英語教師如何於正規及非正規專業發展領域發展個人職能概念:一位教師的敘事研究 - 政大學術集成

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(1)國立政治大學英國語文學系碩士班碩士論文. 指導教授: 招靜琪博士 Advisor: Dr. Chin-Chi Chao. 治政英語教師如何於正規及非正規專業發展領域發展個人職能概念: 大立 ‧. ‧ 國. 學. 一位教師的敘事研究. Developing Professional Identity as an English Language Teacher in Formal. n. al. er. io. sit. y. Nat. and Informal Professional Development Contexts: A Narrative Inquiry. Ch. engchi. i n U. 研究生: 李星瑩撰 Name: Sin-Yin Lee 中華民國 102 年 3 月 March, 2013. v.

(2) Developing Professional Identity as an English Language Teacher in Formal and Informal Professional Development Contexts: A Narrative Inquiry. A Master Thesis Presented to Department of English National Chengchi University. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學 y. Nat. n. sit. er. io. In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirement for the Degree of Master of Arts a. iv l C n hengchi U. by Sin-Yin Lee March, 2013.

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(4) Acknowledgements First and foremost, I would like to express my best gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Chin-Chi Chao, who guided me throughout my thesis with her patience and knowledge. This thesis would not have been completed without her support. I also appreciated the advice given by the committee members, Dr. Chen-Kuan Chen and Dr. Yi-Ping Huang, whose insightful suggestions helped me better revise my thesis. I am truly and deeply indebted to Dr. Hsun-Huei Chang, whose encouragement gave me the strength to pursue a graduate degree.. 政治大 generous sharing of her立 teacher professional developmental stories, the thesis would Next, my thanks go to my participant, Jenny (pseudonym). Without her. ‧ 國. 學. not have come to fruition. I would like to give the warmest thanks to Wun-Ting Jhuang, who did peer debriefing and provided me with helpful suggestions throughout. ‧. my thesis. In addition, I would like to extend my gratitude to my friends at graduate. sit. y. Nat. school—Emily Hung, Jeremy Chen, Joyce Hsu, Kenneth Chua, Linda Lee, Tim. n. al. er. io. Chang, for they always gave me timely help and advice whenever I faced difficulties.. i n U. v. Last but not the least, I would like to give my whole-hearted thanks to my. Ch. engchi. beloved family for their love and support that built me confidence to hurdle all the obstacles during the thesis writing process. This thesis owes its existence to the help, support, and inspiration of these people.. iii.

(5) Table of Contents Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................... iii Chinese Abstract ..........................................................................................................vii English Abstract ............................................................................................................ ix Chapter 1. Introduction ................................................................................................................ 1 Background of the Study ....................................................................................... 1 Purpose of the Study .............................................................................................. 4 . 政治大 2. Literature Review....................................................................................................... 5 立 Research Questions ................................................................................................ 4 . ‧ 國. 學. Language Teacher Professional Development ....................................................... 5 English Teacher Professional Development in Formal Educational Contexts in. ‧. Taiwan .................................................................................................................... 8 . sit. y. Nat. Cram School Issue in Taiwan............................................................................... 10 . al. er. io. Cross-contextual Teacher Professional Development.......................................... 13 . v. n. Rationale of the Present Study ............................................................................. 15 . Ch. engchi. i n U. 3. Methodology ............................................................................................................ 19 Informant.............................................................................................................. 19 Data Collection and Procedures ........................................................................... 21 Data Analysis ....................................................................................................... 23 4. Results and Findings ................................................................................................ 27 Jenny’s Prior Formal Schooling ........................................................................... 27 Jenny’s Teaching Experience in Informal Educational Contexts......................... 33 Jenny’s Teacher Training and Teaching Experience in Formal Educational Contexts ............................................................................................................... 43 iv.

(6) Summary of Jenny’s Story ................................................................................... 53 5. Discussion ................................................................................................................ 55 Addressing Research Question One..................................................................... 55 Addressing Research Question Two .................................................................... 63 6. Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 77 Summary of the Study ......................................................................................... 77 Pedagogical Implications ..................................................................................... 79 Limitations of the Study....................................................................................... 80 . 政治大 Conclusions .......................................................................................................... 82 立 Suggestions for Further Research ........................................................................ 81 . References .................................................................................................................... 83 . ‧ 國. 學. Appendixes . ‧. A. The First Semi-structure Interview Protocol ........................................................... 98 . y. Nat. B. A Sample of the Oral Narrative ............................................................................. 100 . n. al. er. io. sit. C. A Sample of the First Interview............................................................................. 103 . Ch. engchi. v. i n U. v.

(7) List of Tables Table 1. Background of the Informant ......................................................................... 20. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. vi. i n U. v.

(8) 國立政治大學英國語文學系碩士班碩士文提要論文名稱: 英語教師如何於正規及非正規專業發展領域發展個人職能概念: 一位教師的敘事研究指導教授: 招靜琪博士研究生: 李星瑩論文提要內容:. 立. 政治大. 本質化敘事研究旨在探討英語教師如何於正規及非正規專業發展領域中發. ‧ 國. 學. 展個人職能概念。研究對象為一位擁有多年補教與國高中教學經驗的英語教師。研究方法主要包含研究對象的口說敘述及半結構式訪談，目的在於完整記載研究. ‧. 對象之動態專業發展歷程。資料分析方式採用「整體─內容」分析法 (Lieblich,. y. Nat. sit. Tuveal-Mashiasch, & Zilber, 1998)與「關鍵事件」方法 (Webster & Mertova,. n. al. er. io. 2007)。研究結果顯示，研究對象之教師發展出自於其主動作為並連結至其認為. i n U. v. 之與教學相關之要務。其中引領研究對象教師發展之關鍵為其個人與其所在之補. Ch. engchi. 教或學校場域的互動關係。也就是說，她如何看待及解讀場域中有關於教學與教師之價值，並以此價值為基礎發展個人職能概念。此外，研究對象之教師職能概念為一螺旋型過程，其過程強調一學習過程之結束引領另一新的學習發展；於專業發展領域之互動中動態發展。另一方面，藉由研究對象於正規與非正規學校場域中發展職能概念之經驗對照，本質化個案研究對於宏觀之正規及非正規教育系統在協助教師發展的設計，目前所面臨的兩難獲得更深入的了解。本研究期許針對教師教育、甚至於教育政策持續改善，提供可能之方向，使其更能符合教師於個人職能發展的實際需要。在本研究最後，針對於研究結果提出教學與研究上之建議做為參考。 vii.

(9) 關鍵字: 教師職能概念、教師發展、教師教育、補習班. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. viii. i n U. v.

