Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching
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Iranian EFL teachers’ practices and learner autonomy: Do gender, educational degree, and experience matter? Najmeh Nasri, Hossein Vahid Dastjerdy, Abbass Eslami Rasekh & Zahra Amirian To cite this article: Najmeh Nasri, Hossein Vahid Dastjerdy, Abbass Eslami Rasekh & Zahra Amirian (2017) Iranian EFL teachers’ practices and learner autonomy: Do gender, educational degree, and experience matter?, Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 11:2, 146-158, DOI: 10.1080/17501229.2015.1078337 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17501229.2015.1078337
Published online: 11 Sep 2015.
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Date: 03 May 2017, At: 02:06
INNOVATION IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND TEACHING, 2017 VOL. 11, NO. 2, 146–158 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17501229.2015.1078337
Iranian EFL teachers’ practices and learner autonomy: Do gender, educational degree, and experience matter? Najmeh Nasria, Hossein Vahid Dastjerdyb, Abbass Eslami Rasekha and Zahra Amiriana a
Department of English, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran; bDepartment of English, Shahreza Azad University, Isfahan, Iran ABSTRACT
ARTICLE HISTORY
Owing to the importance of learner autonomy (LA) and considering the prominent role of teachers in this respect, the present study investigated: (1) Iranian English as a foreign language teachers’ practices for promoting high school students’ autonomy, (2) possible differences among teachers’ practices with different educational degrees, levels of experience, and gender, and (3) factors which, in teachers’ opinion, affect their practices for promoting LA. To this purpose, 80 randomly selected teachers answered Chang’s (2007. “The Influence of Group Processes on Learners’ Autonomous Beliefs and Behaviours.” System 35 (3): 322–337.) questionnaire. The statistical analysis revealed no significant difference between the experienced/inexperienced and BA/ MA groups. However, female teachers were found to outperform males in using specific strategies. Moreover, the interviewed teachers believed that their practices could be affected by a number of factors such as resources, teacher training, freedom in syllabus and tests, as well as students’, parents’, and principals’ expectations. The findings of this study provide functional pedagogical implications for language teachers and teacher educators.
Received 30 November 2014 Revised 17 July 2015 Accepted 20 July 2015 KEYWORDS
Learner autonomy; teachers’ practices; gender; experience; educational degree
1. Introduction Over the last decades, learner autonomy (LA) has turned into a hot topic in language teaching and learning. It has been argued that no educational program can equip its learners with all the skills and knowledge they require for their lives. Therefore, there seems to exist a growing need for assisting the learners to carry out the responsibility for their learning, and to negotiate with each other as well as with teachers in selecting their learning objectives, sharing knowledge, and evaluating their progress. As such, language teachers have acquired a new role, i.e. as LA receives more consideration, the need for teachers to be dexterous at nurturing their practices becomes more tangible. Little (1995) argues that to promote LA, teachers should provide opportunities for their learners to gradually take more responsibility of their learning. In this respect, the teachers employ a number of strategies which help the development of LA. Many researchers believe that promotion of LA depends, to a large extent, on the teachers’ willingness to shift learning responsibilities to their students (Candy 1991; Little 1995; as cited in Murphy 2008, 84). It is also dependent on the commitment of teachers to provide the learners with an environment in which they can experience autonomous learning. Considering the fact that autonomy is, to a large extent, context dependent (Nakata 2011), the strategies implemented for its promotion are likely to vary in different educational settings. Therefore, there is an overriding need for studies which investigate English as a foreign language (EFL) CONTACT Najmeh Nasri © 2015 Taylor & Francis
[email protected]
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teachers’ practices in different contexts. Moreover, owing to the fact that teachers’ assets such as experience, education, and gender may affect their practices of LA, the present study attempts to investigate this issue which, to the best of the researchers’ knowledge, has rarely been touched.
