Counting on the Experience: A Comparative Study of Novice and Expert English Teachers at Public Junior High School in Japan

International Journal of English Language and Translation Studies

Natsuko SUEZAWA¹ 

[1] Kobe University, Japan ;

关键词: Teaching Expertise;    EFL Education;    Teaching Experience;    Expert and Novice Teachers;    Comparative Analysis;   

DOI  :  

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

This paper presents a study of a comparative analysis between expert and novice English teachers in the Japanese EFL (English as a foreign language) context of public junior high school. In Japan, since we are facing school teachers’ aging and mass-retirement in the near future, it is essential to take over expert teachers’ knowledge to younger generation. In order to seek expertise knowledge and experience, the study attempted: 1) to clarify the differences in viewpoint on classroom observations of a video-recorded English lesson by novices and experts, and 2) to explicitly elicit the experts’ teaching knowledge to be able to enrich the understanding of novices. The procedure first involved video-recording an English lesson taught by a relatively inexperienced teacher. Three expert and three novice teacher-participants were then asked to watch the video-recorded lessons, commenting on what they observed on the screen. Their observations were likewise recorded. The participants’ comments were subsequently analyzed by dividing them into the two categories of descriptive comments and evaluative comments, which were further sub-divided into 21 types. The results showed a great difference in the total number of comments between the novices and experts, the former of whom made only 16, while the latter contributed 72. By contrast with the novices’ observations, which were largely descriptive, the comments by the experts were widely diverse, including suggestions, knowledge gained from experience, and beliefs. Implications for teaching English are discussed in light of their insights.

【 授权许可】

Unknown