(10) Abstract This study explores the development of an English teacher’s professional identity across formal and informal educational contexts. The informant invited in the study is an English teacher who has cross-contextual professional development experience. Data collection methods primarily included an oral narrative and semi-structured interviews in order to document the dynamic professional development trajectory of the teacher informant. The data collected were analyzed with a holistic-content method (Lieblich, Tuveal-Mashiasch, & Zilber, 1998) and a critical events approach. 政治大 development is undertaken 立 by the teacher herself and her concerns. What is really (Webster & Mertova, 2007). The findings of the study indicate that teacher. ‧ 國. 學. critical in guiding teacher development is the interaction between the teacher and her contexts; namely, how the teacher perceives and interprets the value of teaching and. ‧. the meaning of being a teacher from the contexts, which is the basis to develop her. sit. y. Nat. professional identities. Furthermore, teacher professional identity is constructed. n. al. er. io. dynamically as a spiral process in interaction with contexts. A better understanding of. i n U. v. the tensions existing in the macro-level formal educational system is also obtained in. Ch. engchi. the comparison with formal and informal professional development experience of the English teacher in the study. The study provides a possible direction for further improvement of teacher education program and for educational policy reforms to better take care of the actual professional development needs of teachers. Based on the findings, pedagogical implications as well as suggestions for future research are also provided at the end of the thesis.. Keywords: teacher professional identity, teacher development, teacher education, cram school, EFL teachers ix.

(11) CHAPTER 1 Introduction. Background of the Study English education is always emphasized in EFL environments such as Taiwan mainly due to the needs of personal advancement and the country’s economic survival. While the Ministry of Education (MOE) has been promoting communicative language. 政治大 still directs English education in Taiwan. Learners need to pass such high-stake tests 立 teaching (CLT) in English, deep-rooted influence of paper-and-pencil examinations. as BC test (Basic Competence for Junior High School Students) and CEE (College. ‧ 國. 學. Entrance Examination) for advanced study, or other proficiency tests (TOEIC, TOEFL,. ‧. and IELTS) to verify their English competence for future careers. They also need to. y. Nat. invest a large amount of time and efforts to study in cram schools in order to increase. er. io. sit. the possibility of passing examinations. However, cram schools, and the quality of their teachers in particular, have not been fully understood and thus are issues worth. n. al. Ch. probing in the Taiwanese educational system.. engchi. i n U. v. This study aims to explore an English teacher’s professional identity development across formal schools and informal cram school educational contexts. Identity has been defined by a lot of educational researchers in different ways, (Goodson & Cole, 1994; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Norton, 2000; Sfard & Prusak, 2005), and professional identity in the study refers to a particular kind of teacher recognized by a teacher herself or others around her in a given contexts based on Gee’s definition of identity (2001). Language teacher development and professional identity have been the focus of language educational research since the 1980s, because the issues are considered crucial for students’ successful learning. Based on the sociocultural 1.

(12) perspective, teacher education is regarded as a teacher’s learning process of how to teach, which is built through the experiences firstly in classrooms as learners, then in teacher education programs, and finally as the teacher is involved in the teaching communities (Johnson, 2009). Language teacher professional identity is often shaped by the formal teacher education program as well as classroom practice. Qualitative methods have been adopted to investigate teachers’ long-term identity development and shifts in teaching/learning contexts since teacher professional identity is a dynamic, changeable process (Fox, 1995; Franzak, 2002; Golombek & Johnson, 2004;. 政治大 Smit & Fritz, 2008; Tsui, 2007; Zhao & Poulson, 2006). Furthermore, Johnson (2009) 立 Harkavy, 1999; Knowles, 1992; Knowles & Holt-Reynolds, 1991; Morgan, 2004;. has discussed the shifting epistemologies in language teacher education research from. ‧ 國. 學. positivist to interpretative as the teachers’ participation and constitution in their. ‧. professional worlds within multiple sociocultural contexts are investigated.. y. Nat. Cram school teachers, similar to formal school teachers, shoulder the duty of. er. io. sit. teaching students and have direct influence on students, but they are comparatively overlooked in the literature of language teacher education. Generally speaking, cram. al. n. v i n C hof for-profit companies, school teachers are taken as employees and therefore they are engchi U usually excluded from formal teacher education and professional communities; while. formal school teachers are regarded as having a stable vocation and high social status. However, the distinction between the two contexts and their teachers seems to be taken simplistically and fixed. Cram school is named as shadow education by Stevenson and Baker (1992) to highlight its auxiliary role to the mainstream education system and to alternate the term of “cram school” in order to avoid its negative connotation in English (Bray, 2006; Bray, 2010; Kim, 2005; Liu, 2011). The shadow education issue has indeed received much attention recently, yet the special issue on shadow education published by Asia Pacific Education Review in March 2010 only 2.

(13) includes one article related to teachers working in cram schools. The article is about the entrepreneurs of small-scale cram schools in Japan and their challenges in human resources. While teaching personnel is mentioned as an employment problem in the article, the teaching professionalism of cram school teachers is not the emphasis (Dierkes, 2010). In other words, teacher professional development in cram schools has not been sufficiently explored though more attention has been paid to cram school issues in educational research. In fact, teachers have many opportunities to engage in developing. 政治大 studies, it often indicates in the introduction of teacher participants’ background 立. professionalism in both mainstream and shadow educational contexts. In previous. information in the previous studies that the teachers had English teaching experience. ‧ 國. 學. in shadow educational contexts before they moved to formal educational one. ‧. (Cruz-Yeh, 2011; Huang, 2008; Liao, 2007). Nevertheless, such research has not been. y. Nat. expanded to cross-contextual professional development of language teachers; instead,. er. io. sit. they mainly focused on formal teacher development. It has been shown in the literature that language learners would experience identity (re)creation across different. al. n. v i n C h influence language educational settings, which could learning motivation (Harklau, engchi U 2000; Kinginger, 2004; McCarthey, López-Velásquez, García, Lin, & Guo, 2004). Teachers across multiple professional boundaries and their teacher development,. nevertheless, have not received much attention as cross-contextual learners and their learning process in educational research. Moreover, the Ministry of Education (MOE) in Taiwan has recently begun to stress the importance of the qualification of cram school teachers and to ask the cities and counties to supervise cram schools in establishing file systems for teacher backgrounds and qualifications including their majors as well as teaching and proficiency certificates. Such official attention further accentuates the necessity of gaining a better understanding of cram school teachers’ 3.

(14) professional identity developments.. Purpose of the Study The purpose of the study is to unveil an English teacher’s development of professional identity across formal and informal educational contexts through exploring the professional developmental trajectory of an English teacher informant invited in the study, including her prior learning experience and the later cross-contextual teacher development. Narrative and semi-structured interview data. 政治大 professional identity. The study aims to obtain an intact comprehension teacher 立. are adopted in the study to capture the dynamic developmental process of teacher. learning as relevant professional development opportunities are provided by both. ‧ 國. 學. formal and informal educational communities through the teacher informant’s. er. io. sit. y. Nat. Research Questions. ‧. individual stories.. 1. How does the teacher participant develop her professional identity from her. al. n. v i n C h in both formal English learning and teaching experiences and informal engchi U professional development contexts?. 2. What kinds of tension exist in the formal and informal English educational systems of Taiwan in terms of teacher learning and development based on the teacher participant’s cross-contextual professional development experience?. 4.

