Expanding the Socio-Cultural Knowledge

Base of TESOL Teacher Education

Seran Dogancay-Aktuna
Department of English Language and Literature, Southern Illinois
University Edwardsville, Peck Hall, Box 1431, Edwardsville,
Illinois 62026-1431, USA
This paper argues for the expansion of the knowledge base of TESOL teacher
education to integrate greater awareness of the sociocultural and political context of
teaching English to speakers of other languages. It is argued that the changing
roles of teachers, insights gained from classroom research and recent developments
in critical applied linguistics, coupled with the inherent complexity of language
teaching, necessitate this curricular modication. The paper outlines three areas of
inquiry to be integrated into existing TESOL teacher education curricula: (1) discus-
sion of crosscultural variation in language teaching and learning and tools for inves-
tigating this variation; (2) overview of management of pedagogical innovation; and (3)
examination of the sociopolitical factors surrounding the teaching of English as an
international language. Appropriate junctions in current TESOL teacher education
curricula that will allow for the integration of these three areas are suggested through-
out the paper, along with resources that can aid teacher educators and curriculum
developers in educating more socioculturally and politically aware teachers.
doi: 10.2167/lcc320.0
Keywords: sociocultural context, teachers knowledge base, teacher education, teaching
English as a second/international language
Introduction
Second/foreignlanguage learning is a complex process governedby a variety of
individual, instructional and contextual factors. This complexity necessitates
careful preparation of language teachers in a variety of areas in order to equip
them for dealing with the multiplicity of challenges that occur in the language
classroom. Indeed, no single set of disciplinary knowledge could provide the
resources to developrealistic solutions to problems encounteredinlanguage class-
rooms. The broader the knowledge base of teachers, however, the greater would
be their ability to deal with the demands of their profession. Based on the chan-
ging role of teachers in the teaching-learning process and insights gained from
diverse classroomstudies, in this paper I argue for a reconsideration of the knowl-
edge base of TESOL teacher education towards training teachers who would be
more critical in their decision making. I propose three domains of inquiry to be
integrated into existing TESOL teacher education programmes in order to
prepare teachers who are more culturally and sociopolitically conscientious.
These three domains are (1) awareness of crosscultural variation in language
teaching and learning and the tools to explore such variation; (2) knowledge of
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LANGUAGE, CULTURE AND CURRICULUM Vol. 19, No. 3, 2006
management of innovation in teaching; and (3) awareness of the sociopolitical
factors surrounding the teaching of English as an international language. In
light of classroom studies that both revealed crosscultural variation in norms of
teaching and learning and showed how pedagogical innovations need to be
appropriated to local conditions and expectations to be successful, I rst argue
that greater emphasis needs to be given to raising teachers awareness of not
only crosscultural variation in pedagogy but also of the process of implementing
methodological innovations in language teaching. Then, I discuss why teachers
need a deeper understanding of sociopolitical issues surrounding the teaching
of English as an international language and how we, as teacher educators, can
help. Resources to help teacher educators to integrate these three areas into exist-
ing teacher education programmes are also suggested throughout the paper.
Teachers Knowledge Base
Following Tedick (2005: xviii), the knowledge base of language teachers can be
dened as what it is that second language teachers need to knowand understand
to be effective teachers and how that knowledge is incorporated into second
language teacher education. It was Shulman (1987) who offered us one of the
best known conceptualisations of what teachers knowledge base needed to
consist of: content knowledge, general pedagogic knowledge, curriculum knowl-
edge, pedagogical content knowledge, knowledge of learners and their character-
istics, knowledge of educational contexts, and knowledge of educational ends,
purposes and values. He thus showed the multiple perspectives needed for teach-
ing effectively. In their reconceptualisation of the knowledge base of language
teacher education, Freeman and Johnson (1998: 397) argue for the foregrounding
of the activity of teaching itself in teacher education and the inclusion of forms
of knowledge representation that document teacher learning within the social, cul-
tural, institutional contexts in which it occurs, therefore drawing attention to the
sociocultural context of teaching. Grabe et al. (2000), on the other hand, name the
four disciplines that they believe should form the applied linguistics base of
language teacher education: linguistics, psychology, anthropology and education
(see Grabe et al., 2000 for a discussion of the components of each domain).
Works of the above scholars, among others, show clearly that the knowledge
base of teacher educationshouldbe muchgreater thanpedagogical content knowl-
edge and techniques of classroomdelivery. This paper is intended to complement
the above frameworks by detailing the kinds of sociopolitical and cultural infor-
mation teachers need in order to deal with the complexity of teaching English as
an international language today. The need for a reconsideration of the scope of
language teacher education comes from the changing roles and responsibilities
of language teachers, especially those teaching English as a global language. It
also stems from the fact that the sociopolitical and cultural variables surrounding
English language teaching (ELT) have not received adequate attention until
recently, as discussed below.
Changing roles of language teachers
In the past decades we have progressed from a top-down teacher training
approach that regarded teachers as passive transmitters of knowledge to
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 279
learners, to a more bottom-up, reection-oriented teacher development
approach, grounded in language teachers exploring and reecting on their
classroom experiences. Despite this positive development, as
Kumaravadivelu (2003) explains, a shortcoming of the reection-oriented
approach was its total focus on the classroom, with inadequate attention to
the sociopolitical and other contextual factors that shape a teachers practice.
Derived from critical pedagogy, the most recent approach to teacher education
assumes such awareness in the teachers, however. This recent view of teachers
as transformative intellectuals emphasises the teachers role in the sociopoli-
tical emancipation and empowerment of learners. Teachers are expected to be
sociopolitically conscientious and able to maximise learners sociopolitical
awareness via problem-posing classroom activities. Yet, although recent con-
ceptualisations of teacher education reinforce the acknowledgment of the act
of teaching and learning a language as socioculturally grounded, many
language teacher education programmes still appear to focus on linguistic
theory and methodology, usually at the expense of preparing teachers who
are adequately equipped for teaching in todays globalising world (cf.
Govardhan et al., 1999), especially in terms of their macro socio-cultural and
political awareness. Knowledge of the nature of language in general and the
internal structure of the target language in particular and competence in the
target language should, undoubtedly, be an integral aspect of language
teacher education, as should teaching methodology that is informed by
second language acquisition research. What is argued here is that this linguistic
and methodological knowledge needs to be better contextualised within
discussions of language teaching in its sociocultural and political context. It
is teachers connecting and reecting on the interrelatedness of these areas
that will strengthen their professional knowledge base.
Lack of consideration of sociocultural and political factors in
language teaching
The lack of attention given in language teacher education programmes to
sociocultural variables surrounding second and foreign language teaching
has long been pointed out (e.g. Coleman, 1996; Duff & Uchida, 1997;
Holliday, 1994, 1997; Pennycook, 1994; Tedick & Walker, 1994). Indeed, a
review of course requirements of MA TESOL programmes listed in the
Directory of Teacher Education Programs in TESOL in the United States and
Canada (Garshick, 2002) conrms that not much has changed since the pleas
of the above authors, as indicated by the scarcity of courses that deal with
the sociocultural and political context of TESOL (Dogancay-Aktuna, 2005a).
Though many programmes mandate courses in sociolinguistics, language
and culture, or intercultural communication (cf. Nelson, 1998), such courses
usually focus on the basic concepts of the discipline, often with little discussion
of their applications in real-life teaching contexts. In the meantime, language
teachers encounter teaching tips in scholarly publications, conferences, and
the World Wide Web, with little scrutiny of their appropriateness for different
teaching contexts and little guidance in in-service or pre-service programmes
on how to implement pedagogical innovations. In arguing that successful
ELT is a result of cultural continuity between traditional and innovative
280 Language, Culture and Curriculum
forms of teaching, Holliday (1997: 235) wonders to what degree cultural con-
tinuity is addressed in many training courses, and to what degree it is inhabited
by popular views of technique and method, which might cloud the issue and
create a sociological blindness and a subsequently unused local knowledge.
Others echo and add to Hollidays concerns when they discuss apparent
dogmatism and negligence of the needs of international TESOL students in
English speaking countries (Govardhan et al., 1999; Liu, 1998) and caution
against ethnocentrism in MA TESOL programmes (Liu, 1998).
Fortunately, a growing body of classroom research reporting on problems
learners and teachers encounter in crosscultural teaching contexts (hereby
dened as when the teacher and/or pedagogical approaches used, on the
one hand, and the learners, on the other, belong to different cultures of learning
and teaching) is forming a powerful incentive to urge us to take a closer look at
the sociocultural diversity inherent in teaching and learning practices (see, for
example, Coleman, 1996; Holliday, 1994; Hu, 2002) In Duff and Uchidas (1997:
476) words, cultural awareness and understanding are essential for language
teachers, whether they are working with relatively homogenous populations
in certain EFL settings abroad or with students from diverse backgrounds in
ESL settings. Given the fact that language education occurs in multiple
contexts and with diverse populations, it has become imperative that ESL/
EFL teachers are adequately prepared to successfully transplant pedagogical
innovations across contexts when desired, along with having the skills to
explore, question, and deal with the realities of the various teaching contexts
in which they will function. This awareness needs to be grounded in a discus-
sion of the cultural politics of teaching English as an international language (cf.
McKay, 2002). It is with the aid of such knowledge that teachers will gain the
ability to assess the propriety, feasibility, applicability, and practicality of their
particular language teaching methodology against a certain set of political,
sociocultural, and pedagogic situations that they are going to be working in
(Govardhan et al., 1999: 123).
Expanding the scope of language teacher education: A more
encompassing framework
A comprehensive guideline to show what language teachers need to learn
to become critical educators can be adapted from Reagan and Osborn (2002),
who, in trying to move us toward a critical foreign language pedagogy,
argue that knowledge about language needs to accompany knowledge of the
target language. They call this the metalinguistic knowledge base of human
language whose components they delineate as follows (Reagan & Osborn,
2002: 136).
(1) The social context of language.
(2) The nature and outcomes of language contact.
(3) The nature and implications of codeswitching and codemixing.
(4) Bilingualism and multilingualism as individual and social norms.
(5) An awareness of the ecology of language(s).
(6) Ideology and language.
(7) The relationship between language and power.
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 281
(8) Realistic understandings of the nature and extent of language diversity in
different societies.
(9) Language attitudes.
(10) Issues of language standardisation.
(11) Issues of linguistic purism.
(12) The nature and implications of linguistic variation.
(13) The concept of linguistic legitimacy.
(14) Language rights and language responsibilities.
(15) The nature and process of language change.
(16) The interrelationship of languages and language families.
(17) The historical development of languages.
(18) Language acquisition and language learning.
(19) The relationship between language and culture.
(20) The nature of literacy, and the concept of multiple literacies.
(21) Language differences versus language pathologies.
(22) The nature and uses of language policy and language planning.
(23) Critical language awareness.
The above items are areas language teachers need to know. Fortunately,
many of the items on this list are already covered in the various courses in
TESOL teacher education programmes. Items 1, 2, 3, 4, 12 and 19, for
example, are staples of sociolinguistics courses, as are 10 and 11; 9 and 18 are
dealt with in second language acquisition courses, while 15, 16 and 17 are
covered in introductory linguistics courses. In the remainder of this paper, I
argue that the integration of the following three domains of study into language
teacher education can expose teachers to the remaining items and reinforce dis-
cussions of the politics of language, as in language planning, language rights,
and the like, that appear to be lacking in current TESOL programmes.
1
(1) Awareness of Crosscultural Variation in Teaching and Learning
and Tools for Investigating this Variation
A discussion of styles of learning is now quite customary in second language
acquisition and methodology courses. During this discussion it needs to be
highlighted that these styles can have a cultural component. As Oxford and
Anderson (1995: 201) maintain, for optimal language progress, language
instructors need to understand their students learning styles and the cultural
and crosscultural inuences that help shape those styles, in order to prevent
teachers tendencies to view learning difculties among culturally diverse stu-
dents as problems inherent in the students themselves, rather than a lack of
crosscultural or learning style understanding by the teacher. The authors
argue that many teacher education programmes do not adequately prepare tea-
chers to develop their skills in identifying students learning styles and in
dealing with crosscultural differences. They therefore call for more emphasis
on the importance of situated cognition which holds that the setting and the
activity in which knowledge is developed are not separable from learning . . .
Thus, in the foreign or second language classroom, the activities and cultural
inuences cannot be separated from what is learned. (Oxford & Anderson,
1995: 202). Indeed, if the activity in which knowledge is developed is an integral
282 Language, Culture and Curriculum
part of learning, then an activity that the learner is uncomfortable with or does
not know how to utilise will be an impediment to learning.
A parallel discussion to the above is cultural variation in classroom
behaviour. Two decades ago, Hofstede (1986: 305) lamented that scanning
the literature for information and advice for culturally mixed teacher/student
pairs, I found amazingly little, in view of the frequency of crosscultural learning
situations and of the perplexities they generate. Fortunately, in the past decade
we have accumulated a substantial body of literature not only reporting on
issues encountered when teachers and students from different cultures come
into contact in a classroom, but also showing what happens when there is a
mismatch between the norms and expectations learners bring to the classroom
and the principles reinforced by the teachers pedagogy. Works by Holliday
(1994, 1997), reports in Coleman (1996) and a series of articles, for instance,
show how cultures of learning (Cortazzi & Jin, 1996) can vary across cultures
and how the way in which learners were socialised to behave in classrooms
interact with particular methodologies. Holliday (1997), for instance, shows
how teaching methodology that fails to form cultural continuity with what
the students expect can lead to tissue rejection or intercompetence. He
denes these as the anomalous behaviour people display when they are outsi-
ders to a newculture in which they are involved. He also shows that the learning
group ideal, dened based on ESL classrooms in English speaking countries,
is not universal. In a similar vein, Sullivan (1995) shows how overlapping
and simultaneous talk in Vietnamese classrooms seems to be the norm,
while this might look like chaos to outsiders. In a recent overview, Hu (2002)
reports how communicative language teaching (CLT) failed to have the
expected impact on ELT in China because assumptions underlying CLT con-
icted with the Chinese culture of learning and with teachers and learners
expectations of teaching. Other studies show how Chinese teachers and their
students view explicit grammar analysis as being crucial to foreign language
learning and believe that the teacher should dominate the classroom
(Campbell & Yong, 1993). A teacher who does not do these is seen as lazy or
incompetent. Subsequently, Chinese students hesitate to accept group work,
debates and other interactive activities as meaningful or relevant to their learn-
ing, valuing instead mastery through memorisation as this is perceived to be
the knowledge that would bring them condence and a feeling of success
(Cortazzi & Jin, 1996), especially in standardised examinations. The promotion
of autonomy in traditional Chinese classrooms also proved difcult because
while personal autonomy appears to be a universally desirable and benecial
objective, . . . learner autonomy is exercised within the context of specic cul-
tures (Ho & Crokall, 1995: 236).
In addition to the above, scholars have shown that in many EFL contexts the
goals of language teaching and norms of classroom participation differ from
those in ESL contexts. In Japan, LoCastro (1996) reports how the most
popular activity for students is the whole class working with the teacher and
how the mother tongue is used heavily in the lessons. Li (1998) shows how
Korean teachers prefer discrete-point grammar tests to CLTwhile their students
show resistance to classroom participation. Such resistance does not seem to be
unique to secondary school students. Shamims (1996) postgraduate linguistic
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 283
students in a Pakistani university also resisted interactive classroom partici-
pation, hence making the introduction of changes in classroom behaviour
quite difcult for the teacher. In South Africa, students rate the more mechan-
ical aspects of language study highly on enjoyment and benet (Barkhuizen,
1998), while in Indonesia some educators and administrators viewed the intro-
duction of communicative language teaching as socially pollutive because its
tenets countered the traditional norms of school culture (Tomlinson, 1990).
These examples show how norms of teaching and learning, including expected
teacher and student roles and classroom activities, can vary across cultures and
how innovations that reinforce behaviour quite different from students and
teachers previous experiences and expectations can lead to problems. This
crosscultural variation needs to be explored as teacher trainees analyse and
evaluate alternative approaches to language teaching and engage in course
design projects.
On the other hand, scholars such as Guest (2002), Littlewood (2000) and
Kubota (1999) among others, argue that such studies as those cited above can
further reinforce stereotypes and the othering of non-Western cultures. It is
possible that individual variation and the inherently dynamic nature of
culture might not always be adequately foregrounded in studies of cross-
cultural variation. This necessitates that classroom studies are carefully contex-
tualised and scrutinised by teachers and teacher educators. We cannot,
nevertheless, ignore problems that can and do occur as we export teachers
and methodologies across contexts, as evidenced by many reports to this
effect. Furthermore, as Coleman (1996: 13) maintains, a non-universalistic
approach to study of classrooms does not need to imply cultural stereotyping
or simplistic labelling. Awareness of possible problems and their informed dis-
cussion will aid teachers more than the avoidance of these issues for fear of
stereotyping. A culture-general approach that outlines the role of culture in
communication and the way it can be reected in classroom communication
(vs. the culture-specic study of particular groups) can lead to awareness
raising and sensitivity on the part of the teachers that will then facilitate their
engaging in pedagogy that will be locally appropriate for particular learner
groups (see Dogancay-Aktuna, 2005b, for details). It is important to note that
our goal is not for teachers to learn lists of items about different cultures,
which would indeed lead to stereotyping, but to become more sensitive to
the cultural diversity in teaching and learning experiences that students
bring to the classroom.
Exposing teachers to works exemplifying crosscultural variation in class-
room cultures can show them the culture-pedagogy link and trigger discus-
sions of multiple views on literacy (Street, 1984) and discourse styles (cf.
Reagan & Osborns list, items 8 and 20) that can then lead into investigations
of the pedagogical expectations in a particular teaching context. Holliday
(1994: 3) says that the literature (of ELT) is full of models and checklists
about how to do and what to do; but hardly anywhere is there advice on
what we need to know about people and how we can nd this out (empha-
sis original). One eld that can offer teachers and teacher educators insights
into what we need to know about people and how our discourse styles
might vary is that of intercultural communication (ICC). Integrating issues
284 Language, Culture and Curriculum
from ICC into TESOL programmes will also ll an important void in such
programmes because:
without a course that increases both students self-awareness and their
awareness of other cultures, TESOL graduates are more likely to enter
into intercultural teaching situations from an ethnocentric perspective,
evaluating (often negatively) what they experience in terms of their
own culture. (Nelson, 1998: 27)
Awareness of cultural variation will then be supplemented by ethnographic
skills that teachers can use to nd out about different learner groups, as dis-
cussed below.
Having a good grasp of the components of culture and understanding how
cultural norms, often working subconsciously, underlie most of what we do on
a daily basis, including in the classroom, will be the start of a discussion of ICC.
Scollon and Scollon (1995: 126127) dene culture as:
any of the customs, worldviews, language, kinship systems, social organ-
ization, and other taken-for-granted day-to-day practices of a people
which set that group apart as a distinctive group . . . . By using the anthro-
pological (vs. high culture) sense of the word culture, we mean to con-
sider any aspect of the ideas, communication, or behaviors of a group
of people which gives them a distinctive identity and which is used to
organize their internal sense of cohesion and membership.
In light of the above denitions, teachers can explore the dimensions over
which cultures as a whole tend to vary by looking at models and concepts
from ICC. The four-dimensional model of cultural differences across societies
offered by Hofstede (1986), Halls (1966) conceptualisation of variations
across cultures, and Scollon and Scollons (1995) model of discourse variation
across cultures can all be discussed in this domain, with a viewto understanding
how these dimensions can be reected in teacher-student roles across class-
rooms. An understanding of concepts such as individualism vs collectivism,
power distance (cf. egalitarianism and hierarchy), weak vs strong uncertainty
avoidance, masculine vs feminine orientations, and other dimensions over
which cultures tend to vary, such as monochronic and polychronic time orien-
tation; action vs being orientation; and views of change and tradition, will help
the teachers realise why certain problems can arise during crosscultural teaching
encounters. A good way of contextualising the above dimensions is to link
them with teacher trainees analysis of reports from different classrooms,
such as those cited above, or show them videos of crosscultural teaching
encounters that include miscommunication or pedagogical confusion.
It is crucial that this overview of ICC includes a discussion of the dynamic
nature of cultures and the inherent individual variation in each group. We
need to ensure that teacher trainees do not use the above listed dimensions
as part of a checklist to pigeonhole learners. Indeed, this would defeat the
whole purpose of ICC training by shifting the emphasis from awareness
raising to overgeneralising and stereotyping, and as such, utmost care needs
to be taken by teacher educators.
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 285
The study of classroomresearch fromdifferent contexts, awareness of dimen-
sions of ICC, and a crosscultural view of learning styles would reinforce
trainees understanding of external and internal contexts, dened by
Gudykunst and Kim (1992) as the two types of context characterising any situ-
ation. External context refers to the various settings where communication
occurs and the social meanings society attaches to them. Societal norms on
what constitutes appropriate teacher and student behavior in a classroom or
how language teaching should be carried out are examples of external contex-
tual factors. Internal context, on the other hand, refers to the cultural norms and
expectations that the participants bring with themselves to an encounter. As
such, both views of the context of learning and teaching are inuenced by
learner cultures and can lead to serious misunderstandings when undermined,
ignored, or simply not met because pedagogy is culturally and contextually
determined.
As aforementioned, the above knowledge base needs to be complemented by
skills teachers can use to explore the particular norms their students and col-
leagues follow in a given context. This is where practical ethnography can be
introduced to teacher trainees as a tool to gather information on the socio-
cultural backgrounds of the learners. Many scholars (Coleman, 1996;
Holliday, 1994, among others) suggest that teachers engage in some sort of
interpretive (as opposed to a normative) research project, as embodied in eth-
nography or ethnographic action research, to develop their skills of observation
and gain a deeper understanding of classroom culture and factors shaping it.
Holliday (1994: 218) maintains that through ethnographic action research we
can develop appropriate methodology and curricula via a process of gradual
interaction with the relevant features of the host educational environment.
Consideration of the host culture of learning is needed in order to avoid the
cultural invasion or the methodological chauvinism of ESL-oriented peda-
gogy over other contexts. This would in turn ensure that the different social
contexts encountered in different educational environments thus become
more than simply backdrops for the practice of English language education:
they become a signicant input to the process. (Holliday, 1994: 218).
Hollidays (1994) classroom-oriented approach, comprehensive accounts of
ethnography, like those of Hammersley and Atkinson (1983) and Saville-
Troike (1989), can be used effectively in TESOL training programmes to give
trainees an in-depth understanding of ethnographic research. An important
issue to convey in teacher education, however, is that ELT educators engage
in applied or pragmatic ethnography (vs pure), as in ethnographic action
research (see Holliday, 1994: 192193). For this reason Watson-Gegeo (1988)
and Damen (1987) are good sources for ELT practitioners. Damens (1987:
6469) description of the steps involved in pragmatic ethnography (that is,
choosing a target group and informants to work with, types of descriptive ques-
tions to be asked of them, analysing the data, and the making and testing of
emergent patterns, while looking in the mirror to understand the teachers
own interpretation of events under scrutiny), seems the most appropriate for
the kinds of classroom research proposed here for language teachers.
Ethnographic action research is simple yet informative for teacher trainees to
carry out as individual, pair, or group projects and as the foundation of their
286 Language, Culture and Curriculum
subsequent pedagogical reection. Coupled with knowledge on the man-
agement of change and the sociocultural factors surrounding their teaching,
this knowledge can form a forceful move towards a more ecological, socio-
culturally appropriate pedagogy.
(2) Knowledge of Management of Innovation in
Language Teaching
During their education and subsequent professional development, ESL/EFL
teachers will encounter pedagogical innovations whose feasibility, practicality
and sociocultural appropriateness they need to evaluate for their own teaching
contexts. Failure to scrutinise the feasibility of innovations can lead to the kinds
of problems revealed by the above mentioned classroom studies. A body of
work in ELT that can help teachers and teacher educators in understanding
better the dynamics of change implementation is work in managing curricular
change/innovation. Markee (1994: 1) denes curricular innovation as a
phenomenon that involves managing developmental change in the design,
implementation, and maintenance of teaching (and/or testing) materials, meth-
odological skills, and pedagogical values that are perceived as new by individ-
uals who comprise a formal (language) education system. Dened as such,
success of curricular innovations require the cooperation of various groups
besides an understanding of how the spread of innovation can offer language
teachers and course designers the tools to manage change more effectively.
Highly accessible works by Kennedy (1987), Markee (1993) and White (1987)
can be integrated into teacher education programmes to be discussed alongside
the implementation of various methodological approaches to language teaching.
Kennedy (1987) adapts Chin and Bennes (1976) strategies for implementing
change to the context of ELT and teacher development. After distinguishing
among power-coercive (top-down), rational-empirical (based on providing infor-
mation to receivers), and normative-re-educative strategies (where the complex-
ity and multifaceted nature of change implementation are recognised), Kennedy
argues that the normative-re-educative strategy is the only viable one for change
in ELT because teaching is essentially a cognitive, behavioural and attitudinal
activity. Kennedy further argues that the collaborative, problem solving feature
of normative-re-educative strategies shares commonalties with action research
and places the responsibility for degree of change and acceptance or rejection
on the teacher, who is the insider, so that a lip service effect is less likely to occur.
Whites (1987) step-by-step approach to managing innovation uses principles
from the eld of management for introducing innovations. White emphasises
the crucial importance for the receivers to have a clear understanding of
aims of innovations because no proposal for change occurs in a vacuum. In a
similar vein to Kennedy (1987, 1988), White maintains that in general, inno-
vations which are identied by members of an institution and arise within it
stand more chance of success than those which are imported or imposed
(White, 1987: 212). This would explain why power-coercive strategies will
not work, as evidenced by the failure of some ELT aid projects (cf. Rubdy,
2000), and how the culture of the school should be taken into account in
managing innovation. As part of a systematic approach to innovation, White
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 287
suggests considering six steps while evaluating the appropriateness of
intended innovations: (1) Dening aims what is the innovation? What do
we mean by the terms that we use? (crucial in ELT when there can be con-
fusion of terminology) Why are we carrying out this innovation? What is it
for? Who is it for? and do we actually need it? (2) Dening end results
what do we want to achieve? What does it mean for those affected by the
change? What will they be doing differently after the change has been
implemented? In short, what does change mean in practice for them? (White,
1987: 214). (3) Gathering information based on analysing the reasons for
present practices; discovering what people want that is different from what
they are doing; making tentative decisions about the priority of proposed
changes; planning the innovation carefully in terms of teacher preparation,
student preparation, procedures to be followed, and the anticipated effects
of the innovation; and, determining the times and techniques for evaluation.
(4) Dening what has to be done making up a detailed list of actions, dead-
lines and responsibilities. (5) Action where it is important to monitor what is
being done. (6) Reviewing and evaluating the process of change implemen-
tation to get a comprehensive understanding of a complex reality.
The above approach can benet ELT professionals greatly because, as White
(1987: 217) maintains:
the content of a course, the methods employed, and the materials used are
pedagogic and professional concerns; but choosing, using, and evaluating
all of these involve management and the application of reasonably sys-
tematic ways of organizing and running a complex network of social, per-
sonal, and professional relationships.
A nal reading of Waters and Vilches (2001) description of the implemen-
tation of ELT innovations within a needs analysis framework and following
the hierarchy of familiarisation, socialisation, application and integration of
the innovation will reinforce the above ideas for teachers in training.
Combined with further readings from Markee (1993), Kennedy (1999), Rea-
Dickins and Germaine (1998) and Trappes-Lomax (2000), knowledge on mana-
ging innovations as detailed above can raise teachers awareness on the nature
of the diffusion of innovation that would come into play when they decide to
make changes in their pedagogy. As Waters and Vilches (2001) maintain, we
should not forget that innovations generate a need for teacher learning.
Any attempt to change the curriculum whether indirectly through
changes in teaching materials, for example, or more directly, through
changes in teaching methodology implies a need for teacher learning,
i.e. opportunities for the teacher to learn about the rationale for the new
form of teaching, to critically evaluate it, and understand how to get the
best out of it. (Waters & Vilches, 2001: 137)
Awareness of possible crosscultural variations in norms of teaching and
learning, skills in ethnographic inquiry, and knowledge of how innovations
can be managed will enable language teachers to evaluate in a more informed
fashion whether the proposed innovation is socioculturally and educationally
appropriate for the target learner group.
288 Language, Culture and Curriculum
Discussions on crosscultural variation in learning can begin in a second
language acquisition course and can be reinforced in methodology courses
when teachers review approaches to language teaching and design language
curricula. Completing and strengthening teachers awareness of the socio-
culturally situated nature of language teaching would be a macro view of the
sociopolitical context of ELT that forms the third domain of inquiry to be inte-
grated into the proposed knowledge base of TESOL teacher education.
(3) Awareness of Sociopolitical Factors Surrounding Teaching
of English as an International Language
An informed discussion of the sociopolitical factors surrounding TESOL is
necessary in teacher education today, given the sometimes controversial role
of English as an international language and the economic, social, political
and cultural concerns stemming from this global presence. The sociopolitical
and cultural context of TESOL is dened as the macro domain of English
language teaching that includes political, cultural and social issues such as
overt and covert language-in-education policies, the status of New Englishes,
the ideology and politics of TESOL education, language identity, critical peda-
gogy and the like. Knowledge of these macro issues is required in order to
engage teachers in issues and dynamics of the sociocultural context of
schools and schooling (Freeman & Johnson, 1998: 409) and to give them the
opportunity to engage critically with sociopolitical concerns. As Pennycook
(1994: 167) asserts, ELT practices cannot be reduced to a set of disconnected
techniques but rather must be seen as part of larger cultural, discursive or ideo-
logical order. This sociopolitical engagement will, in turn, facilitate teachers
critical appraisal of their social roles and responsibilities and lead to socio-
culturally and politically contextualised pedagogical decisions.
Unfortunately, this sociopolitical domain has been the most overlooked one in
teacher education programmes (cf. Garshick, 2002). A review of courses offered
in MATESOL programmes in the US and Canada, as listed in Garshick (2002),
shows that courses dealing with the macro sociopolitical context of TESOL are
indeed scarce. Only about 30 (around 20%) institutions out of 155 list courses
whose titles indicate some coverage of these macro sociopolitical issues as
denedabove (Dogancay-Aktuna, 2005a). As Crookes (1997: 71) says in outlining
the special problems of foreign language teacher education,
even relatively innovative S/FL (second/foreign language) teacher prep-
aration programmes, including ESL programmes, usually reect a more
general tendency in education: a technocratic orientation that makes it dif-
cult to provide new teachers with an understanding of their sociohisto-
rical context, of themselves as political actors, and of the idea that the
classroom is not a given.
The rationale for gaining an understanding of the macro issues surrounding
language teaching are succintly summarised by Hall and Eggington (2000: 1)
who maintain that
language policies, both ofcially and unofcially sanctioned, cultural
expectations about the roles of teacher and student, and our identities
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 289
in terms of, for example, gender, race, ethnicity and nationality at the
same time inform and constrain what we do in the classroom. Our
actions, in turn, both shape and constrain the social, academic and lin-
guistic consequences for our learners. Thus, as important to the develop-
ment of English language teacher expertise as knowledge of effective
classroom practices may be our understanding of these more macro
dimensions of pedagogy and how they shape both our roles as teachers
and our students roles as learners.
Such a goal would then necessitate a reconceptualisation of language teacher
education towards critical pedagogy where teachers are led to see the broad
social, historical, cultural, and political contexts of teaching and learning
(Wink, 2000: 44). This move would empower teachers to engage in a pedagogy
of possibility (Kumaravadivelu, 2001) and situate themselves better into the
sociopolitical context of language teaching. It will give them critical language
awareness and exposure to the remaining components of the metalinguistics
of human language (Reagan & Osborn, 2002: 136) such that they will learn
about ideology and language, the relationship between language and power,
issues of linguistic legitimacy, language rights and responsibilities, and about
language planning (items 6, 7, 13, 14, 22 and 23).
The discussion of the sociopolitics of language teaching can be achieved by
critically engaging TESOL teachers with authors who have raised our con-
sciousness about the power and politics, ideologies and inadequacies that
beset English language education around the world. Discussions of auton-
omous and ideological views of literacy (Street, 1984); critical applied linguis-
tics (Pennycook, 2001); globalisation of English language teaching and the
professional demands this makes on teachers (Block & Cameron, 2002;
Holliday, 2005; McKay, 2002); ideology and politics of language policies
(Canagarajah, 1999; Hall & Eggington, 2000; Pennycook, 1994; Phillipson,
1992; Ricento, 2000) including the politics of TESOL education; (Ramanathan,
2002); language and identity (Norton, 1997); the role and status of non-native
English speaking professionals in TESOL (Braine, 1999, 2005; Gnutzmann,
1999; Gnutzmann & Intemann, 2005; Kamhi-Stein, 2004; Llurda, 2005); the
ethics of ELT (Johnson, 2003); the ecological approach to language teaching
(Tudor, 2001), and World Englishes (Kachru, 1992) would give teachers a realis-
tic, socioculturally grounded perspective. In this way, teachers can learn to link
the micro aspects of English language teaching with the macro context. They
will learn to problematise and contextualise their practice and engage in
praxis. As scholars like Kramsch (1993) and Pennycook (1994) argue, critical
pedagogy means teacher awareness of the global context of their work,
coupled with local knowledge and respect for various approaches to pedagogy.
An awareness of the sociopolitical ramications of their work and the power
relationships involved in it will help teachers situate themselves in debates
where they might be seen as imperial troopers of the Empire, to borrow
Edges (2003) term, or as agents of linguicism who are destroying the ecology
of languages (cf. Skutnabb-Kangas, 2000). In recent years, there has been a pro-
liferation of scholarly publications on the socio-political context of ELT, some of
which are listed above, which indicates a shift in emphasis in applied
290 Language, Culture and Curriculum
linguistics away from purely methodolocial concerns. Integration of these
materials into TESOL teacher education programmes will help teachers
become more analytical of their professional roles, while forming an important
step towards critical pedagogy.
