| dc.description.abstract | This study explores English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers’ experiences of Professional Development (PD) programmes in Egypt. The current study investigates the sample’s experience as learners, instructors, and as individuals in relation to different contexts that include the classroom, school, and PD. In addition, it identifies the views of other PD stakeholders, including parents, school principals, PD designers, and training providers. The study has four main aims:(1) to identify teachers’ needs, concerns, problems, challenges, and frustrations with their PD; (2) to provide insight into the English Language Teaching (ELT) class context and any hindering factors that contribute to unsatisfactory PD; (3) to identify contextual factors in the school environment that hinder EFL teachers’ PD; and (4) to investigate the views of PD stakeholders towards EFL teachers’ experiences of PD.
The participants of this study are in-service EFL teachers who have attended, or are currently attending, at least one of four PD programmes in the Cairo and Giza governorates. The sample, representing Greater Cairo, was selected to include a mix of gender, academic backgrounds, varied years of experience, and a variety of governmental school districts. PD stakeholders were selected according to the nature of their work which is closely connected to PD and school as well as parents. The methodology adopted by the researcher broadly follows mixed methods methodology that uses a sequential mixed-methods approach. The data generation process combines Questionnaire, Journal Writing, Focus Groups and Individual Semi-Structured Interviews. Data is analyzed quantitatively using Statistical Package of Social Sciences (SPSS) software and qualitatively using exploratory content analysis.
The study’s most significant finding was the impact the following have on PD: teachers’ classroom practice and pedagogy, their workloads and time pressures, the role of private tuition, separation between PD and class pedagogy, curriculum innovations, PD and quality standards, the size of classes and teachers’ relationships with students. The school context is a vital finding of the study; context includes the influences of school principals, supervisory practices, collegiality within the school, the influence of parents, and school libraries on the effectiveness of PD. A significant finding that emerged from the data analysis illustrates a major concern with EFL PD, particularly, the management of teachers’ PD. This emerging theme sheds light on PD and the Ministry of Education’s decisions, its centralization, bureaucracy, issues of favouritism, co-ordination between the different parties of schools, universities, training schools, and personnel, employment, or job-related issues. The findings of the current study have been discussed into five different categories with regard to EFL teachers’ PD: cultural, social, academic, affective and institutional domains.
The study concludes with a number of potential fruitful implications and suggestions for further research. | en_GB |