(15) CHAPTER 2 Literature Review The following literature review mainly includes four sections. The first section introduces the conception of language teacher professional development, including its epistemological shift, the research focus changing with the shift, and the elaboration of language teacher identity in the relevant research paradigm of teacher professional development. English teacher professional development in formal educational contexts is discussed in the second section. The third section puts the emphasis on. 政治大. cram school phenomena in Taiwan and the studies relevant to the professional. 立. development of cram school teachers. In addition, the review of the research on. ‧ 國. 學. across-contextual teacher development is displayed in the last section. At the end of the literature review, the rationale of the present study is further elaborated.. ‧ y. Nat. sit. Language Teacher Professional Development. n. al. er. io. Epistemological shift from positivism to interpretative paradigm. Teacher. i n U. v. professionalism, as a decisive role in language education, is one of the emphases. Ch. engchi. related to teacher education program and classroom practice. The exploration of teaching and teacher education has been greatly influenced by positivism by the middle of the 19th century. Under positivist epistemology, knowledge is objective, identifiable, and generalizable and can be captured through systematic research processes. The main foci are hence the effective teaching behaviors and processes leading to learner achievement on test scores in practical classroom application of teachers, and how the teaching behaviors can be transmitted to other teachers through professional training (Johnson & Golombek, 2002; Shulman, 1986, 1987). In the early 1980s, ethnographic investigators began to penetrate teacher 5.

(16) practice in actual classroom and found that teachers constructed their own interpretation of teaching, which underlined the complex nature of teacher thinking on teaching practice and teachers as active creators of their professional knowledge (Elbaz, 1983l Lampert, 1985). According to Connelly and Clandinin (1988), and Johnson (2009), the positivist research paradigm has been criticized since the 1980s due to its depersonalized and decontextualized nature. In response to such criticism, the research has been gradually shifted to the interpretative paradigm, under which knowledge is considered socially constructed and contingently emerging from the. 政治大 professional lives, the processes of their professional development, and teacher 立. social activities and contexts where people engage in. Teachers’ participation in their. identities are the core issues. The process of teacher professional development is. ‧ 國. 學. hence considered to be dynamic and lifelong, in which teachers are as active. ‧. participants in teacher education programs, as learners of teaching in classrooms and. y. Nat. schools, and also as members in a broader educational community. Such. er. io. sit. conceptualization of teacher professional development is in line with sociocultural theories emphasizing the social nature of cognition and learning (Cobb & Bowers,. n. al. i n C h1978; Wenger, 1998). 1999; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Vygotsky, engchi U. v. Issue of language teacher identity in sociocultural perspective. Under the interpretative paradigm, language teacher professional identity, being one of the essential parts in teacher professional development, refers to a particular kind of teacher that is recognized by a language teacher herself or others in given contexts (Clarke, 2008; Gee, 2001). The formations or transformations of teacher identity are shaped and penetrated by the teacher’s knowledge, professional philosophy, teaching practice, self-reflection, and social communication with others from the sociocultural perspective (Miccoli, 2008; Norton, 2010; Lantolf, 2005; Ricento, 2005; Singh, & 6.

(17) Richards, 2006; Varghese, Morgan, Johnston, & Johnson, 2005). Owing to teachers as active agents to conduct their own teacher development, their perception and interpretation toward the values of teaching and teachers not only in professional developmental contexts but also in any other contexts can also be crucial in forming their professional identities. According to elaboration of Flores and Day (2006), identity is a dynamic process which “entails the making sense and (re)interpretation of one’s own values and experience” (p. 220). Becoming a language teacher, therefore, essentially involves the (trans)formation of teacher identity in which a teacher’s. 政治大 own personal experiences (Sachs, 2001). 立. values about what it means to teach and the type of teachers they aspire to be via their. Regarding the studies on teacher professional identity, Beijaad, Meijer, and. ‧ 國. 學. Verloop (2004) provided suggestions for further research by reviewing relevant. ‧. studies from 1988 to 2000 which mainly adopted qualitative research methods on the. y. Nat. basis of interpretative epistemology. One of the suggestions is about in-depth. er. io. sit. exploration of the relationship between the contexts and teacher’s professional identity formation. Language teachers’ professional lives have been investigated to. al. n. v i n discuss teacher identity and C professionalism with various h e n g c h i U contexts later on, while many of the studies primarily focused on teacher learning and professional. development in a certain context or at a certain stage in the lives of the teacher participants. Fox (1995), for instance, focused on the early teaching experience of two beginning teachers tracking their transformation from an English learner to a language teacher. Franzak (2002), on the other hand, emphasized the influences of in-service teachers’ experience sharing on student teachers’ identity development during participation in a teacher study group of teacher education program named critical friends group. Johnson and Golombek’s Teacher’s Narrative Inquiry as Professional Development (2002) collects many narrative inquiry studies on teacher’s construction 7.

(18) of knowledge about language teachers and language teaching using different data sources including self-reflection on teaching, group discussions, and interaction with students, while the teachers were basically in the same teaching contexts. Moreover, Clarke (2008) published a book on teacher identities of student teachers using community of practice theory. Tsui (2007) also conducted a long-term inquiry to capture the lived experience of a formal school English teacher throughout his English learning process and teaching career to have a better understanding of multifaceted nature of language teacher professional identity, which is one of the few. 政治大 professional identities of language teachers have been widely explored in the recent 立 cross-contextual studies on teacher’s professional identity development. While. decades, the research on English language teacher across multiple contexts is still. ‧ 國. 學. scarce, not to mention teacher’s professional development and identify formation in. Nat. sit. y. ‧. formal and informal professional development contexts.. io. Taiwan. er. English Teacher Professional Development in Formal Educational Contexts in. al. n. v i n C h professional development Generally speaking, English teacher in formal engchi U. educational contexts is usually discussed by exploring the experiences of two teacher groups respectively: pre-service and in-service teacher groups, and the classification is mainly based on whether or not the teacher has any formal teaching experience and obtains teacher certificate (Ministry of Education, Taiwan, 2012). For pre-service group, making a decision of becoming a teacher and carrying out the decision is the main focus. There are two path ways that one could take to become an English teacher in formal schools in Taiwan: one is to enter a normal university or teacher’s colleges to receive four-year teacher education for primary and secondary school teachers. The other is that in addition to receiving formal teacher education program provided by an 8.

(19) officially-authorized university, one should finish the compulsory courses about English literature, linguistics, and language skills in an English department (Laws and Regulation Database of The Republic of China, 2010). While being in a formal teacher education program, one needs to fulfill internship and pass the examination for teaching certificates. College students can become a qualified English teacher and begin their teaching career through either path (Pan & Yu, 1999; Chou & Ho, 2007; Wu, 2008). The educational research on teacher development, therefore, often explores the relationship between teacher professional development or identity. 政治大 pre-service teachers, the foci are primarily on teachers’ development in teacher 立 formation and the pre-service training of becoming a teacher. In the studies on. education programs and practicum as well as their initial construction of the. ‧ 國. 學. conception about teaching and teachers from prior schooling experience as a learner. ‧. (Calderhead, 1991; Johnson, 1994; Nettle, 1998; Russell, 2008; Reid, 2011; Rogers,. y. Nat. 2011). Research on in-service teachers, in addition to investigating teachers’. er. io. sit. pre-service training, put more emphasis on the relationship between teacher professional development and actual classroom practice, such as teacher thinking on. al. n. v i n C hbehavior in class (Kwakman, curriculum design and teaching 2003; Mawhinney, 2010; engchi U. O’Donnell; 2005; Sato & Kleinsasser, 2004).. In fact, the background information of formal English teacher participants provided in some of the studies reveals that a number of formal English teachers do have informal teaching experiences (Cruz-Yeh, 2011; Huang, 2008; Liao, 2007), while the research did not put much emphasis on such experiences and its possible impact on teacher professional development. It is still unknown the similarities or differences exist in formal and informal educational systems on teacher professional development. The current study thus suggested that teacher development research should look into dynamic teacher professional advancement by capturing teachers’ 9.

