PAPER
REVIEW
— Haris C.
Adhikari
Khaing, T.
(2020). Investigating the qualities of EFL teachers from the perceptions of the
students. International Journal of English Language Teaching, 8(3), pp.
34-46.
Thantar Khaing’s (2020) article “Investigating the qualities of EFL teachers from the perceptions of the students,” which is published in International Journal of English Language Teaching (IJELT), analyzes undergraduate (EFL third year) students’ responses regarding their understanding of the qualities of EFL teachers. The author states that his objectives in this study are to identify students’ perceptive attitude on the qualities of language teachers and to find out the prominent features of good language teachers, as perceived by his research participants. Overall, because of a number of reasons, the article reads a ‘mediocre’ one.
The author uses a mixed method in this research. His reviews of relevant literature and recent empirical researches in the area read ‘qualitative’ in nature, whereas his questionnaires adapted from Murdoch (1997) gives the research a ‘quantitative’ angle. The first approach helps him see certain perceptions established by theories and empirical researches. The researcher says that the second approach, i.e., the survey, helps him test and see the truth behind those perceptions. Yet, he only ritualistically deals with this in his analysis. Similarly, his questionnaires are so designed that focus primarily on three areas, namely, ELT competencies, general teaching competencies, and teachers’ knowledge and attitudes. But these areas, too, are not clearly dealt with, as we will shortly see.
As theoretical guidance, the author goes to Richards (2001), who forwards six core components of teacher knowledge, namely, practical knowledge, content knowledge, contextual knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, personal knowledge, and reflective knowledge. Similarly, he uses Borg’s (2006) idea of socio-affective skills, which enable teachers to establish good rapport with their students and to maintain the process of education more effectively. In addition, he borrows ideas from Richards and Farrell (2005), who suggest that learning regularly with self-reflection and evaluation, developing specialized knowledge and skills about teaching and research through theory and practical issues in teaching, taking on new roles and responsibilities, developing collaborative relationships with others, and updating with rapid changes in the profession, all are important for being a successful language teacher.
The author also consults some empirical researches regarding his topic. Apart from the theoretical references made, which cover a wide range of teacher qualities, his references to Lee’s (2010) research (which views EFL teachers and teaching as ‘unique’ in many ways and takes contextual factors to affect and shape teaching and learning) and to Nghia’s (2015) research (in which three qualities, namely, teachers’ English competence, teaching skills, and socio-affective skills have been found as the most significant aspects for being a successful English teacher) in particular seem to have been helpful for him to frame his questionnaire.
The reader may find this research quite ‘odd’ because it does not use research questions. It sets out with its objectives, which are mentioned only in its abstract, towards literature review and review of relevant empirical researches. This is followed by its research design, in which the author talks about research participants, research procedure, data collection, and data analysis and interpretation. His survey participants are forty EFL third year students from Mandalay University of Foreign languages. He believes that these students, with their two years of previous experiences as EFL learners, are more capable to speak on qualities of language teachers. However, he does not provide any rationale for choosing only ‘forty’ participants. He collects data using 52 different items kept in the questionnaire, in which ‘ELT competencies’ (Part - A) comprises of 22 items, ‘general teaching competencies’ (Part – B) includes 20 items, and ‘knowledge and attitudes’ (Part – C) contains 10 items. The researcher has used 6 points scale in which 0 stands for ‘not sure’, 1 for ‘totally irrelevant’, 2 for ‘of minor importance’, 3 for ‘important’, 4 for ‘very important’ and 5 for ‘absolutely essential’. But in the analysis sections, he only ritualistically touches upon his promise of presenting the perceptions of his participants on each item of the survey questionnaires, i.e., by means of percentage. He lacks a rigorously in-depth analysis of the survey data. He only deals with three or four highly valued items in the survey.
