ERIC Number: EJ1017865
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2013-Nov
Pages: 24
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1072-4303
EISSN: N/A
Authoring Teacher Development in a Graduate Seminar in Vietnam
Baurain, Bradley
TESL-EJ, v17 n3 Nov 2013
The purpose of this narrative inquiry is to explore stories of teacher development experienced by English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers in a graduate seminar in Vietnam. The author was the instructor for the course, entitled "Literature and Language Teaching." Three types of data were collected: course documents, a professional diary kept by the author, and student portfolios, including diary entries, writing assignments, lesson plans, and group projects. Within a narrative framework, this study reveals the authoring processes underlying professional development in lived experience. Specifically, three narratives are (re)constructed around the theme of expectations--a collective seminar participants' story about overturned expectations, an individual participant's story about revived expectations, and a curricular story about fused personal and professional expectations. Teacher development is thus perceived not as a linear process of skill-building, but rather as a multidimensional process of narrative construction that problematizes boundaries between the personal and the professional and emerges as a story of coming to understand experience in ways that promote teacher praxis.
Descriptors: Foreign Countries, English (Second Language), Second Language Instruction, English Teachers, Faculty Development, Diaries, Portfolios (Background Materials), Lesson Plans, Student Projects, Expectation, Personal Narratives, Inquiry, Praxis, Course Content, Research Methodology, Language Teachers, Graduate Students, Graduate Study
TESL-EJ. e-mail: editor@tesl-ej.org; Web site: http://tesl-ej.org
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Vietnam
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A