(20) diverse teaching backgrounds and experiences instead of partial documentation.. Cram School Issue in Taiwan Brief introduction of cram school phenomenon. Confucianism and the current education policy are two major factors leading to prosperous cram school phenomenon in Taiwan. As other East Asian countries, Taiwan has been under the influence of Chinese Confucianism and meritocracy in which people hold a high respect for academic study and intellectuals. Both students and parents believe that. 政治大 prestigious school. Hence, the outstanding academic performance of English, just as 立 people would have a better career and a promising future if they can enter a. other school subject matters, has been greatly stressed in Taiwan’s education, and a. ‧ 國. 學. large number of students are sent to cram schools for school-based achievement (Ho,. ‧. 1998; IIAS Newsletter, 2011; Kwok, 2004; Oladejo, 2006; Ross, 2008).. y. Nat. On the other hand, international trade is the mainstay of Taiwan’s economy. er. io. sit. (Executive Yuan Website, 2010), and English competence is thus regarded as the core in educational policy. English has been the only mandatory foreign language in. al. n. v i n Clater secondary education since 1967, and MOE conducted a series of reform U h einn2001 i h gc programs to begin English learning in elementary school (Liao, 2004). Many higher education institutions also set English graduation thresholds. The booming of cram school business has thus been sustained and accelerated in the recent years (Chang & Yi, 2004; Chang, 2006; IIAS Newsletter, 2011; Lee, 2009; Liu, 2006; Wang, 2006). Cram schools are for-profit institutes to provide supplemental instructions to mainstream education; thus, it is also named “shadow education” (Stevenson & Baker 1992; Bray, 2006; Bray, 2010; Kim, 2005; Liu, 2011). Cram schools in Taiwan are categorized into academic and non-academic ones; English is included in both categories. An academic cram school provides learners with supplementary courses of 10.

(21) school subject matters. The other is non-academic language institutes, which provide learning programs not directly related to regular school curriculum. Learners there hope to learn foreign languages such as English and other foreign languages for the purposes of improving communication skills. The two types of cram schools in Taiwan take up approximately 83 percentage of the cram school market (the total number of cram schools in 2011 was 18,961): 10,424 cram schools and 5,231 language institutes are registered nationwide in 2011 (IIAS Newsletter, 2011; Short-term Busiban Information Management System, 2011).. 政治大 the research include the origin and changes of cram school phenomena with 立. The research of cram school issues in Taiwan, however, is scarce. The foci in. sociological perspectives (Chou & Ho, 2007; IIAS Newsletter, 2011; Liu, 2011), and. ‧ 國. 學. the findings in such research indicated that the prevalence of cram schools in Taiwan. ‧. is highly related to the trend of educational policy and parental expectation toward. y. Nat. their children’s academic success. In the research on cram school operation model or. er. io. sit. the degrees of customer satisfaction from the viewpoint of business administration (Chen, 2008; Huang, T. Y., 2008), the suggestions are provided for cram school. al. n. v i n C h of operation andUservice quality as well as to satisfy owners to improve the efficiency engchi customers’ learning needs. The relationship between education in cram schools and. students’ academic performance is also another focus in the previous studies (Chang & Yi, 2004; Liu, 2011). Although Liu (2011) in his article pointed out that instructions in cram schools had positive impacts on the improvement of students’ academic performance, other researchers still held a skeptical attitude toward the benefits that cram school teaching brought students and their learning (Chang & Yi, 2004; IIAS Newsletter, 2011). Issues on teachers’ beliefs or teacher identity in cram schools of Taiwan, on the other hand, have only received attention for approximately a decade (Huang, S. Y. S., 2008; Wu, 2007), and the details will be provided in the following 11.

(22) section. Studies on cram school English teachers. Cram school teachers in Taiwan are not specifically divided into pre-service and in-service groups, and do not need to undergo either of the officially-authorized processes of being qualified to teach. Nevertheless, both their educational backgrounds and teaching practices are still emphasized in informal cram school contexts (Chen, 2000; Wu, 2006). Most cram schools require their English teachers to be English majors, to pass English proficiency tests designed by the cram schools, or to possess other validated English. 政治大 teaching may also be required to show their teaching skills. Some cram schools do 立 proficiency certificates. English teaching experience and/or certificates, or demo. offer such pre-service or in-service training as lesson plan writing or doing classroom. ‧ 國. 學. observation of experienced teachers. However, generally speaking, cram schools do. ‧. lack systematic training programs or evaluation systems for their teachers.. y. Nat. Research on English education in cram schools has often been conducted for. er. io. sit. examining the efficiency of instructions. For example, Liu (2010), observed cram school students’ English speaking practice via Skype after class, while Wang (2012). al. n. v i n C hreading instructionUon cram school students. examined the effectiveness of balanced engchi In addition, English teachers’ beliefs and teaching behaviors have also been the. emphases. Huang S. Y. S. (2008) investigated teachers’ beliefs of three cram school English teachers who taught primary school students in Taichung. She found that learners’ age, proficiency levels, cognitive aspects, affective state, and drill-oriented instruction greatly influenced language teacher’s belief, and that the contradictions between teacher’s belief and practices may be contributed by deficient teaching strategies, inadequate professional knowledge, and the lack of reflective practices. Similarly, Wu (2007) also discussed two English teachers’ belief and their teaching practices within cram school contexts. The results showed that teacher’s beliefs 12.

(23) generally corresponded to their teaching practices and that the teachers also stressed the necessity of moral education in their classroom instruction in addition to English language teaching. In fact, teacher’s beliefs, teaching attitude or behavior are all relevant to their teacher identity, i.e., how they position themselves as teachers. To the best of the author’s understanding, however, no studies have explored professional identity development of teachers across formal and informal professional development contexts. This study, therefore, aimed to capture a more intact picture of teacher professional development from a teacher participant in both formal and. 政治大 experiences in both contexts, moreover, it would be possible to understand strengths 立 informal educational contexts. Through comparing professional development. and weaknesses of formal and informal educational contexts in facilitating teacher. y. Nat. Cross-contextual Teacher Professional Development. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. advancement and growth.. er. io. sit. Under the sociocultural perspective, teacher professional development is highly relevant to the interaction between a teacher and the professional development. al. n. v i n Cashmentioned previously. contexts he or she engages in Teacher’s learning/teaching engchi U experiences across cultures have been the main focus in the research relevant to cross-contextual teacher professional development (Burnaby & Sun, 1989; Flowerdew & Miller, 1995; Lee, 2011; Gu, 2004; Thaman, 2001; Zhao, Meyers, & Meyers, 2009). Culture, according to Wenger (1998), is defined as “a composite repertoire created by the interaction, borrowing, imposing and brokering among its constituent communities of practice” (p. 291). Moreover, culture could be identified at different levels; it can be developed “at the level of a group of countries, an individual country, a group of institutions within a given country, or a particular institution within a given country” (Flowerdew and Miller, 1995, p. 362). 13.

(24) Many of the relevant studies have discussed cross-cultural programs or experiences of teachers in different county contexts and their impacts on teacher professional development. In general, cross-cultural teacher training and teaching experience is beneficial for teachers’ professional advancement in some way. Zhao, Meyers, and Meyers (2009), for instance, studied a four-week teaching and learning experience of ten American elementary pre-service teachers in China and indicated that the overseas experience helped participants to understand Chinese culture as well as the ways of teaching non-English speaking students. Gu (2004), on the other hand,. 政治大 education on the professional developments of both British teacher educators and 立 studied the impacts of the intercultural experience in English language teacher. Chinese teachers. The findings of Gu’s study revealed that Chinese teachers could. ‧ 國. 學. better adopt both their traditional and Western teaching approaches with a critical. ‧. perspective. British teacher educators, however, held opposite attitudes toward the. y. Nat. intercultural experience: some thought it beneficial while some regarded it as a. er. io. sit. demanding experience. Moreover, Lee (2011) focused on the benefits of a six-week language teacher training program in New Zealand on a group of Hong King student. al. n. v i n teachers. The language competenceC and cultural understand h e n g c h i Uof the student teachers. were enhanced in the overseas teacher training program. In addition, the researcher in the study pointed out the differences between the educational systems in New Zealand and Hong Kong, including teaching strategies, learning environments, classroom management strategies, and teaching characteristics. That is, the strengths and weaknesses of the two educational systems for teacher development were derived from the participants’ across-cultural teacher training experience. The above-mentioned studies are at an across-country level; that is, the researchers focused on the relationship of the cultural difference and teacher professional development. However, to the best of the researcher’s understanding, 14.

(25) cross-contextual teacher professional development at a level of different educational systems within a county, i.e. formal and informal educational contexts, is still unknown without much attention in current teacher educational research and also worth exploring.. Rationale of the Present Study As mentioned previously, language teacher education field seldom focuses on teachers in shadow education or those cross formal and informal teaching contexts,. 政治大 school studies. Therefore, this study aimed to trace the entire learning and teaching 立 and neither have teachers and their identities been received much attention in cram. process of an English language teacher, including her early learning experience as a. ‧ 國. 學. learner, teaching experience as a cram school teacher, and teacher learning in teacher. ‧. education program and internship as a pre-service teacher at the postgraduate stage. In. y. Nat. the process, the English teacher informant’s professional identity formation and shifts. er. io. sit. within those contexts were documented. In addition, the study tried to obtain a better understanding of teacher learning which is facilitated by both formal and informal. al. n. v i n educational contexts throughCthe teacher informant’s h e n g c h i U individual stories.. According to the research questions in the study, the process of learning how to. teach English and how to develop language teacher identity in both formal and informal educational contexts are the foci, while a social theory of learning, i.e., the notion of communities of practice, is employed as the primary theoretical framework to obtain a better understanding of the relationship between the professional development of the teacher informant and the educational contexts that she stayed (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998). A community of practice framework, according to Wenger’s definition (1998), comprises three dimensions: “mutual engagement, joint enterprise, and share repertoire” (pp. 72-73). Mutual engagement 15.

(26) refers to participation in actions in which meanings are negotiated among participants within a community. In the case of the current study, the community of practice is understood as the informant’s perception of her community. Using this CoP framework, joint enterprise is defined as the focus of activity that links members in a community. Through ongoing negotiation from different responses of participants, the community is created by and reflected in the common focus and leads to the coherence in its members. The last dimension, share repertoire, means the common resources that participants can obtain to create meaning within their engagement in. 政治大 dynamic trajectory of increasing participation. In other words, the novice participants 立 joint enterprise (Clarke, 2008). Within the context of CoP, learning is conceived as a. in a community of practice are initially in charge of simple activities to gain access. ‧ 國. 學. sources of understanding, grow their involvement wherein, and gradually they would. ‧. become old-timers with full participation (Lave, & Wenger, 1991). The informant as a. y. Nat. member of her CoP, based on the aforementioned three dimensions of CoP, not only. meaning of her work and the rules of engagement.. al. er. io. sit. shared the understood knowledge with other members but had a space to negotiate the. n. v i n Cashthe core issue in the Concerning identity formation study with the notion of engchi U. communities of practice, it is a “dual process” that involves identification and. negotiation within a community of practice according to Wenger (1998, p.188). Wenger (1998) refers to identification as a process that individuals build their identities via relations of association and differentiation in their experiences within communities. Members can identify with a community through mutual enterprise or culture, and then the identification with the community determines their membership and participation to some extent as well as constitutes who they are (Barab, MaKinster, & Schekler, 2003). Furthermore, it is a dynamic process that one identifies with a community and also becomes identified as something or someone. 16.

(27) Identification would facilitate and shape what individual are (not), and also leads to (non-)participation in a community (Wenger, 1998). Negotiability, on the other hand, refers to the extent that individuals can “control over the meanings in which they are invested” (p. 235), and it includes the “ability, facility, and legitimacy to contribute to and shape the meanings that matter within a [community]” (p. 197). Reversely, individuals with opportunities of negotiability can develop their ownership over the community’s mutual enterprise. In order to make the understanding of cross-contextual teacher professional identity development more transparent, the. 政治大 duality notion of identity and negotiation. 立. present study explores narrative story and interviews of an English teacher with the. Furthermore, via the investigation of the teacher informant’s personal. ‧ 國. 學. experience in a community of practice framework for learning, the (re)constructions. ‧. in teacher identity of an English teacher, the skills and actions in the social practice,. y. Nat. and the relationship and interconnections among participants, the practice and the. er. io. sit. macro-level educational system are discussed in the study. Wenger’s four duality pairs of design for learning in a community— participation/reification, the designed/the. al. n. v i n C and emergent, the local/the global, were thus employed to U h eidentification/negotiablitiy i h ngc present the tensions existing in both formal and informal educational systems where the teacher developed her professionalism. Participation/reification is the duality of meaning. Participation is “a process of taking part and also to the relations that reflect this process” (1998, p. 55), that is, when people are engaged in a community, they would negotiate meaning through mutual recognition with others. Reification means to make the meaning into concrete and organized “thingness” (p. 58). The designed/the emergent focuses on the tension between the pre-organized structure of a community and the emergent structure in the actual practice. The local/global duality discusses the relation between the local practice of individuals and the global agenda 17.

(28) in a community. An ideal design for learning in a community is on the premise that “local practice [has] global meaning” (Barab, MAinster, & Scheckler, 2003, p. 246). In the concept of identification/negotiability, members can “identify with a community, [which] determines their membership and participation” (p. 247). At the same time, they have a certain degree of power to control the meaning of their work and to shape their identities. Through the discussion on the design for teacher learning in these two educational systems, the researcher attempts to make a contribution to the further improvement of the formal educational system by the Ministry of Education. 政治大 more flexible educational reforms and regulations in the near future can be 立. and to better understand informal educational contexts and the teachers within so that. established.. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. 18. i n U. v.