The survey analysis and interpretation lead to the central ideas of the paper, which come from the three categories, namely ELT competencies, general teaching competencies, and teacher knowledge and attitudes. The paper basically focuses on contextual perceptions about prominent qualities and competences of good EFL teachers. Regarding ELT competencies, the findings from the analysis of the 22 items in this particular category mainly reveal that an effective language teacher should be able to present language points in clear and interesting ways (as expressed by 77.5 % of the participants), working as a model for students. Employing a variety of activities for developing the four language skills is essential (as expressed by 70 % of the participants). In this, language proficiency has been viewed as an essential quality of an English language teacher—to have effective teaching and learning processes. Equally important are content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge—to guide or facilitate students effectively. Similarly, creating interesting classroom or group work activities is highly essential. Interactive activities, which remind of some tenets of socio-affective skills (Borg, 2006), can help teachers motivate students for developing the four skills of language. It helps strengthen teacher-students relationship as well.
In terms of general teaching competencies, the 20 items under this category in the survey primarily reveal that if language teachers can give clear instructions, examples or demonstrations prior to classroom activities, the learning process will be more effective (as revealed from 75 % of the participants). Similarly, positive or inspiring teacher personality encourages shy students, apart from helping to build a good relationship with students in general. Regarding teachers’ patient, polite and helpful nature, 18 out of 40 participants go for “absolutely essential.” In addition, checking constantly and making sure about whether students have understood teaching points or not is very important (as revealed by 24 out of 40 students). Moreover, taking into consideration students’ interests, recognizing their achievements or potentials, and providing appropriate feedback count as essential for a fruitful learning. Language teachers should also be equally good at classroom management.
As regards teacher knowledge and attitudes, the author says that the 10 items in this category basically identify what a good English instructor should possess in EFL context. But he does not enumerate all of them. 50 % of the participants have responded that EFL teachers need to experiment and carry out classroom research in order to further improve their teaching competence. It is also essential for their professional development. The second important factor for 18 out of 40 participants is that EFL teachers should be knowledgeable concerning the use of different varieties and styles of English across different cultures. Similarly, these participants view English teachers as distinctively different from other subject teachers, as mentioned by the author. But the author does not provide the reason why. Instead, he rushes to state that this is the reason (unexplained reason!) why ELT competencies, general teaching competencies, and teacher knowledge and attitudes are believed as important characteristics of language teachers, as perceived by the participants. Interestingly, these participants rate the issue of language teachers’ knowledge and attitudes as less important than other issues.
In the conclusion, the author irrelevantly makes references to other empirical research findings before he lengthily reiterates the same things discussed in the analysis sections. I did not find the paper so helpful because it does not reveal much as promised. Rather, it disorients its readers to some extent. The author could have devoted much space for data interpretation and findings and could have made it ‘in-depth’ and ‘clearer’.
On another front, the paper has a lot of other drawbacks which appear ‘conspicuous’. It seriously lacks rigorous reviewing and editing. For example, let us see the grammatical incoherence in the highlighted and italicized words and phrases in these sentences: “The reason for choosing the students from this university is that students are learning foreign languages as a major subject and they can be more aware of a good qualities of language teacher” (p. 38). The missing article in the construction “…that students…” gives a feel that of a draft copy. Further, there is an absence of grammatical agreement. So is the case with the expression “of minor important” (p. 38). Also, there are too many spelling errors. Among them, here are two examples: ‘Socio-affective’ has been written as “socio-effective” (p. 36) and ‘different societies’ has been written as “different society” (p. 44). Similarly, two conclusion section constructions read: “Therefore; this research aimed to …” (p. 44) and “in the context different universities” (p. 45). In the first one, the connector is followed by a ‘semicolon’. In the second one, a preposition is missing. There are many other similar instances in the paper. A paper published in a peer reviewed international journal must have been a finer one, which is not the case with this paper. The reader feels disappointed.
Most important of all, the inquiry proceeds ahead without any research questions, as mentioned earlier, and ends up with a shallow or scanty analysis. All in all, this research article is prematurely published. I wonder why such journals as IJELT, which is published from the UK, rush to publish without sufficient editorial scrutiny. Perhaps the situation created by COVID – 19, during which the paper has appeared, might have something to do with this. Is publication easy during pandemic situations?
LINK TO THE JOURNAL / REVIEWED PAPER:
