scholarly journals The Effects of a Study-Abroad Experience on Pre-Service Foreign Language Teachers’ Teaching Philosophies

2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-87
Author(s):  
Ayşegül Takkaç Tulgar
Keyword(s):  
Study Abroad ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Teaching Profession ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Foreign Language Teachers ◽  
Exchange Programs ◽  
Teaching Philosophies ◽  
The World ◽  
International Learning

Summary With the globalization of the world and the ease to travel to different parts of the globe, the popularity of exchange programs for students has increased. Many students around the world apply such programs in order to have international learning experiences in which they can, besides educational purposes, meet new social and cultural values while introducing their native cultures. As study-abroad experiences have attracted attention regarding their various effects on the participants, research focusing on students participating in such programs may provide useful insight on their contributions to pre-service teachers’ teaching philosophies. Therefore, this study is intended to investigate the effects of a study-abroad experience on the way three pre-service teachers perceived the teaching profession and whether it modified their teaching philosophy. The data were collected through reflection reports and semi-structured interviews with three Turkish pre-service teachers who spent a semester in Hungary on a study-abroad experience. Content analysis was adopted for data analysis. The results revealed that the participants developed in terms of their linguistic, personal, social, cultural and educational understanding, which in turn contributed to their perceptions and conceptions of the teaching profession and caused them to adjust their teaching philosophies. In the light of these results, some suggestions are provided.

A Multicultural Approach at the Early Stage of Teaching a Foreign language

2021 ◽  
pp. 34-40
Author(s):  
Nadezhda Kantysheva ◽  
Alfiya Rahmatullina
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Novice Teacher ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Future Teacher ◽  
Cultural Identification ◽  
Foreign Language Teachers ◽  
The World ◽  
Elective Course ◽  
Technological Competencies

The article presents the experience of developing an elective course program for future foreign language teachers studying at Tyumen State University. The content of the course is based on the principles of communication and variability and is focused on the development of the communicative, psychological, pedagogical and technological competencies of the future teacher. The creation by the teacher of favorable pedagogical conditions for a positive cultural identification of the student’s personality allows the child to become aware of the multicultural space of the world. The professional portfolio of a novice teacher includes techniques, methods and technologies that can be used for further pedagogical modeling.

Online Informal Language Learning Among Foreign Language Teachers

2020 ◽  
pp. 315-332
Author(s):  
Violeta Jurkovič ◽  
Vita Kilar ◽  
Nives Lenassi ◽  
Darja Mertelj
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Social Group ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Online Resources ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Foreign Language Teachers ◽  
Online Behaviour ◽  
Insight Into

Today's online world provides foreign language users and learners with a multitude of opportunities to engage in a variety of language activities. A social group that can derive major benefits from the availability of online resources in different languages is foreign language teachers. Based on an ‘emic' approach, this study involves case studies of three experienced foreign language teachers that used diaries over a period of eight weeks to report on every instance of online use of their predominant foreign language and English. Semi-structured interviews were used to obtain insight into online behaviour that was not specifically related to the eight-week period of diary-keeping. The results indicate that the online uses of the three participants, although they belong to the same social and age groups, display great variety in terms of online activities and the predominant language used to perform these activities.

scholarly journals The Gayonese Culture of Marriage System: The Islamic Law Perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 108
Author(s):  
Ridwan Nurdin ◽  
Muhamad Yusuf ◽  
Syarifah Sharah Natasya
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Values ◽  
Islamic Law ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Family Resilience ◽  
Cultural Value ◽  
Community Leaders ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Depth Analysis ◽  
The Family ◽  
The World

This research explores the Gayonese culture of marriage through an analytical view of the Islamic law. There has been a shift in marriage system in the Gayonese society, in which the Juelen and the Angkap, the two formerly known systems shifted to Kuso Kini. This is an empirical research using the law historical approach to allow the author restropectively explore the construction of law and its shift from time to time.  The data was gathered through an in-depth analysis of the literature and semi-structured interviews of the community leaders. The findings suggest that marriage systems are shifting and the Gayonese communities do not problematize this transformation. In fact, they are not in the position to force their children to adopt both the Juelen and the Angkap marriage system. This is so, since most communities in the present times prefer Kuso Kini marriage system to the other two. The Kuso Kini marriage system gives freedom for spouses to decide where they should stay, either with their parents or find their own living. This shift in marriage system is the result of cultural intermingled, in which some non-Gayonese migrated to the Gayonese Island and brought with them their own cultural values. The same is true to the Gayonese communities migrating to places beyond the Gayonese Island. It is therefore believed that a shift in marriage system is a must as the world today allow people across different cultural values to integrate with each other. The integration for sure gives changes to a certain cultural value. However, changes in cultural practices do not result in cultural-religious clashes. In fact, it is expected that the changes contribute to the family resilience and the marriage cultural system, the Kuso Kini, prevails.

scholarly journals Virginity Testing Beyond a Medical Examination

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (7) ◽  
pp. 152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehri Robatjazi ◽  
Masoumeh Simbar ◽  
Fatemeh Nahidi ◽  
Jaber Gharehdaghi ◽  
Mohammadali Emamhadi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sexually Transmitted Diseases ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Medical Examination ◽  
World Health ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Sexually Transmitted ◽  
The World ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Virginity Testing

<p>Apart from religious values, virginity is important in different communities because of its prominent role in reducing sexually transmitted diseases and teen pregnancies. Even though virginity testing has been proclaimed an example of violence against women by the World Health Organization, it is still conducted in many countries, including Iran. 16 in-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with participants aged 32 to 60 years to elucidate the perceptions and experiences of Iranian examiners of virginity testing.</p><p>The perception and experience of examiners were reflected in five main themes. The result of this study indicated that virginity testing is more than a medical examination, considering the cultural factors involved and its overt and covert consequences. In Iran, testing is performed for both formal and informal reasons, and examiners view such testing with ambiguity about the accuracy and certainty of the diagnosis and uncertainty about ethics and reproductive rights. Examiners are affected by the overt and covert consequences of virginity testing, beliefs and cultural values underlying virginity testing, and informal and formal reasons for virginity testing.</p>

scholarly journals Building Professional Competences of English Language Teachers

2018 ◽  
Vol 50 ◽  
pp. 01077
Author(s):  
Lyudmila Karpova ◽  
Elena Grigorieva ◽  
Elena Ladonina ◽  
Olga Popova ◽  
Anna Shchekoldina
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
English Language ◽  
Teaching Profession ◽  
Educational Process ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Foreign Language Teachers ◽  
Language Of Instruction ◽  
Language Teacher ◽  
Key Skills ◽  
English Language Teachers

This article is devoted to the problem of building professional competences for the teaching profession. The paper highlights four main groups of professional competences: cultural and linguistic competences, linguistic and didactic competences, social and educational competences, professional and educational competences. It presents a brief summary of key skills a person should possess to be a competent foreign language teacher. Foreign language teachers should act as professional inheritors, critics and interpreters of knowledge and culture when teaching students. They also have to be able to communicate clearly in the language of instruction, using correct grammar, in various contexts related to teaching. Moreover a foreign language teacher should adapt his or her teaching to the needs of students with various disabilities, integrate ICT in teaching activities, cooperate with school staff, parents and students in pursuing the educational objectives, collaborate with the teaching team in developing programs and projects when teaching students. The article attempts to identify learning situations that are appropriate to the students concerned and the subject content with view to developing the competences targeted. The study can help in designing and modelling the educational process within the frameworks of the competence approach.

scholarly journals English as a Foreign Language Teachers’ Motivation: An Activity Theory Perspective

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Teymour Rahmati ◽  
Karim Sadeghi
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Activity Theory ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Mixed Methods Study ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Foreign Language Teachers ◽  
Motivation Factors ◽  
Teachers Beliefs ◽  
Practical Implications

Drawing upon Activity Theory, this mixed-methods study explored L2 teachers’ (de)motivation factors, motivation change, and voice in adopting strategies that could motivate L2 teachers. Semi-structured interviews, a motivational timeline diagram, and a researcher-developed scale were used to collect data from 226 in-service L2 teachers. The interview data collected from 15 participants were analyzed through open, axial, and selective coding using MAXQDA Analytics Pro version 12.3. Individual participants’ motivational timelines were also carried over into a collective diagram to illustrate motivational trajectories. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the quantitative data collected from 211 teachers. The findings identified a number of (de)motivation factors and indicated that L2 teachers experienced changes in their motivation due to some primary and secondary level contradictions in their motivational activity systems. Moreover, L2 teachers’ commitment to their profession revealed the significant role of teachers’ beliefs and agency in resolving those contradictions. The theoretical and practical implications of the study were accordingly discussed.

scholarly journals RECONSTRUCTION OF IRANIAN ENGLISH FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHERS’ PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY IN ONLINE CLASSES

2021 ◽  
Vol 79 (6) ◽  
pp. 858-879
Author(s):  
Raziyeh Fallah ◽  
Azizeh Chalak ◽  
Hossein Heidari Tabrizi
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Communities Of Practice ◽  
Professional Identity ◽  
English Teachers ◽  
Qualitative Approach ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Teaching Skills ◽  
Online Classes ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Foreign Language Teachers

Because of the Covid-19 outbreak, all academic institutions all over the world swiftly shifted to reconstitute the presentation of their courses that customarily took place on campus. This study explored the kind of online professional identities that English teachers in private language institutes constructed during the Covid-19 Pandemic. Additionally, it examined possible impacts of adopting online solutions on teachers’ performance and teaching skills and their perceptions of communities of practice and their effect on their PI in online classes during this period. The study was conducted on 35 English teachers, teaching English in language institutes in Yazd, Iran. The study followed a qualitative approach. Semi-structured interviews were conducted individually and also in groups, to gain access to their lived experiences of running online classes. Results revealed four main characteristics that (re)constructed and affected teachers’ PI in online classes, namely, teachers’ role, competency and self-effectiveness, appreciation and connection, and future plans. The findings also revealed that streamlined communication and communities of practice were very beneficial in (re)constructing their changing identities in online classes. Membership in communities of practice was found to be an essential action to make teachers’ teaching skills and social learning better and share common experiences. The results showed that these aspects highly influence the teachers’ reconstruction of PI in a positive way in language institutes. Keywords: communities of practice, English as a foreign language, language institute, online professional identity, qualitative approach

scholarly journals Benefits of Studying Abroad for Graduate Employability: Perspectives of Exchange Students from Lao Universities

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Soubin Sisavath
Keyword(s):  
Study Abroad ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Exchange Programs ◽  
Studying Abroad ◽  
Graduate Employability ◽  
Job Opportunities ◽  
Educational Credentials ◽  
Student Exchange ◽  
Student Exchange Programs ◽  
High Level

This study investigated the benefits of studying abroad with student exchange programs for graduate employability. Data were drawn from a survey with 163 Lao former exchange participants at three public universities in Laos, followed by 19 semi-structured interviews. Results revealed that participants benefited from participating in overseas exchanges at a high level in terms of the development of employability skills, particularly interpersonal and communication skills, and in multidisciplinary knowledge and international competences. Study abroad experience was positively considered as being related to increasing job opportunities, which signal better educational credentials with proven skills that are demanded in the domestic labor market. This study offers useful insights into the benefits of student exchange programs and adds perspectives from a developing country whose voice has been little heard in the literature on the value of study abroad. 

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