(29) CHAPTER 3 Methodology. This study aims to explore the dynamic nature of an English teacher’s professional identity across formal and informal educational contexts. In order to have an in-depth understanding of the research topic, the study adopts case study methods to acquire abundant descriptive data of the informant and to analysis qualitatively. The present study, by utilizing case study methods, attempts to probe into English teacher. 政治大. identity as well as to better understand the opportunities of teacher learning provided. 立. by formal and informal educational contexts through the detailed report of the. ‧ 國. 學. informant’s developmental experience. The following is the introduction of the methodology for the study, including an elaboration on the informant’s background,. ‧. data collection, and data analysis procedure.. n. al. er. io. sit. y. Nat Informant. i n U. v. An English teacher who had professional development experience as an English. Ch. engchi. teacher in both cram schools and formal schools was invited to be the informant of this study. In this section, the informant’s personal information, educational background, teacher professional training, and teaching experience will be included. The informant, Jenny (a pseudonym), was female and 30 years old. She received all the education in Taiwan without any studying abroad experience. Jenny was an English major in college, and currently she has been pursuing a master degree at a university in a northern Taiwan. She had completed the teacher education program at the university, finished the one-semester internship in a senior high school, and passed the certification examination for formal school teachers. 19.

(30) The English teaching experience of Jenny can be discussed into two categories based on the contexts that she taught in: formal school and informal cram school teaching experiences. She started English teaching in informal educational contexts during her sophomore years. She then accumulated informal teaching experience more than four years in three kids’ English institutes and two junior high English cram schools until she quit the teaching job to pursue her MA studies in linguistics. At the postgraduate stage, Jenny taught in a junior high school, including in the English remedial program for one year and in the elite programs for a half year in a junior. 政治大 experience of Jenny. Table 1 is a brief summary of the informant’s teaching 立 high school. Internship in a senior high school was another formal teaching. background.. MA Student. Informal Teaching. experiences. experiences. 2001vIn a kids’ English a2010-2011 i l C In a junior n high school: center: Six month h e nOne-year gchi U. n. Jenny. io. Situation. Formal Teaching. of Linguistics. sit. Current. er. Informant. Nat. Background of the Informant. y. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. Table 1. remedial-program. teaching. 2011 In a junior high. 2003-2005 In two kids’. school: One-semester. English institutes:. elite-program. Two-year teaching. 2011-2012 In a senior. 2005-2007 In two junior. high school:. high English cram. One-semester internship. schools: Two-year teaching. 20.

(31) Data Collection and Procedures To acquire an in-depth understanding of the teacher’s professional development, an oral narrative of the informant’s entire professional developmental trajectory and three semi-structured interviews were collected as the primary data. One face-to-face and five online written follow-up interviews were conducted for further clarification of the primary data in the study. The narrative and interview data were in Chinese, the shared native language of the researcher and the informant.. 政治大 Narrative research. The research framework of the study adopted narrative 立. research, which is, according to Clandinin and Connelly (2000), a process of narrative. ‧ 國. 學. experience formation via story-telling, in which life experience is a continuum. ‧. represented at present but also underwent in the past. Considering the experience. y. Nat. being personal as well as social in nature, Dewey (1938) transformed narrative. er. io. sit. experience into an inquiry term in order to provide better understanding of educational life from individual stories within broader social contexts. In Dewey’s. al. n. v i n viewpoint, one criterion for C experience is continuity, h e n g c h i U a concept that experiences are. intertwined. It means that one’s experiences always develop from previous ones and at the same would lead to further ones. Clandinin and Connelly (2000), developed three dimensional space for narrative inquiry under the concept of continuity—“the temporal, the personal and social, and place” (p. 50). Employing narrative inquiry, researchers capture fluctuant, temporal matters in the lived experience shuttling in time (that is, the past, present, and future), moving from inner, personal perceptions to outward such as environments and interactions with other people, and transferring across contexts. It is therefore the researcher’s expectation that by collecting and analyzing a personal, contextualized narratives the study would provide insights from 21.

(32) what and how the English teacher undergoes the experience as learners of language teaching, what the teacher believes and knows about language teaching, who she becomes or is becoming as a teacher, and how all these lead to her personal and professional growth (Johnson & Golombek, 2002; Juzwik & Ives, 2010; Smit & Fritz, 2008; Tsui, 2007). An oral narration is included in the study, and it was conducted in late March, 2012. The narration was captured on a recorder and later transcribed for further analysis, and the length of it was approximately three hours. In the narration, the. 政治大 documented, in order not only to explore her professional development as a teacher 立 teacher informant’s overall English learning and teaching experiences were. but also to investigate the process she took to move from an English learner to an. ‧ 國. 學. English teacher (Appendix B).. ‧. y. Nat. Semi-structured interviews. In addition to the three-hour narration, three. er. io. sit. semi-structured interviews were also conducted in the study, subject to narrative data, to acquire more about informant’s reflections on and/or perspectives toward her. al. n. v i n C hongoing professional English teaching history as well as her identity development. engchi U The researcher’s goal was to document the identity shifts that the informant. experiences, and her position as a teacher in the English educational context. The interview protocols were designed based on Carspecken’s guidelines (1996), in which each topic domain focuses on one core issue and is extended with several follow-up questions. Some of the interview questions referred to the initial reflective questions for teacher’s self narrative inquiry in Johnson and Golombek’s Teachers’ narrative inquiry as professional development (2002). Three semi-structured interviews were conducted from early April to late May, 2012, and all of them were audio recorded and transcribed for analysis (Appendix A). The first 22.

(33) interview lasted for two hours and centered on the experience relevant to teacher training or education provided by formal and informal educational contexts (Appendix C). The second one, approximately two hours in length, mainly focused on the teacher informant’s teaching philosophy and self-reflections on her teaching experience. The last interview, lasted two and a half hours, tracked the people or the interactions in both formal and informal educational contexts that greatly impacted the informant’s professional development and also explored the informant’s self-reflection on her role of an English teacher in mainstream and shadow. 政治大 In addition, the informant in each interview was asked several questions derived 立. educational environments.. from aspects of the narration or previous interviews that needed to be clarified. After. ‧ 國. 學. the process of primary data collection, follow-up interviews were also conducted from. ‧. June to November, 2012 during data analysis and writing-up, including a face-to-face. y. Nat. interview and five written follow-ups via Facebook platform (an online media) in. n. al. er. io. sit. order to clarify key information connected to the narratives and interviews.. Data Analysis. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. All the data collected in Chinese in the study were transcribed, translated to English, and put into analysis. Meanwhile, the researcher’s notes and inferences as interviewer comments were subject to analysis. In order to guard the trustworthiness of the study to verify data interpretation, a graduate student with TESOL background was invited for peer debriefing, and member checking (Stake, 1995). The research questions in this study were addressed through iteratively analyzing with the grounded theory procedure (Glaser, 2002; Moghaddam, 2006; Strauss, & Corbin, 1990). Analysis method in the study adopted Lieblich, Tuveal-Mashiasch, and Zilber’s holistic-content method (1998) wherein a 23.

(34) pattern/theme were identified as they emerged after material being read episode by episode several times. During the analysis, the basic outline of the events and the way the story was told were paid special attention (Hiles, Cermak,& Chrz, 2009). Since the unit of analysis was an episode, an outline helped to identify the shifting points of outer contexts and inner identity changes in the informant’s story. The researcher also followed the five procedures of holistic content method which are listed as follows according to Lieblich et al. (1998, pp. 62-63): 1. Read the materials several times until a pattern emerges;. 政治大 3. Decide on special foci of content or themes that the researcher wants to follow in 立 2. Put the researcher’s initial and global impression of the case into writing;. 4. Read the themes separately and repeatedly;. 學. ‧ 國. the story as it evolves from beginning to end;. ‧. 5. Keep track of the result in several ways: Follow each theme throughout the story. y. Nat. and note the researcher’s conclusions.. er. io. sit. In addition, a critical-event approach was adopted the study as well in order to make the results of analysis specifically displayed. According to Webster and Mertova. al. n. v i n (2007), “a critical event as told in aC story, [positively or negatively], reveals a change hengchi U of understanding or worldview by the storyteller” (p. 73). What makes an event. critical is decided by its impact on the storyteller as well as the performance of the storyteller in a professional role. Moreover, because critical event is about changing experience, it can only be captured after an impact of the event has happened to a person. The retrospective nature therefore makes a critical events approach suitable for the narrative and interview data in the study, which were mainly about the past experience relevant to the professional identity development that the English teacher informant had, including her learning and teaching trajectories. The narrative and interview data in the study were divided into periods chronologically, mainly 24.

(35) following Measor’s intrinsic type of critical phases applied to the teaching profession (1985), in which critical events are the events “[occurring] within the nature progression of a career” (Webster & Mertova, 2007, p.74). The transcribed narrative and interview data were recursively read with the holistic content method for salient themes and finally relevant theories emerged to connect to the themes through the analysis procedures. The professional development process of the informant was divided into several critical periods. In each period, the critical events will be elaborated in details to exhibit the significance of the impacts. 政治大 These critical events were then linked to the Wenger’s notions of identification and 立 on the teacher informant’s professional identity construction in the fourth chapter.. four duality pairs in CoP for learning to discuss the issue of teacher professional. ‧ 國. 學. identity and extend to the design for teacher learning in both formal and informal. ‧. CoPs in the fifth chapter.. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. 25. i n U. v.

(36) 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. 26. i n U. v.

(37) CHAPTER 4 Results and Findings. As the purpose of the study is to explore an English teacher’s professional identity development across formal and informal educational contexts through all of her English learning and teaching process, the learning and teaching stories of the English teacher informant, Jenny, are presented in this chapter to provide a broad picture of her background. The stories are divided into several critical phases based on. 政治大. chronological order and the main events occurring at each phases relevant to her. 立. professional identity formation are provided. Through the results depicted in this. ‧ 國. 學. chapter, the interactions between the teacher informant, her learning and teaching contexts and the accompanying impacts on her teacher identity and professional. ‧. development are revealed.. io. sit. y. Nat. n. al. er. Jenny’s Prior Formal Schooling. i n U. v. This section presents Jenny’s prior formal schooling experience from. Ch. engchi. elementary school to university. Two subsections of Jenny’s formal schooling experience are described as follows: the first one focuses on her learning of English language and her perception towards English language; the other is about her schooling experience and her initial conception toward teachers and teaching.. Jenny’s English learning story. Jenny learned English in Taiwan, never studying abroad. In the summer vacation before Jenny entered a junior high school, she started her English learning in a cram school where English teaching could be described as traditional. That is, oral speaking ability and practice were not 27.

(38) emphasized. Jenny narrated, [… our learning in the cram school] was not about learning oral speaking happily. [Instead,] we [treated English learning] as [a kind of] abstract knowledge. [We] just read the articles from the textbooks. My [English] learning background did not have any oral speaking practice. (Excerpt one: Narrative 031912) Basically, Jenny in her cram school before junior high school was required to read articles from the textbook and memorize the K.K. phonics. For her, the requirements. 政治大 I would just make use of the time during TV commercial to memorize the 立. was actually quite easy to meet as she described,. vocabulary, and it could be about ten minutes. […] Anyway, I could cram the. ‧ 國. 學. vocabulary words in a very short time. [In fact,] my grades were very high. ‧. and [I often took the tests] very smoothly. [I] just felt free and relaxed for my. y. Nat. [English] learning, and did not think junior high English was difficult at all.. er. io. sit. (Excerpt two: Narrative 031912). Moreover, sometimes Jenny felt that the pace of instruction was so slow that she. al. n. v i n Clearn could actually read the textbooks and by U herself. Most of the time, in h e everything i h ngc. fact, she did the self-studying in class regardless of following the teacher’s instruction, but she still had good performance and was sometimes complimented by the teacher. English language learning in the junior high school was no obvious difference for Jenny, either. The instruction given by formal school teachers mainly focused on the same grammatical patterns and reading skills as what she had learned in cram schools. Jenny’s English learning therefore was not challenging at all during junior high school years, both in the formal school and the cram school. The encouragement from her English teachers in the two learning contexts brought confidence to her. She provided some examples of teacher’s praise for her English performance in the cram 28.

(39) school and the formal school. [In the cram school], my English learning went very well when I was about to become a freshman in junior high school. [I] learned cursive writing [at that time]. And I still remembered at that time the teacher mentioned two names who wrote good cursive writing among a hundred students: one was me and the other was the student sitting next to me. (Excerpt three: Narrative 031912). One of my junior high school [English] teachers encouraged us to mark K.K.. 政治大 us to write K.K. for bonus points. […] And I usually did it for bonus, and then 立. [phonics]. That is a very traditional way of learning English, […] to encourage. most of [the phonics] I wrote were correct, so the teacher had a really good. ‧ 國. 學. impression of [me]. (Excerpt four: Narrativ031912). ‧. In Jenny’s senior high school years, she found that English learning was not as. y. Nat. easy as before and her English ability could not be improved without a great deal of. er. io. sit. effort. However, Jenny’s interest in English did not wane since she has favorable past impression of English learning. She said,. al. n. v i n In junior high school, C [I] could read [EnglishUtextbooks] faster than [the pace of hengchi. instruction given by] the teacher. [I] just did not think it should take any efforts. That is, I had a feeling that I obtained [all the English knowledge] without making any efforts. And in senior high school, [I] felt that I always made mistakes in identifying parts of speech and could not make up sentences for compositions. [I] began to feel that English ability was not easy to develop. The feeling [of learning English] became different. But the positive impression before [still worked]. When I did not gain [as much as before], [when I] was not encouraged, or did not gain the bonus points, I did not become to dislike the school subject. [I] probably had drawn enough benefits from it [before], so 29.

