also advanced compared to the current level of the students:
“unfortunately, it does not appreciate the individual differences, as it is an advanced textbook, which I think it may be hard for many students.”
However, PT1 has thoughts that the new textbook will advantage him on application of more methods of teaching, which he could not manage to use with the present textbook.
Furthermore, he added that the new textbook which was applied in a number of schools, but not all of them, is going to be very relevant to meet the students’ needs and it will also be advantageous for teachers:
“The Ministry of Education has developed a new textbook which is more advanced than the existing one, but it has not been activated for all schools yet, only two or three schools within one city. Nevertheless, I can say that this new textbook is more reliable and applicable for teachers, which helps the teacher apply new and many teaching methods.”
PT3, who teaches the new released textbook in the capital city of Saudi Arabia, partly agrees with PT1, who obviously did not yet experience teaching the new curriculum by himself, however, PT3 declared neither an applicable nor reliable as what PT1 thought the new textbook would be.
PT3 claimed that it is similar to the old textbook in terms of their preferences and that it is more enhanced than the level of his students, as thought by his colleague regarding the textbook:
“The main problem is the book itself, because its level is far beyond my students, who are aged around 12, but it is designed for professionals or special English language institutions, therefore, this is the main discouragement.”
PT had beliefs that his students had a poor foundation level of English, which was also a demotivation by itself, since they were poorly taught by their previous teachers. The teachers applied the textbook only and left the students lacking in basics:
“The discouragement I had was going through a rough performance with badly founded students with no basics from the previous teacher who only used the book, and the student is the victim here, so I tried to start from the beginning with them and built a foundation with every student.”
PT6 continues to affirm that the students themselves were a discouragement, since they only possessed the interest of using the textbook as the primary source for language acquisition so as to excel in their examinations:
“Moreover, I found a discouragement from the students themselves as they indicated that they were only interested in the book because they think that they only need to study the book for exams.”
B. Teacher training
PT2, PT4 and PT6 all agreed with the notion that the administration in education fails to provide adequate courses or seminars, which concern the development of teachers, and rather offers opportunities for general workshops with respect to classroom subjects as well as exams:
“Regarding the teacher training courses that are usually provided by the administration, they are general courses focused on how teacher arrange their exam questions or classroom control or students’ discipline”(PT2), “About the training courses, they are very general and not specified for English language teachers, however, English language teachers usually attend a workshop at the beginning of their teaching about the procedures of how to make an exam.”
Meanwhile, PT1, PT3 and PT5 appear to be very content with the training of teachers, which they enrolled for, although they failed to indicate the particular type of training that they go through. Although, PT1 seem to be generally satisfied with teacher training, with clarification of what kind of satisfaction or type of courses:
“The only encouragement I found is the training courses which are provided by the education administration in Saudi Arabia.”
C. The MoE/school system
The MoE, which provides the system of education in Saudi, is amongst the demotivating factors that teachers tend to experience, often with respect to the materials development offered by the ministry or development of teachers. Hence, the majority of teachers, as with the people who participated in this study, possess issues directly or indirectly with the Saudi MoE.
For example, PT1 links the old textbook that was supplied by the MoE in all the schools to the main disappointment to his teaching and as a limitation to the choices he can make on other approaches of teaching:
“I think the old publishing of the English book, which is provided by the Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia, discourages me to apply different approaches.”
Moreover, PT2 accuses the rules of the Ministry of Education, which act as a limitation to the teacher from using more methods of teaching in the classroom and also hinder him from combining or getting another textbook:
“The MOE does not give enough space for the teacher to enhance their pedagogical methods or even to participate in materials development. Furthermore, teachers are forbidden from joining a second text book inside classrooms rather than the one provided by the Ministry of Education.”
PT3 and PT5 were discouraged by the MoE, who imposed rules that are unethical according to them, which hindered teachers from performing their tasks efficiently and treated them as machines, as declared by PT3:
PT3 “The Ministry of Education rules sometimes are a big disappointment for teachers as they think that the teacher is a machine or a walking robot, after that the school will ask me why I didn’t finish the book, which is a rule by the Ministry of Education that you should finish the book even if the ministry didn’t know whom you are teaching.”
This affirmation made by PT3 comply with the affirmation made by PT6, who had thoughts that the rules were meant to be bent and no person will present the information to the MoE when they were bent:
“About the Ministry of Education rules, the best thing about those rules is that nobody asked me to apply them except finishing the book, everyone asked about the book, the book (Repeated), but, there is no punishment if I didn’t finish with the book because no one will tell the ministry about that.”
Both PT3 and PT5 think of the MoE as opposing teachers and they believe it often establishes rules and sends memos to schools that cause students to turn against their teachers, which might affect the teachers’ job inside classrooms:
“The Ministry of Education always gives contradictory memos and rules that make the students turn against the teacher sometimes, which may affect the teacher’s work sometimes”
PT5 also claimed a similar example, which was explained earlier by PT3, regarding the disruptive student in class, who wasted the time of both students and teachers concurrently. The teacher is forced, by policy, to keep that student inside the classroom:
“For instance, one of the rules is that the teacher should never ask students to go out the class during the teaching period, which is an obstacle because, the teacher have no time to waste and the punishments are not the teacher responsibilities in the school. Students sometimes deliberately annoy the teacher on the class because they know that the Ministry of Education rules is for the benefit of the students against the teacher, which may confuse the teacher.”
As indicated in several occasions in this data collection, the teachers’ supervisors acted as the mediators/agents of the MoE and therefore, are the ones who evaluate or guide teachers in situations, where they needed their professional opinion. However, PT4 and PT5 stated that they went through scenarios that required consultation or advice from their supervisors, although they acted as individuals since their supervisors did not encourage their teaching approaches and only visited them when they wanted to discover mistakes or criticise. Thus, PT4 said:
“my supervisors just come for a typical visit and search for mistakes with no recommendations of their previous and personal qualifications in the field of education”.
PT5: “I don’t care about the way students understand the lesson as long as they understand it at the end, and this way makes my supervisor criticise the method on every approach I do inside the class and find the disadvantages instead of the advantages.”
2) Teachers exercising autonomy
After choosing the appropriate themes and categories from the study questions, I opted to separate a number of the themes and categories in relation to the changed topic in the interviews, from the development of teachers, to their levels in practicing autonomy and its engagement in this perspective so as be made more clear, as depicted in a separate graph (graph 4).
Graph 4: Themes and categories of teachers exercising levels of autonomy: