3 Design of the research project
3.4 The Participants
3.3.3 Research Questions
The research questions changed over time, in interaction with the data and with the researcher’s unavoidably increasing knowledge on the subject. This is in line with the characteristics of qualitative research. Initially, the beginning conceptual framework that was informing and guiding the research questions also led to focus on investigating whether the workshop sessions fostered professional development - observed only in teachers’ statements, not in their teaching practice - and investigating the impact of teachers’ beliefs. Later, the focus shifted to the personal contribution of the teachers to the development task. As described in Chapter 2.7, it was hypothesised that the expectations placed on teachers imply tacit demands, which might possibly involve one specific competence. It was from this hypothesis that the fundamental question arose: What are the essential features of this competence? This is not directly discernible, of course. As the teachers of the present study shape their own learning process on the basis of full self-responsibility, and since autonomy is hypothesised here as constitutive of this competence, the pivotal concepts of autonomy were tentatively maintained in the following operationalisation:
1. setting one’s goals
2. planning methods, materials and procedures to achieve the goals 3. monitoring
4. evaluating the process
As a consequence, the following research sub-questions were posed:
What are the goals of university language teachers in their professional development?
What do they do in order to reach their goals?
During the process of data analysis, further questions emerged, such as:
What strategies do the teachers utilise?
What roles do their goals play in the development process?
Which factors influence their goal-setting and their development?
What teacher profiles can be observed based on their goals?
A preliminary remark should be made regarding the types of positions the teachers hold. Two are the possible positions for university language teachers working at the Bavarian Universities: either they are “employed” or they are “freelance”81.
’Lehrbeauftragte’ is the term used to refer to those teachers who work for the university without being employed82. They are fleelancers and self-employed people, who in a certain sense, could be considered suppliers of a service83. According to the GEW84, freelancers take over up to between 25% to 50% of the university courses. This form of self-employment is defined in the Bavarian Higher Education Act85, according to which the freelancers are in a public-law employment relation to the institution. One of the conditions of this work relation is the maximum of hours (= 8-9) that have been established as a limit for the free-lancers.
This detail in itself does not support the development of a sense of the profession in these teachers.
As regards the requirements, among the language departments there are some differences:
some teachers, mainly the English teachers, usually have specific qualification for teaching English as a foreign language to adults (such as a Diploma in English Language Teaching to Adults DELTA) or other teaching qualifications (such as Postgraduate Certificate in Education PGCE) when they are hired at the university. For other languages a university degree is mandatory, but a specific qualification in language teaching is not required. As a matter of fact, in these cases these teachers may work and teach according to what Johnson (2009: 41) calls “native speakerness”: in order to teach the language it is enough to be a native speaker, “if you can speak you can teach”. They may therefore lack the necessary competences to carry out the teaching task adequately and, as their experience increases, may feel the need to receive specific support in many respects, such as teaching methodology, information technology, etc. This concise description of the teachers' situation underscores the overriding reason why professional development opportunities are relevant for them, also manifest in the expressed desire of the language teachers in this context to become more professional, and in the gratitude of these teachers when projects, such as KommUNIkation, are designed to support them.
81 Egentenmeyer (2010: 39) also lists the alternative as “volunteers” in the field of adult education.
82 It corresponds to the American Adjunct Professor.
83 The advantages and disadvantages of being self-employed are detailed in Collrepp (2011: 2-5).
84 GEW: Gewerkschaft Erziehung und Wissenschaft, a Germantrade union which corresponds to an Education and Science Workers’ Union.
85 Hochschulpersonalgesetz BayHSchPG Abs.III Art. 31-32 and Lehrauftrags- und Lehrvergütungsvorschriften für die staatlichen Hochschulen LLHVV § 2 Abs. 2. 2.
To further characterise freelance university language teachers, some other major differences are listed below, and contrasted with language teachers at schools86:
School L2 teachers Freelance L2 teachers
- Formal training (theoretical and practical) before teaching and on the job required
- No formal teacher training before teaching or on the job required87 (however, some variation in the required teaching qualifications depending on the language departments is possible, as for English)
- Permanent employees, stable position, tenure, assurance, retirement arrangements
- Freelance, no stable position (no insurance, no retirement arrangements 88)
- Typically one job - Many jobs (not necessarily in teaching)
- Teaching pupils - Teaching adults (undergraduate, graduate students)
- Living in their own culture - Have left their own culture/country
- Good salary - “at the bottom of the earning scale“ (citation form one of the participants89) = low pay
Table 3.1 Freelance university language teachers contrasted with language teachers at schools
A short profile of the teachers who participated (= 10) in the interviews showed that they:
- had a different L1
- were mostly freelancers (n= 7) - all held a university degree
- as the only current, professional support available, they may take part in the events organised by local publishing houses
- participated on a voluntary basis in the workshops and in the interviews
- had left their home country/culture and live in Germany either temporarily or permanently (if they are employed or have created their own family there, then they have become German residents).
86 The professional development of language teachers at schools is not the focus of the current study, which can not investigate whether their development unfolds in ways that are similar to that of their university colleagues or whether teaching qualifications, language status (teaching their mother tongue or the L2) or the teaching context make a difference. Likewise, the study will not focus on the difference between university teachers and school teachers. It is possible to assume that there are general aspects, which could apply to many language teachers, independently of the context in which they act, but this is only an assumption at the moment und would deserve further attention in follow-up studies.
87 Dissimilarly from other contexts, such as American Universities, there are no beginning training or compulsory methods classes for new instructors or on-the-job training required at the LMU.
88 Regarding salaries and social security, the working conditions of adult educators are unsatisfactory in most European countries, as Egentenmeyer points out (2010: 40). Other unfavourable conditions under which teachers work are also mentioned by Pennington (1995: 708).
89 This resonates with another account in the literature, such as the feeling of being “the lowest on the ladder”
(Johnston et al. 2005: 61).
In terms of teaching experience there was a high degree of variation, ranging from 7 to 30 years of experience.
The following table shows data regarding the participating teachers, listed in alphabetical order according to the codes assigned:
Code Female/
male
Position F=freelance, P=permanent
Language taught
Years of teaching experience
Interview date
A54 F F English 10 Pilot, 13.7.09
and 2.2.10
B282 F F English,
German
15 11.2.10
D243 F P German 19 12.11.09
I312 F F90 English,
German
15 14.11.09
J106 F F German 7 16.11.09
M96 F F Polish 9 6.12.09
M171 F F / P Chinese 10 11.11.09
N51 F F Italian 20 19.11.09
N95 F P Dutch 30 19.1.10
P73 F F Spanish 13 22.12.10
Code information: The first letter was automatically generated from the questionnaires; the number refers to the number of the first questionnaire associated with each teacher
Position refers to the type of position (F=freelance, P=permanent)
Language taught refers to the language (or languages) taught by the teachers Table 3.2: List of the teachers who participated in the interviews (= 10)
The table indicates a multifaceted profile of the teachers, who differ in age, teaching experience and cultural background91. With some exceptions, none of the teachers began language teaching with specific teacher training. They all arrived to teach from different paths or “from the back door”, as teacher A54 formulated it, thus lacking the basic teaching competences, and were forced to acquire them on their own. Significantly, one participant
90 Teacher I312 is the owner of a language school.
91 Intercultural issues will not be addressed in this study, although I acknowledge that culture governs our behaviour and “establishes for each person a context of cognitive and affective behaviour” (H.D. Brown 1994:
164). Despite the pervasive character of culture in learning, this aspect goes beyond the focus and the scope of this study.
(teacher A54), labeled herself and her colleagues “housewife teachers“92.