Conclusion
In this paper, I have discussed three main areas of inquiry to be integrated
into language teacher education programmes in order to prepare teachers
better for working in diverse contexts. I argued that in response to the changing
role of teachers, the nature of problems encountered in the transfer of pedago-
gical innovations across contexts, and recent attention to the macro context of
language teaching, TESOL curricula need to integrate greater discussion of
crosscultural variation in learning and teaching and expose teachers to the
management of pedagogical innovation and the sociopolitical context of teaching
English on a global scale. The goal is to facilitate teachers recognition of the
complex and situated nature of English language teaching that will help
them in making socioculturally appropriate pedagogical decisions. Another
goal is to help teachers deal with bandwagons that are abundant in TESOL.
As Clarke (1982: 444445) says:
As a profession we appear to have a strong propensity for bandwagons,
an inclination to seek simple, nal solutions for complex problems. As
individuals we need to resist the assumption that there is one Truth. We
need to recognize the fact that the dynamic nature of our profession
will continue to produce new insights into language, language learning
and language teaching, and that these insights will make it possible for
us to improve the way we do our jobs.
Inclusion of the above discussed domains in TESOL teacher education can
lead to teachers who are better equipped to deal with bandwagons. This
move can also aid in the paradigm shift towards training culturally and
sociopolitically sensitive TESOL professionals who can design a pedagogy of
particularity, practicality and possibility in the Kumaravadivelu (2001) sense
of the post-method pedagogy and foster the ecological perspective of language
teaching as informed by local realities at multiple levels (Tudor, 2001, 2003).
Finally, such modications would
enhance the teachers geographical and anthropological literacy and
respect for other countries and communities, their cultures, their edu-
cational systems, and their conditions and ethics of work, including
those that provide the socio-cultural exibility to cope with unfamiliar
living and working conditions. (Govardhan et al., 1999: 123)
Several points need to be kept in mind in integrating these three domains into
teacher education curricula. First of all, it needs to be noted that the suggested
curricular expansions for TESOL programmes are not envisioned to be mere
additions to existing courses, but viewed instead as a comprehensive paradigm
shift. Agood model to subsequently adapt in teacher education is the ecological
model (Tudor, 2003) that involves exploring language teaching and learning
Knowledge Base of TESOL Teacher Education 291
within the totality of the lives of the various participants involved, instead of as
a sub-part which can be examined in isolation. As Tudor (2003: 6) explains:
Adopting an ecological perspective requires us to look for the reality of
language teaching beyond the ofcial version we nd in academic pub-
lications and curriculum descriptions. It also requires us to look beyond
the concept of rationality as a single concept and to acknowledge the
existence of different rationalities, i.e. different understandings or ways
of perceiving situations and choices. In essence, it assumes that teaching
and learning will be effective only if they acknowledge and work with the
various understandings and perceptions which participants bring with
them to the classroom and to the teaching-learning experience. This, in
turn, calls for an open acknowledgement of diversity as a fundamental
component of language teaching.
Secondly, it needs to be noted that many teachers, particularly the local ones,
may already have the kinds of crosscultural knowledge as outlined above.
What is suggested here is to dedicate more time to the above issues in pre-
and in-service teacher education so as to facilitate teachers linking their knowl-
edge with their classroom practices in a more sociopolitically and culturally
informed manner. The suggested modications will empower local (non-
native) teachers of English by legitimising their pedagogical concerns and
expertise, which can, in turn, increase teacher motivation that can benet the
learners. Expatriate (native) teachers will also benet from these discussions
by virtue of learning to function with greater efciency in unfamiliar contexts
of teaching and by learning to utilise better what learners bring to the class-
room. Understanding the sociopolitical and cultural connotations of teaching
English as an international language can also help native and non-native tea-
chers collaborate to explore the linguistics of English as a global communi-
cation tool.
Finally, teacher educators need to keep in mind that some of the above
proposed issues are already covered in various courses traditionally offered
in TESOL programmes, such as sociolinguistics, methodology and second
language acquisition. Their goal should be the facilitation of teachers linking
the above three domains to what they already know by laying the foundation
for more sociopolitically and culturally informed discussions.
Correspondence
Any correspondence should be directed to Seran Dogancay-Aktuna,
Department of English Language and Literature, Southern Illinois University
Edwardsville, Peck Hall, Box 1431, Edwardsville, Illinois 62026-1431, USA
(saktuna@siue.edu).
Note
1. Inspiration for these three domains of inquiry comes from various sources: works by
Pennycook (1989, 1994), Phillipson (1992), and others writing on the sociopolitics of
English language teaching; research in intercultural communication, including
research on culturally different learning styles; concepts from the elds of manage-
ment of innovation, ethnography of communication, language planning and policy
making, and works by applied linguists who have reconceptualised language
292 Language, Culture and Curriculum
teaching (Kumaravadivelu, 2001) and foregrounded the need for an ecological
(Tudor, 2003), socioculturally appropriate methodology (Coleman, 1996; Holliday,
1994; Kramsch 1993), and critical applied linguistics (Pennycook, 2001).
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