(40) there was a kind of savings for me to consume. (Excerpt five: Narrative 031912) Jenny’s own hobby, reading, also helped to maintain her interest in English learning. She remarked, The reason that I liked to enter the English department in high school is because I read a lot [of novels] at the senior school stage. The extracurricular reading material of mine since childhood is novels, of course, Chinese novels. But I found they were actually translation versions when I was young. In the author. 政治大 from some English words [that I could] not understand. […] [I found that the 立. introduction of the book page, the name of the author in Chinese was translated. novels] were written in English and hoped to read their original versions. […]. ‧ 國. 學. The main motive of my choosing English department is that I wanted to read. ‧. the original versions, though actually I did not read then at all. I thought the. y. Nat. reason I chose English department is maybe because of books. […] I found it. er. io. sit. was very strange that I was in Taiwan yet the books I read are all translations, and I began to want to study the language. (Excerpt six: Narrative 031912). al. n. v i n C hshe had read were originally Jenny loved reading, and many novels written in English. engchi U. She therefore became interested in the original versions of those novels and also in the language. Both previous smooth learning experience and her personal interest in novel reading led her to choose to study social sciences in the later two years of senior high school and finally pursued advanced education an the English department during university.. Jenny’s holistic schooling experience. In Jenny’s prior schooling experience before becoming an English teacher, many of the teachers she met positively impressed her, and she held deep affection for her teachers. She liked the teachers 30.

(41) who had positive interaction with students and had true concerns for students in their own ways. Teachers represented knowledgeable intellectual in Jenny’s student life. In the second year of elementary school, Jenny liked her homeroom teacher. The teacher firstly introduced herself as a graduate from a college, which impressed Jenny very much and she thought studying in a college must be great. The following is Jenny’s description. I liked my homeroom teacher in the second year of elementary school, and I. 政治大 [graduated] from Tunghai University. So, [I] felt that studying in a college was 立 always have a deep impression [of her]. And [she once introduced that] she. great and the teacher was great. It was a positive impression, which may be. ‧ 國. 學. related to my own life, the life out of school, my family background, in which. ‧. there was no university at all. Because I was young at that time, in my life there. io. er. college. (Excerpt seven: Narration 03192012). sit. y. Nat. were just my father, mother, and an elder sister, and none of them studied in a. al. n. v i n C h in the fifth and sixth Jenny’s homeroom teacher years of elementary school, on engchi U. the other hand, had more frequent and intimate interaction with Jenny and her classmates. She said,. The teacher in the fifth and sixth years of elementary school is impressive because that was the first time that I had such joyous time in [my] life. Then in [my] impression, the relationship between [the teacher and the whole class] was close. We all played together. It was not true [for the teacher and us] to play together actually. [But I] felt [we were] very close. (Excerpt eight: Interview 052912) During Jenny’s senior high school life, the homeroom teacher in the second and 31.

(42) third years impressed her greatly with the paper-and-pencil interaction on a weekly journal. Jenny once expressed a stupid idea yet actually important for herself on the journal. She thought it was just a small thing, but the teacher treated it seriously. She seemed to understand her feeling and responded with positive comments on the journal. Jenny described the idea and the teacher’s response, I was a shy person, shy to all unfamiliar things. So, it was really stupid. Near my home there was a park that was being built. The park was on both sides of a bridge. So a bridge in the middle connected the park. I just felt, just imagined,. 政治大 cross the bridge from this side to that side of the park. […] In fact, to go to an 立. and felt it was wonderful. [I] really wanted to hang around in the park, and then. unfamiliar environment and do such a thing without any purposes is truly weird.. ‧ 國. 學. Then, I wrote in my weekly journal that [I] hoped one day I would do this thing.. ‧. [That is] to overcome the unfamiliar feeling and do such a thing. Ya, then she. y. Nat. […] encouraged me, or was positive to my idea, and said, “ya, hope you can do. er. io. sit. so one day.” I felt so touched. (Excerpt nine: Interview 052912). Jenny was an introverted person and afraid to try new, unfamiliar thing. Yet the. al. n. v i n C h Jenny feel touched teacher’s comments on the journal made for she felt the teacher’s engchi U. concerns about students. The sharing and the teacher’s feedback on the journal was a kind of positive interaction for Jenny. In addition, when the classmates asked some personal questions, the teacher always answered without reservations. In Jenny’s mind, the teacher treated the students sincerely and candidly without talking like a bureaucrat or holding onto a teacher’s authority. In Jenny’s schooling experience, it is clear to know that the teacher-student interaction between most of the teachers and her left positive impression on her. The good impression generated her deep affections toward the teachers as well as favorable feelings toward teaching jobs. 32.

(43) Jenny’s Teaching Experience in Informal Educational Contexts This section presents Jenny’s initial teaching experience and teacher professional development with shifts between different informal educational contexts. By starting to access English teaching in informal educational contexts, Jenny integrated her favorable English subject matter and teaching aspiration to capture a general understanding of English teaching.. 政治大 First teaching experience in a kids’ English center. Jenny began her English 立. teaching job in the second year of university. One of Jenny’s senior high school. ‧ 國. 學. friends wanted to apply for a part-time teaching job and asked Jenny to do it with her.. ‧. Jenny had been interested in teaching, yet she was unsure about her competence and. y. Nat. thought that she might not overcome her introvert personality to teach in front of. er. io. sit. many students. Nevertheless, this best friend’s company and encouragement made her feel more comfortable and then helped her take a big step to enter English teaching. al. n. v i n C h kids’ English center profession. The owner of a regional did not really set strict engchi U. qualifications for English teachers, so Jenny and her friend successfully got the job there without any teaching experience. She expressed the meaning of the first English teaching job as, At that time [I] thought kids’ English was beginning level, and I could try [teaching] with a friend’s company. It is also what I am interested in. Of course, being interested in [teaching] was still the core reason. Some of my other friends may think that I took the job because this person did it. [But] if she did something else that I was not interested in, and I would not have done it simply because of her. […] I always think that I am a person who just swims with the 33.

(44) current, letting the nature take its course. [I] swim with the current to the place I want. […] for me, it was just the first try. At that time I did not know the payment [of an English teacher]. But I just thought that [I] [wanted] a comfortable workplace to be familiar with this [profession]. Even though the payment was really low, I did not care about it, for what I needed was an intial try. (Excerpt ten: Narrative 031912) Through the first part-time English teaching job, Jenny knew that she liked teaching and interaction with students.. 政治大 advancement from Jenny’s viewpoint. Jenny stated, 立. However, the kids’ English center was not an ideal context for professional. Basically, while the feeling of [teaching] there was good and I liked the job, that. ‧ 國. 學. [I] liked the job means that [I] would hope to have a further development in this. ‧. field. But that was a very small-scale cram school, in which I thought the. y. Nat. potential for career advancement was low. What I meant is not the promotion.. er. io. sit. Instead, I was just a novice, and the colleagues around me were also new and they were not really good at teaching. […] Because the cram school owner was. al. n. v i n C h[…] she socializedUwith the mothers of the more of a master of socialization. engchi. students and used this as a strategy to keep the enrollment. She kept the students in such a way but it was not because of good teaching effects. I liked teaching, and to continue teaching in the same cram school was also a way to go. But if I wanted to obtain a better ability or have a [better learning model], I did not think I would get it [from this particular cram school]. (Excerpt twelve: Narrative 031912) In addition to the primary drawback about advancement potential mentioned in Jenny narrative, the cram school owner asked teachers to conduct a student achievement presentation by themselves without providing any assistance. As a 34.