Caught in a dilemma: the beliefs and practices of Japanese teachers of English

Abstract

The understanding of teachers' thought processes and practices has been gaining researchers' attention for the past two decades. In particular, the relationship between teacher beliefs and practices has been thought to be important in order to understand teachers' beliefs and personal pedagogical theories, and whether and how they translate their beliefs into practice. The current study employs ethnography as the research method in order to understand the beliefs and practices of Japanese teachers of English at the secondary level in their socio-cultural and political contexts . The teachers' initial interviews revealed that the teachers considered three themes --communicative language teaching (CLT), learner motivation and classroom management (CM) --as important areas in their work, and these were selected for further investigation. An important theme that emerged from these three topics is that the teachers are caught in many dichotomous dilemmas. The results show that although the teachers believed in the benefits of teaching English communicatively, many factors hinder them from translating their beliefs into practice. Furthermore, in spite of their support for CLT, the teachers mostly taught English using the traditional translation-based method. This dichotomy has led to a concern that students perceive there are two different types of English-one type being communication, and the other being grammar lessons for passing the tests. Aware of this divide, many of the teachers did not know how to bridge the two approaches to teaching and learning. Another teacher concern was student behaviour including motivation and class management. The teachers' perception of learner motivation suggests that whereas they believe in the importance oflong-term motivation, they have few strategies to encourage it. In addition, the difficulties in ensuring classroom management impose many challenges for the teachers. In order to simultaneously accomplish two different goals-academic achievement and classroom management-the teachers used various strategies and constantly made compromises. An examination the teachers' beliefs and practices has shown that the relationship between these two constructs is not straightforward, but complex. Factors involving teacher cognition as well as many social factors play an important role in facilitating, but at times hindering, teachers' translating their beliefs into practice. The results demonstrated that some social factors, at times, encourage teachers ' beliefs to change over time. The study offers possible suggestions pertaining to improving English education in Japan while considering the cultural and social constraints. Implications for further research are also discussed.