COMPETENCE AND PERFORMANCE IN
LANGUAGE TEACHINGJack C Richards
Adjunct Professor, Regional Language Centre, Singapore

Introduction
What is it that language teachers need to know and do to be effectiveclassroom practitioners and language teaching professionals? How is thisknowledge and practice acquired? And how does it change over time? The
issue of language teachers’ knowledge and skill base is fundamental to ourunderstanding of effective teaching and to approaches to language teacher
education. In this paper I want to explore the knowledge, beliefs and skills
that language teachers make use of in their practice. My focus is on theunderstandings and practices of those teachers who would generally be
regarded by their peers as exemplary language teaching professionals. We allrecognize those teachers when we work with them. But what distinguishes
the way they understand and approach their work? In trying to answer thisquestion I will focus on ten core dimensions of language teaching expertiseand practice. They are not in any hierarchical relationship and there is someoverlap among them but they help lay out some of the basic territory and will
hopefully help conceptualise the nature of competence, expertise andprofessionalism in language teaching.

But first a word of caution. The nature of what we mean by effectiveness inteaching is not always easy to define because conceptions of good teachingdiffer from culture to culture (Tsui 2009). In some cultures a good teacher is
one who controls and directs learners and who maintains a respectful distance
between the teacher and the learners. Learners are the more or less passive
recipients of the teacher’s expertise. Teaching is viewed as a teachercontrolled and directed process. In other cultures the teacher may be viewed
more as a facilitator. The ability to form close interpersonal relations withstudents is highly valued and there is a strong emphasis on individual learnercreativity and independent learning. Students may even be encouraged to1question and challenge what the teacher says. These different understandingsof good teaching are reflected in the following teacher comments:
When I present a reading text to the class, the students expect me to go
through it word by word and explain every point of vocabulary or grammar.
They would be uncomfortable if I left it for them to work it out on their own or
if I asked them just to try to understand the main ideas. (Egyptian EFL
teacher).
If a student doesn’t succeed, it is my fault for not presenting the materials
clearly enough. If a student doesn’t understand something I must find a way
to present it more clearly. (Taiwanese EFL teacher).
If I do group work or open-ended communicative activities, the students andother colleagues will feel that I’m not really teaching them. They will feel that
I didn’t have anything really planned for the lesson and that I’m just filling intime. (Japanese EFL teacher).
The way a person teachers and his or her view of what good teaching is will
therefore reflect his her cultural background and personal history, the context
in which he or she is working, and the kind of students in his or her class. For
this reason teaching is sometimes said to be “situated” and can only beunderstood within a particular context. This is reflected in a comment by anAustralian student studying Chinese in China and reacting to the “Chinese
approach” to teaching:
The trouble with Chinese teachers is that they’ve never done any realteacher-training courses so they don’t know how to teach. All they do is follow
the book. They never give us any opportunity to talk. How the world do they
expect us to learn?
Compare this with the comments of a Chinese student studying in Australia:
Australian teachers are very friendly but they can’t teach very well. I neverknow where they’re going – there’s no system and I just get lost. Also,
they’re often very badly trained and don’t have a thorough grasp of theirsubject.
Brick 1991: 153
Notwithstanding the reality of culturally determined understandings of goodteaching, I will focus in what follows on those dimensions of teacher
knowledge and skill that seem to be at the core of expert teacher competence
and performance in language teaching, at least from the perspective of a“western” orientation and understanding of teaching.

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1. The language proficiency factor
Most of the world’s English teachers are not native-speakers of English and it
is not necessary to have a native-like command of a language in order toteach it well (Canagarajah 1999). Some of the best language classes I haveobserved have been taught by teachers for whom English was a foreign orsecond language. Conversely some of the worst classes I have observed havebeen taught by native-speakers. So the issue is, how much of a language
does one need to know to be able to teach it effectively, and how does
proficiency in a language interact with other aspects of teaching (Bailey,2006; Kamhi-Stein 2009)?

To answer the first question we need to start by considering the languagespecific competencies that a language teacher needs in order to teacheffectively. These include the ability to do the following kinds of things:
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To comprehend texts accurately
To provide good language models
To maintain use of the target language in the classroom
To maintain fluent use of the target
To give explanations and instructions in the target language
To provide examples of words and grammatical structures giveaccurate explanations (e.g. of vocabulary and language points)
To use appropriate classroom language
To select target-language resources (e.g. newspapers, magazines,
internet)
To monitor his or her own speech and writing for accuracy
To give correct feedback on learner language
To provide input at an appropriate level of difficulty
To provide language-enrichment experiences for learners

Learning how to carry out these aspects of a lesson fluently andcomprehensively in English is an important dimension of teacher-learning for
those whose mother tongue is not English. There is a threshold proficiency
level the teacher needs to have reached in the target language in order to beable to teach effectively in English. A teacher who has not reached this levelof proficiency will be more dependent on teaching resources (e.g. textbooks)
and less likely to be able to engage in improvisational teaching (Medgyes
2001).

For teachers who are native speakers of English, other discourse skills will
also need to be acquired – skills that enable the teacher to manage classroom

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discourse so that it provides maximum opportunities for language learning.
These discourse skills relate to the following dimensions of teaching:To be able to monitor one’s language use in order to provide suitablelearning input
To avoid unnecessary colloquialisms and idiomatic usage
To provide a model of spoken English appropriate for students learning
English as an international language
To provide language input at an appropriate level for learners

However apart from the contribution to teaching skills that language
proficiency makes, research has also shown that a language teacher’s
confidence is also dependent upon his or her own level of language
proficiency, so a teacher who perceives herself to be weak in the target
language will have reduced confidence in her teaching ability and an
inadequate sense of professional legitimacy (Seidlhofer 1999). This may be
why research into what teachers’ views of their needs for professional
development generally identifies the need for further language training as ahigh priority (Lavender 2002).

A variety of approaches have been proposed to address the language
proficiency of non-native speaking English teachers. Many link the language
component to the methodology component, so that teachers practice thelanguage skills needed to implement particular classroom teaching strategies(Cullen 1994; Snow, Kahmi-Stein and Brinton 2006). In this way language
proficiency is linked to classroom teaching and to carrying out specificinstructional tasks. Cullen (2002) uses lesson transcripts to help teachersdevelop a command of classroom language. However in general, insufficientattention has been given to the issue of language proficiency in many TESOL
teacher-preparation programs.

2. The role of content knowledge
A recurring issue in second language teacher-education concerns what thecontent knowledge or subject matter of language teaching is, andconsequently the question of what it is that we think teachers need to know inorder to reach their full potential as language teachers. This is the “content
knowledge dilemma”, and it has provided a ripe field for debate anddiscussion since SLTE emerged as a discipline. Here I am distinguishing4

“knowledge” from “skill”, since while there is little disagreement concerning
the practical skills language teachers need to master, there is much lessagreement concerning what the formal or academic subject matter oflanguage teaching is. Content knowledge refers to what teachers need toknow about what they teach (including what they know about language
teaching itself), and constitutes knowledge that would not be shared withteachers of other subject areas.

Traditionally the content knowledge of language teaching has been drawn
from the discipline of applied linguistics, which emerged in the 1960s - atabout the same time that language teaching was being revitalized with the
emergence of new methodologies such as audiolingualism and situational
language teaching (Richards and Rodgers 2001). Applied linguistics generated
the body of specialized academic knowledge and theory that provided thefoundation of new approaches to language teaching, and this knowledge basewas represented in the curricula of MA programs which began to be offeredfrom this time. Typically it consisted of courses in language analysis, learningtheory, methodology, and sometimes a teaching practicum, but the practicalskills of language teaching were often undervalued. The debate over the
relation between theory and practice has been with us ever since.

Some of the confusion that often appears in debate over the theory-versus
practice issue is due to a failure to distinguish between disciplinary knowledge
and pedagogical content knowledge. Disciplinary knowledge refers to acircumscribed body of knowledge that is considered by the language teachingprofession to be essential to gaining membership of the profession. Suchknowledge is acquired by special training, and possessing knowledge of thiskind leads to professional recognition and status. It is important to stresshere that disciplinary knowledge is part of professional education and does
not translate into practical skills. When language teaching emerged as an
academic discipline in the 1960s this disciplinary knowledge was largely
drawn from the field of linguistics, but today it encompasses a much broader
range of content. For example it could include: the history of language
teaching methods, second language acquisition, sociolinguistics, phonology

5and syntax, discourse analysis, theories of language, critical applied
linguistics and so on.

Pedagogical content knowledge on the other hand refers to knowledge thatprovides a basis for language teaching. It is knowledge which is drawn fromthe study of language teaching and language learning itself and which can beapplied in different ways to the resolution of practical issues in language
teaching. It could include course work in areas such as curriculum planning,assessment, reflective teaching, classroom management, teaching children,
teaching the four skills and so on. The Teacher Knowledge Test developed byCambridge ESOL is an example of a recent attempt to provide a basis in
relevant pedagogical content knowledge for entry-level teachers.

The language teaching literature often divides clearly into texts addressing
either disciplinary knowledge or pedagogical content knowledge. So for
example we can compare a book such as Ortega’s recent book Understanding
Second Language Acquisition (Ortega 2008), with Lightbown and Spada’s
How Languages are Learned (Lightbown and Spada 2006). Ortega’s excellent
book, like many tomes on second language acquisition, contributes todisciplinary knowledge, throws valuable light on such issues as the critical
period hypothesis, language transfer, cognition and language earning,
aptitude, and so on but does not deal with practical application. Lightbown
and Spada’s book on the other hand contributes to pedagogical content
knowledge since it is a part of a series designed to resolve practical issues inlanguage teaching. Although it covers some of the same topics that areincluded in Ortega’s book, the focus is not so much on research issues
involved in investigating a phenomenon but practical implications of research.
Similarly a book such as Halliday’s An Introduction to Functional Grammar(Halliday 2004) as with similar books dealing with models of language
analysis, belongs to the domain of disciplinary knowledge, while Parrott’s
Grammar For English Language Teachers (Parrott 2000) belongs to that ofpedagogical content knowledge.

A sound grounding in relevant pedagogical content knowledge should prepareteachers to be able to do things such as the following:

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Understand learners’ needs
Diagnose learners’ learning problems
Plan suitable instructional goals for lessons
Select and design learning tasks
Evaluate students’ learning
Design and adapt tests
Evaluate and choose published materials
Adapt commercial materials
Make use of authentic materials
Make appropriate use of technology
Evaluate their own lessons

The role of pedagogical content knowledge is demonstrated in a study byAngela Tang (cited in Richards 1998), in which she compared two groups ofEnglish teachers in Hong Kong – one with training in literature and one
without such training – and how they would exploit literary texts in theirteaching. Some of the differences between these two groups of teachers areseen in the following summary of the research findings:

Literature majors

Non-literature majors

Saw ways of dealing with any
difficulties the texts posed.
Saw a wide variety of teachingpossibilities with the texts
Addressed literary aspects of thetexts
A variety of strategies were used tohelp students explore the meaningsof the texts

Worried about how to deal with thedifficulties the texts posed
Planned to use the texts mainly forreading comprehension
Did not address literary aspects of thetexts
Mainly used questions to checkcomprehensions of the texts

So we see here that possessing relevant content knowledge made asubstantial difference to how teachers planned their lessons. Teachers with
relevant content knowledge should be consequentially be able to make betterand more appropriate decisions about teaching and learning and to arrive at
more appropriate solutions to problems than a teacher without suchknowledge. However the central issue of what constitutes appropriate
disciplinary knowledge and what is appropriate pedagogical content
knowledge, remains an unresolved issue, and studies that have sought toinvestigate the impact of content knowledge on teachers practices haveproduced very mixed results (Bartels 2005).

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A further important component of professional knowledge in today’sclassrooms has been terms “technological pedagogical content” knowledge, or
TPCK (Mishra and Koehler 2006) – that is, the ability to incorporate andintegrate technology into teaching. Reinders (2009, 231) points out that
depending on the teacher’s level of technological expertise, this could involve“being able to first, use a certain technology; second, being able to creatematerials and activities using that technology: and third, being able to teachwith technology “. The use of technology in teaching becomes more importantin present times because teachers also have to be able to keep up with thetechnological knowledge of their students. Young learners today have moreaccess to information and more tools available to them to manage their own
learning. Reinders (2009, 236) suggests that “the challenge for teachers will
be more one of helping learners develop the skills to deal successfully with
the increased control and independence that technology demands.”
Becoming a language teacher also involves learning to “talk the talk”, that is,acquiring the specialized discourse that we use among ourselves and thathelps define the subject matter of our profession. This means becoming
familiar with several hundred specialized terms such as learner-centredness,learner autonomy, self-access, alternative assessment, blended learning,task-based instruction, phoneme, common European Framework that we use
on a daily basis in talking about our teaching. Being able to use theappropriate discourse (and of course, understand what they mean) is one
criteria for membership of the language teaching profession.

3. Teaching skills
The initial challenge for novice teachers is to acquire the basic classroom skills
needed to present and navigate their lessons. Teaching from this perspective
is an act of performance, and for a teacher to be able to carry herself throughthe lesson she has to have a repertoire of techniques and routines at her
fingertips. These include routines and procedure for such things as:
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Opening the lesson
Introducing and explaining tasks
Setting up learning arrangements
Checking students’ understanding
Guiding student practice
Monitoring students’ language use

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Making transitions from one task to anotherEnding the lesson

What we normally mean by the term “teacher training” refers to instruction inbasic classroom skills such as these, often linked to a specific teachingcontext. Training involves the development of a repertoire of teaching skills,
acquired through observing experienced teachers and often through practiceteaching in a controlled setting using activities such as micro-teaching or
peer-teaching. Good teaching from a training perspective is viewed as themastery of a set of skills or competencies. Experiencing teaching in a variety
of different situations, with different kinds of learners and teaching different
kinds of content is how a repertoire of basic teaching skills is acquired. Overtime, experience is said to lead to the development of routines that enable
these kinds of skills to be performed fluently, automatically and with lessconscious thought and attention, enabling the teacher’s able to attention to
focus on other dimensions of the lesson (Tsui 2009; Borg 2006).

This view of the process of teaching has been extended through research onteacher cognition (Borg 2006, 2009). Concepts such as teacher decisionmaking introduce a cognitive dimension to the notion of skills, since each“skill” involves the teacher in engaging in sophisticated processes ofobservation, reflection, and assessment and making on-line decisions about
which course of action to take from a range of alternatives that are available.
These interactive decisions often prompt teachers to change course during alesson, based on critical incidents and other unanticipated aspects of thelesson.

As teachers accumulate experience and knowledge there is thus a movetowards a degree of flexibility in teaching and the development of what issometimes called “improvisational teaching”. Thus research reviewed by Borg
and others hence describes some of the following characteristics of expert
teachers.
They have a wide repertoire of routines and strategies that they cancall upon
They are willing to depart from established procedures and use theirown solutions and are more willing to improvise
They learn to automatize the routines associated with managing theclass; this skill leaves them free to focus on content

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They improvise more than novice teachers – they make greater use ofinteractive-decision making as a source of their improvisational
performance
They have more carefully developed schemata of teaching on which tobase their practical classroom decisions
They pay more attention to language issues than novice teachers (whoworry more about classroom management)
They are able to anticipate problems and have procedures available todeal with them
They carry out needed phases more efficiently, spending less time on
them
They relate things that happen to the bigger picture, seeing them notin the context of a particular lesson
They distinguish between significant and unimportant issues that arise

So while learning to teach from the perspective of skill development can bethought of as the mastery of specific teaching competencies, at the sametime these reflect complex levels of thinking and decision-making, and it isthese cognitive processes that also need to be the focus of teacher training.
From the perspective of teacher cognition, teaching is not simply theapplication of knowledge and of learned skills. It is viewed as a much more
complex cognitively-driven process affected by the classroom context, theteacher’s general and specific instructional goals, the teacher’s beliefs andvalues, the learners’ motivations and reactions to the lesson, and theteacher’s management of critical moments during a lesson.

4. Contextual knowledge
A key factor in understanding any teaching situation is the social andphysical context – the rules, facilities, values, expectations, and personal
backgrounds, which act as resources, constraints, and direct influenceson teaching and learning. (Posner 1985, 2)
Sociocultural perspectives on learning emphasize that learning is situated, i.e.
takes place in specific settings or contexts that shape how learning takes
place. Language teachers teach in many different contexts and in order tofunction in those contexts need to acquire the appropriate contextual
knowledge that will enable, for example, an Australian teacher to learn how to
be an effective teacher in China or vice versa, or a Singapore teacher how to
be an effective EFL teacher in Japan. Different contexts for teaching create
different potentials for learning that the teacher must come to understand.

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For example a teacher might be teaching in a campus-based ESL program, ina local public school, in a community college, or a private language institute.
Depending on the context, the learners may be children, teenagers or adults
and may represent a variety of different social, economic, cultural andeducational backgrounds. Different teaching contexts hence present different
notions of the process of language teaching (Zeichner & Grant, 1981).
Teacher-learning thus involves developing not only the skills of teaching but
also the norms of practice expected of teachers in a school, both inside andoutside the classroom. Teaching involves understanding the dynamics andrelationships within the classroom and the rules and behaviors specific to aparticular setting. Schools have their own ways of doing things. In someschools, textbooks are the core of the curriculum and teachers follow aprescribed curriculum. In others, teachers work from course guidelines andimplement them as they see fit. In some institutions there is a strong senseof professional commitment and teachers are encouraged to co-operate witheach other. In others teachers work in relative isolation. This is reflected inmany different aspects of the way the school functions as we see in thefollowing comments of student teachers on the schools in which they arecarrying out their practice teaching:
I love the school where I am working. The teachers I have met seem real
friendly and helpful and my c-operating teacher goes out of her way to makeme feel comfortable in her class. Judy.
The teachers in the school where I am teaching seem to have little contact
with each other. There are a lot of part-time teachers who just teach theirclasses and disappear. I get a sense that there is not a strong feeling ofcollegiality among the teachers in the school. Robert.
The teacher I am working with is very strict about everything. Seems like theschool has lots of procedures teachers have to follow and I have to do things
exactly the way they like to do them. Andrew.
My first few weeks went really well, then I had to work in a different class andI found the students very difficult to work with. They didn’t seem to beinterested in learning. Anna. .
The notion of “context” here is hence a very broad one, since it includes
issues such as the school’s goals and mission, its management style and“school culture” its physical resources, including classroom facilities, media,
and other technological resources, the curriculum and course offerings, therole of textbooks and tests, as well as the characteristics of teaches and11learners in the school. Some of these factors have to do with “structural
influences” (i.e. those to do with life in the classroom and the school in
general), while others belong to the domain of “personal influences”, (i.e.
they come from other persons the teacher interacts with while at the school,
including the learners, other teachers in the school, and in some cases thelearners’ parents). As Miller (2009, p.10) comments:
Knowing the school, the possibilities of the classroom space, thestudents, their neighbourhoods, the resources, the curriculum andpolicy, the supervising teacher- these are all critical elements that affectwhat teachers can do, and how they negotiate and construct identity
moment to moment.
Teaching in a school thus involves understanding the specific values, norms ofpractice and patterns of social participation of that school. This will include
understanding such things as the role of the prescribed curricula, the school
culture, the routines of the classroom, the school’s procedures for lesson
planning, and learning how to interact with students, school authorities andcolleagues.It involves induction to a community of practice, Lave andWenger’s (1991) concept for learning that takes place within organizationalsettings, which is socially constituted and which involves participants with acommon interest collaborating to develop new knowledge and skills. In theschool, teacher-learning takes place through classroom experiences and iscontingent upon relationships with mentors, fellow novice teachers andinteraction with experienced teachers in the school. The teacher’s teachereducation course constitutes the start of the teacher’s professional
development, subsequent learning taking place in the particular context
provided by the school. Learning to teach within a specific teaching context istherefore a process of socialization. Learning to teach involves becomingsocialized into a professional culture with its own goals, shared values andnorms of conduct. This “hidden curriculum” is often more powerful than theschool’s prescribed curriculum.

5. The language teacher’s identity
One of the things a person has to learn when he or she becomes a language
teacher is what it means to be a language teacher. A sociocultural perspective
on teacher-learning posits a central aspect of this process as the reshaping ofidentity and identities within the social interaction of the classroom. Identity12refers to the differing social and cultural roles teacher-learners enact throughtheir interactions with their students during the process of learning. Theseroles are not static but emerge through the social processes of the classroom.
Identity may be shaped by many factors, including personal biography,
gender, culture, working conditions, age, gender, and the school andclassroom culture. The concept of identity thus reflects how individuals seethemselves and how they enact their roles within different settings. In ateacher education program a teacher-learner’s identity is remade through theacquisition of new modes of discourse and new roles in the course room.
Teacher-learning thus involves not only discovering more about the skills andknowledge of language teaching but also what it means to be a language
teacher.
In a training course or campus-based teacher education program the studentteacher’s identity emerges through the acquisition of new modes of discourse
as well as new roles in the campus classroom. Once the student teacher
starts teaching his or her identity is further reshaped as the role of teacher isgradually assumed.

This transition is not always easy and can create stress and anxiety. For many
ESL teachers their identity may partly reflect their wish to empower
immigrants, refugees and others for whom English is way out of their current
circumstances (Cooke and Simpson 2008), as these comments suggest.
When I went into the class first to observe my cooperating teacher I was soshocked at the reality of the differences in ethnic backgrounds of all thestudents and wondered how I would manage this and what my role was as ateacher of English. When I started to teach the class and got to know thembetter I realized my role would not only be to teach them how to speak
English but also how to navigate the culture outside the classroom because
now they were in a new country (USA). I realized that I would take onanother role as that of cultural ambassador as I explained more and more
about the US to them during and even after class. Eventually, I had them allover to my house. Eva
Since I have been in teaching practice and inside teaching a real class withreal ESL students I no longer feel an outsider in this profession even though I
am a non-native speaker of English. Now that I have had a chance to provemyself as a teacher in front of these students and shown them that I know
many different techniques as well as my skills using English (yes, and even if
I still have a bit of an accent), they have begun to accept me as their teacher
and I am beginning to feel more like a teacher of English. Momoko.

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Native-speaker and non-native-speaker teacher learners may bring different
identities to teacher learning and to teaching. Those untrained nativespeakers teaching EFL overseas face a different identity issue: they aresometimes credited with an identity they are not really entitled to (the“native-speaker as expert” syndrome), finding that they have a status andcredibility which they would not normally achieve in their own country. In
language institutes, students may express a preference to study with nativespeaker teachers, despite the fact that such teachers may be less qualified
and less experienced that non-native-speaker teachers. For non-native
speaking teachers studying in SLTE programs, identity issues may lead someto feel disadvantaged compared to native-speaker teachers in the same
course. While in their own country they were perceived as experienced andhighly competence professionals, they now find themselves at a disadvantage
and may experience feelings of anxiety and inadequacy. They may have asense of inadequate language proficiency and their unfamiliarity with thelearning styles found in British or North-American university course rooms
may hinder their participation in some classroom activities.

6. Learner-focussed teaching
While teaching can be viewed as a type of teacher performance, the goal ofteaching is to facilitate student learning. The extent to which the focus of alesson is teacher rather than learner-focussed is reflected in the following
aspects of the lesson:The amount of talking the teacher does during the lesson
The extent to which input from learners directs the shape and directionof the lesson
The extent to which the teacher’s primary preoccupation during thelesson is with such things as classroom management, control, andorder
The extent to which the lesson reflects the teacher’s lesson plan

Some teachers however achieve a more learner-focussed approach toteaching in their lessons and this is reflected in characteristics like these:
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The degree of engagement learners have with the lesson
The extent to which learners’ responses shape the lesson
The quantity of student participation and interaction that occurs
The learning outcomes the lesson produced
The ability to present subject-matter from a learner’s perspective

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How the teacher is able to reshape the lesson based on learner
feedback
How the lesson reflects learners’ needs and preferences
How the lesson connects with the learners’ life experiences
How the teacher responds to learner’s difficulties

We see these different perspectives on lessons in how two teachers
responded to the question, “What constitutes an effective language lesson
from your perspective?”
Teacher A:
It’s important to me that I achieve the goals I set for the lesson and don’tskip things I planned to cover. I need to feel I did a good job on covering thedifferent stages of the lesson – the presentation phase, the practice stage,
and the free production stage for example.
Teacher B:
To me the most important thing is that the students enjoyed themselves andhad useful practice. And that the lesson was at the right level for them – not
too easy or too difficult so that they felt it was really worth while coming toclass today.
Or in the two teachers’ view of their teaching philosophy:

Teacher A:
I believe the best lesson is a well-planned lesson. I find it much easier toteach when I have a detailed plan to follow. I find that I am more likely to use
the time efficiently in the classroom if I know exactly what I will do and what
I expect students to do during the lesson.
Teacher B:
I believe every child in my class has got the capacity to learn, even if he or
she is not aware of it. Every learner is a winner. I try to encourage each
student to discover what he or she is good at and to help them be successful
at it.

It is natural when one first starts teaching to be preoccupied with one’s own
performance as a teacher, to try to communicate a sense of confidence,competence and skill, and to try to create lessons that reflect purpose, order,
and planning. It is a period when things are being tried out and tested, when
the teacher’s role and identity is being developed, and when many newchallenges have to be overcome. Hence studies of teachers in their first yearof teaching have revealed a transition from a survival and mastery stage
where the teacher’s performance is a central concern, to a later stage where15teachers become more focussed on their students’ learning and the impact of
their teaching on learning (Farrell 2009). The challenge is to make sure thatsuch a transition occurs and that one’s initial teaching experiences do not leadto a style of teaching that sticks, one that provides a comfort zone for theteacher but that fails to provide learners with the opportunity to achieve theirfull potential as learners (Benson 2001).

Learner-centredness as a characteristic of expert teachers is seen in some of
the research Borg reviews (Borg 2006), where the characteristics of expert
teachers include:They are familiar with typical student behaviours
They use their knowledge of learners to make predictions about whatmight happen in the classroom
They build their lessons around students’ difficulties
They maintain active student involvement

Senior (2006) suggests that a central aspect of learner-focussed teaching iscreating a classroom that functions as a community of learners.
It is sometimes forgotten that language classes operate as communities,
each with its own collection of shared understandings that have been
built up over time. The overall character of each language class iscreated, developed, and maintained by everyone in the room.
Senior (2006, 200).
Effective teachers use different strategies to develop a sense of community
among their learners, including using group-based activities, by addressing
common student interests and concerns, by regularly changing seating
arrangements so that students experience working with different classmates,by using humor and other ways of creating a warm and friendly classroom
atmosphere, and by recognizing that students have both social as well as
learning needs in the classroom.

The ability to personalize one’s teaching is also an important aspect oflearner-focussed teaching. By personalizing teaching I mean centering one’s
teaching wherever possible on one’s students and their lives, concerns, goals
and interests. This can be achieved by linking the content of lessons to thestudents lives and by involving students in developing or choosing the content
of lessons (Dyornyei 2001). For example in teaching narratives, while thetextbook might provide examples of what narratives are and describe their16linguistic and textual features, sharing personal stories among themselves
can be a powerful way of promoting genuine communication among students.
In sharing account of their childhoods and discussing significant events orexperiences in their lives, students will be prompted to practice and develop
their communicative resources by asking questions, asking for clarification,
responding with their experiences and so on.

Students can also be involved in generating lesson content. For example they
can work in groups to choose suitable topics for essay-writing. Instead ofusing examples from the textbook to present a lesson on idioms, students
might compile lists of idioms they have encountered out of class and bringthese to class for discussion. Learner-centredness in teaching thus reflects theview that “language teaching is an educational endeavour which should seek
to empower learners by enabling them to assume an informed and selfdirective role in the pursuance of their language-related life goals” (Tudor
1995: xii).

7. Pedagogical reasoning skills
An important component of current conceptualizations of SLTE is a focus onteacher cognition. This encompasses the mental lives of teachers, how theseare formed, what they consist of, and how teachers’ beliefs, thoughts andthinking processes shape their understanding of teaching and their classroom
practices. Borg (2006,1) comments:
A key factor driving the increase in research in teacher cognition, not justin language education, but in education more generally, has been therecognition that teachers are active, thinking decision-makers who play acentral role in shaping classroom event. Couple with insights from the fieldof psychology which have shown how knowledge and beliefs exert a strong
influence on teacher action, this recognition has suggested that
understanding teacher cognition is central to the process of understanding
teaching.
An interest in teacher-cognition entered SLTE from the field of general
education, and brought with it a similar focus on teacher decision-making, onteachers’ theories of teaching, teachers’ representations of subject matter,and the problem-solving and improvisational skills employed by teachers withdifferent levels of teaching experience during teaching. Constructs such asteacher’s practical knowledge, pedagogic content knowledge, and personal17

theories of teaching are now established components of our understanding ofteacher cognition (Golombek 2009).
A central aspect of teacher cognition is the role of the teacher’s pedagogicalreasoning skills, the specialized kind of thinking that teachers posses andmake use of in planning and conducting their lessons. Here is an example of
how teachers use these skills. I recently gave an expert teacher the following
challenge.
“A teacher has just called in sick. You are going to teach her 50 minutespoken English class, lower intermediate level, in 5 minutes. You only
teaching aid is an empty glass. What will your lesson look like?”
The teacher thought about it for less than a minute and then elaborated heridea for the lesson.
1. I would start by showing the glass and ask students to form
groups and brainstorm for five minutes to come up with the names ofas many different kinds of containers as possible. They would thengroup them according to their functions. For example things that
contain food, things that are used to carry things, things that areused to store things in and so on. I would model how they should dothis and suggest the kind of language they could use. (10 minutes).
2. Students would present their findings to the class to see who had
come up with the longest list. (10 minutes).
3. For a change of pace and to practice functional language I would
do some dialog work, practicing asking to borrow a container from aneighbour. First I would model the kind of exchange I want them topractice. Then students would plan their dialog following this outline:a) Apologize for bothering your neighbour.
b) Explain what you want and why you need it.
c) Your neighbour offers to lend you what you want.
d) Thank your neighbour and promise to return it on the weekend.
Students would then perform their dialogs.
This is a good example of a teacher’s pedagogical reasoning skills. These are
the special skills that enable English teachers to do the following:

To analyse potential lesson content (e.g. a piece of realia, as in theexample above, a text, an advertisement, a poem, a photo etc) andidentify ways in which it could be used as a teaching resource.
To identify specific linguistic goals (e.g in the area of speaking,vocabulary, reading, writing etc) that could be developed from thechosen content
To anticipate any problems that might occur and ways of resolving
them.

18



To make appropriate decisions about time, sequencing, and groupingarrangements

Shulman (1987) described this ability as a process of transformation in which
the teacher turns the subject matter of instruction into forms that are
pedagogically powerful and that are appropriate to the level and ability of thestudents. Experienced teachers use these skills every day when they plan
their lessons, when they decide how to adapt lessons form their course book,and when they search the internet and other sources for materials andcontent that they can use in their classes. It is one of the most fundamental
dimensions of teaching, one that is acquired through experience, throughaccessing content knowledge, and through knowing what learners need toknow and how to help them acquire it. While experience is crucial indeveloping pedagogical reasoning skills, working with more experienced
teachers through shared planning, team teaching, observation, and otherforms of collaboration can also play an important role in helping lessexperienced teachers understand the thinking processes employed by othermore experienced teachers.

8. Theorizing from practice
Mastery of teaching skills and the specialized thinking skills expert teachers
make use of are essential aspects of teacher development. But teacherlearning also involves developing a deeper understanding of what teaching is,of developing ideas, concepts, theories and principles based on our
experience of teaching (Borg 2006). The development of a personal system ofknowledge, beliefs and understandings drawn from our practical experience ofteaching is known as the theorizing of practice. The belief system andunderstanding we build up in this way helps us make sense of our experienceand also serves as the source of the practical actions we take in theclassroom. To better understand the concept of theorizing of practice it will
be useful to contrast two ways of thinking about the relationship between
theory and practice. The first is the application of theory. This involves
making connections between the concepts, information and theories from ourteacher education courses and our classroom practices; it involves putting
theories into practice. So after studying the principles of task-based

19instruction or collaborative learning for example, we might try to find ways ofapplying these principles in our teaching.
The theorizing of practice on the other hand involves reflecting on ourpractices in order to better understand the nature of language teaching andlearning and to arrive at explanations or hypotheses about them. The
information we make use of is the experience of teaching, observations of
how our learners learn or fail to learn, and our reflections on things that
happen during our lessons. The theorizing that results from these reflections
may take several different forms. It may lead to explanations as to why
things happen in the way they do, to generalizations about the nature ofthings, to principles that can form the basis of subsequent actions and to thedevelopment of a personal teaching philosophy (Richards 1998). The following
examples taken from teachers’ narratives and journals illustrate teachers
beginning to theorize from practice:

Arriving at explanations and generalizations
Children are much better language learners than adults because they are notworried about making mistakes and are much more prepared to take risks.
When we begin learning a language it’s better to follow the natural way, using
imitation. But when you are more advanced then you need to know more
about the grammar.
The essential thing in language learning is knowing how to say what you wantto say but not why you have to say ti in a particular way.
Learners learn more when they work in groups because they can learn fromeach other and they get more opportunities to talk than when the teacher isconducting the class.
Error correction works best when you ask students to monitor their own
language, rather than having them depend on the teacher all the time.

Developing principles and a teaching philosophy
A further stage in theorizing from practice is when teachers formulate
principles that they refer to when planning and evaluating their teaching andto the personal philosophy which guides their decision-making (Bailey 1996).
Here is an example of a teacher describing some of the beliefs and principles
she brings to her teaching:20

I think it’s important to be positive as a personality. I think the teacher
has to be a positive person. I think you have to show a tremendous
amount of patience. And I think if you have a good attitude you canproject this to the students and hopefully establish a relaxedatmosphere in your classroom so that the students won’t dread to cometo class but have a good class. I feel that it’s important to have a lessonplan of some sort. Because you need to know what you want to teachand how you are going to go from the beginning to the end. And also
taking into consideration the students, what there ability is, what theirbackground is and so on. I have been in situations where I did notunderstand what was being taught or hat was being said, and how
frustrating it is and so when I approach it I say: how can I make it theeasiest way fort them to understand what they need to learn?
This teacher’s philosophy emphasizes the teacher’s attitude and the need tocreate a supportive environment for learning in the classroom. She stresses
the need for lesson planning, but her justification for lesson planning is basedon helping the students rather than helping the teacher. Other examples ofprinciples which teachers have described in journals and conversations
include:








Follow the learners’ interest to maintain students involvement.
Always teach to the whole class - not just to the best students.
Seek ways to encourage independent student learning.
Make learning fun.
Build take-away value in every lesson.
Address learners’ mental processing capacities.
Facilitate learner responsibility or autonomy.

Activities in which teachers articulate their theories, beliefs and principles are
an important component of professional development and journal-writing,narratives, discussion and critical reflection can all be used for this purpose.
The theorizing that results from these procedures often provides the basis forinterpreting and evaluating one’s own teaching as well as the teaching ofothers.

9. Membership of a community of practiceLanguage teaching is sometimes considered a solitary and private activity,
something we do within the confines of our own classrooms. But this is anarrow and self-centred view of teaching that fails to capitalize on thepotential for learning and growth that comes from participating in acommunity of teachers having shared goals, values and interests. The schoolor the teaching context becomes a learning community and its members

21

constitute a community of practice. A community of practice has two
characteristics:
1. It involves a group of people who have common interests and who relate
and interact to achieve shared goals
2. It focuses on exploring and resolving issues related to the workplace
practices that members of the community take part in.
In our work as language teachers this often takes the form of collaboration
with other teachers in order to better understand the nature of the teaching
and learning that goes on in our classrooms, to share knowledge and skills, tobring about changes in practice when necessary, and to capitalize on thepotentials that team work and group collaboration can bring about.
Membership of a community of practice in a school provides opportunities forteachers to work and learn together through participation in group-oriented
activities with shared goals and responsibilities, involving joint problem
solving. Collegiality creates new roles for teacher, such as team leader,teacher trainer, mentor, or critical friend (Richards and Farrell 2005).

This collaboration can take a number of different forms (Johnston 2009). For
example:Collaboration with fellow teachers. This often involves a focus on teachingissues and concerns, such as use of the textbook, development of tests, andcourse planning.
Collaboration with university colleagues. This may involve collaborative
research or inquiry into issues of shared interest, such as exploring aspects ofsecond language acquisition or learning strategies.
Collaboration with others in the school. This may involve working withadministrators or supervisors on issues of concern to the school.
An example of how this kind of collaboration can happen is with the Lesson
Study Approach that has been widely implemented in Japan (Lewis andTsuchida 2003). As reported by Johnson (2009), teams of teachers co-plan alesson that focuses on a particular piece of content of unit of study.
Throughout the planning process, they draw on outside resources, including
textbooks, research, teaching theories, and engage in extended conversations
while focussing on student learning and the development of specificoutcomes. Once the plan has been developed, one member of the teamvolunteers to teach it, while the others observe. (Sometimes outsiders arealso invited to observe). After the lesson, the group discuss their findings in a
colloquium or panel discussion. Typically the teachers who planned the lesson

22

focus on their rationale for how they planned the lesson and their evaluationof how it went, particularly focussing on student learning. The planning groupthen re-convene to review the lesson, revise it, and a different teacher thenteaches it to a different class.

The cycle culminates in the team publishing a report that includes lessonplans, observed student behavior, teacher reflections, and a summary of thegroup discussions. These are then made available to others.

Many forms of professional development can help foster the sense of acommunity of practice, such as reading groups, action research, teamteaching, peer observation and peer coaching, however this may require achange in mind-set for some teachers who do not see themselves as
members of a team. For others, however, collaboration can be seen as asource of strength that can have valuable personal as well as practicalbenefits. Making the transition from seeing oneself as a self-contained
independent individual to seeing oneself as a member of a community ofpractice is an important component of the shaping of teacher identity and an
important milestone in professional development.

10. Professionalism
English language teaching is not something that anyone who can speak
English can do. It is a profession, which means that English teaching is seen
as a career in a field of educational specialization, it requires a specialized
knowledge base obtained through both academic study and practicalexperience, and it is a field of work where membership is based on entry
requirements and standards. The professionalism of English teaching is seenin the growth industry devoted to providing language teachers withprofessional training and qualifications, in continuous attempts to develop
standards for English language teaching and for English language teachers, tothe proliferation of professional journals and teacher magazines, conferences
and professional organizations, to requirements for English teachers todemonstrate their level of proficiency in English as a component ofcertification, to the demand for professional qualifications for native-speakerteachers, and to the greater level of sophisticated knowledge of language23teaching required of English teachers. Becoming an English language teacher
means becoming part of a worldwide community of professionals with sharedgoals, values, discourse, and practices but one with a self-critical view of its
own practices and a commitment to a transformative approach to its own
role.

There are two different dimensions to professionalism (Leung 2009). The firstcan be called institutionally prescribed professionalism – a managerial
approach to professionalism that represents the views of ministries of
education, teaching organizations, regulatory bodies, school principals and soon that specify what teachers are expected to know and what quality teachingpractices consist of. There are likely to be procedures for achieving
accountability and processes in place to maintain quality teaching. Suchspecifications are likely to differ from country to country. This aspect ofprofessionalism involves becoming familiar with the standards the profession
sets for membership and a desire to attain those standards. Such standards
involve acquiring the qualifications the profession recognizes as evidence ofprofessional competence, as well as demonstrating a commitment to attaining
high standards in our work, whether it be as classroom teachers, supervisors,administrators, or teacher trainers.

The second dimension to professionalism is what Leung calls independent
professionalism, which refers to teachers’ own views of teaching and theprocesses by which teachers engage in reflection on their own values, beliefs,
and practices. A key to long-term professional development is the ability to beable to reflect consciously and systematically on ones teaching experiences.
Reflection means asking questions like these about ones teaching:
1. What kind of teacher am I?
2. What am I trying to achieve for myself and for my learners?
3. What are my strengths and limitations as a language teacher?
4. How do my students and colleagues view me?
5. How and why do I teach the way I do?
6. How have I developed a teacher since I started teaching?
7. What are the gaps in my knowledge?
8. What role do I play in my school and is my role fulfilling?
9. What is my philosophy of teaching and how does it influence my teaching?
10. What is my relationship with my colleagues and how productive is it?
11. How can I mentor less experienced teachers?

24

There are many ways in which teachers can engage in critical and reflective
review of their own practices throughout their teaching career (see Richards
and Lockhart 1994; Richards and Farrell 2005), e.g. through analyzing criticalincidents, teacher support groups, journal writing, discussion groups, action
research and portfolios. Reflection involves both looking back at teachingexperiences as well as looking forward and setting goals for new or changed
directions. Dewey’s (1933) suggested three attributes that can facilitate theprocesses or reflective thinking: open-mindedness, responsibility, andwholeheartedness. Open-mindedness is a desire to listen to more than one
side of an issue and to give attention to alternative views. Responsibility
means careful consideration of the consequences to which an action leads.
And wholeheartedness implies overcoming fears and uncertainties to allow
critical evaluation of one’s practice in order to make meaningful change.

Conclusions
In this paper in trying to describe the nature of competence and performancein language teaching I have attempted to realize a somewhat ambitious
agenda. And any attempt to characterize the nature of quality, expertise,
professionalism or effectiveness in language teaching is liable to the charge ofdifferent kinds of bias, since such an attempt is bound to reflect
understandings that are shaped by culture, by context, by individual belief
and preference as well as by limitations in our present state of knowledge.
These limitations however should not prevent us from reflecting on the beliefs
and assumptions that shape the way we understand the nature of teacher
knowledge and teacher development for language teachers. For when we doso we are in a better position to assess what the goals of language teacher
education are, as well as the means by which we seek to achieve them.

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