2. Background of the study 2.1. Role of language teachers in promoting LA One of the major goals of teaching is to bring about beneficial changes in learners. However, these changes, as Voller (1997) argues, are determined by a complex set of factors which depend on the learners’ and teachers’ perceptions of their respective roles, their past and present experiences, and the decisions imposed upon them. In order to promote autonomy among language learners, the teachers need to make every effort to adjust their own roles. Many scholars have written on the nature of these roles. Among them, Knowles (1975) believes that teachers should act as consultants, facilitators, and helpers. In a similar vein, Voller (1997) argues that language teachers should play the role of a facilitator who supports the processes of decision-making, a counselor who cares for the students’ ongoing needs, and is a resource person whose knowledge and expertise are available to his learners when needed. Aoki (1999) states that if teachers seek to make their learners autonomous, they should recognize them as ‘legitimate members of a decision-making body of an educational program’ (145). However, as Aoki aptly claims, learners are not expected to make big decisions from the beginning; the teachers should provide them with enough support. Actually, participation in making decisions entails voice, which is not simply asking the students to talk about their preferences. Ellsworth (1992) argues that for the students to give voice, the power relations, trust, anxiety, desire, as well as safety come at work. Xu and Xu (2004) have elaborated on the teachers’ role, stating that the teacher should, at the first stage, help learners build the confidence and trust in autonomous learning. Later, they can provide enough help for the learners to implement appropriate strategies and put them into actual practice. Finally, they should pave the way for more communication between teachers and students while monitoring the learning process. To take a look at the issue from another angle, Xu and Xu (2004) have investigated the students’ ideas about the role of teachers in developing LA. The participant students in their study have referred to almost the same roles. They, therefore, believe that the teacher should be a guide who develops the students’ skills and teaches them appropriate strategies, a facilitator, a peer partner, an inspirator, and supporter who stimulates their interest in learning language and encourages them to use it, a monitor, and finally a resource supplier who provides some references and materials. The studies on LA have mainly elaborated on what teachers should do and what they are expected to do for fostering it. However, they have failed to examine the actual role the teachers play in promoting the autonomy of the learners in their classes.
2.2. Studies on LA in Iran Although discussions on LA can be traced back to the 1970s, due attention has just recently been paid to it by researchers in such contexts as Iran. A summary of the conducted studies is presented in Table 1. A number of Iranian researchers have investigated the effects of autonomy on different language skills. As an illustration, employing a collaborative approach to autonomy, Khabiri and Lavasani (2012) compared the effects of an autonomous approach on oral skills with a control group. The autonomous group was given a choice over the selection of learning materials. The students in this group were also asked to choose the follow-up tasks and negotiate in performing them. However, in the control group, the teacher selected the material, taught the lesson, and assigned some
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Table 1. Summary of studies conducted on LA in Iran. Study Bagheri and Aeen (2011) Khabiri and Lavasani (2012) Nematipour (2012) Shakeri and Nosratnia (2013) Azimi Mohamad Abadi and Baradaran (2013) Shangarfam and Ghazisaeedi (2013) Farahani (2014)
Participants 60 intermediate EFL learners 48 intermediate EFL learners 200 EFL university students 106 EFL university students 190 EFL learners 145 EFL university students 405 EFL learners
Results Practicing autonomy improves the writing proficiency Autonomous approaches have a positive effect on oral skills Autonomy level and visual and auditory learning styles are positively related No significant relationship between autonomy level and reading comprehension A positive relationship between autonomy level and use of vocabulary learning strategies A positive relationship between autonomy level and L1 and L2 essay writing A significant gap between the participants’ consciousness of autonomous learning and their actual classroom practice
exercises for the students. The results of an oral interview after the treatment were significantly in favor of the experimental group. Azimi Mohamad Abadi and Baradaran (2013) investigated the relationship between autonomy and vocabulary learning strategies. For this purpose, they distributed questionnaires among 190 EFL learners. Correlational analyses revealed a significant positive correlation between the autonomy of learners and their use of vocabulary learning strategies. Moreover, the study revealed that the more proficient learners’ scores had a stronger positive correlation with their vocabulary learning strategies than those of the less proficient ones. Shangarfam and Ghazisaeedi (2013) conducted a study to investigate the relationship between EFL university students’ autonomy level and their L1 and L2 essay writing. The results revealed that autonomy was a good predictor of both L1 and L2 essay writing. However, compared to L1 writing, the autonomy scores showed a stronger correlation with L2. The results resonated with Bagheri and Aeen (2011) who had studied the effect of practicing autonomy on the writing proficiency of intermediate EFL learners. Nevertheless, as for the reading skill, Shakeri and Nosratnia (2013) did not find any significant correlation between 106 university students’ scores on a questionnaire on autonomy and their reading comprehension scores. The authors claimed that although autonomy can be beneficial for other language skills, it does not have a significant relationship with reading comprehension. Conducting a quantitative study in a university in Iran, Nematipour (2012) investigated the autonomy level of 200 undergraduate EFL learners. The results indicated that most of the participants were moderately autonomous. Moreover, a significant positive correlation was found between the visual and auditory learning styles of the participants and their autonomy. In a more recent study, Farahani (2014) investigated 405 EFL learners’ readiness for autonomous learning. For this purpose, she distributed questionnaires, observed classes, and conducted interviews. The results revealed a gap between the participant students’ perceptions and their actual practices. The students referred to the absence of motivation, time, and teacher feedback as the reasons behind the gap. The studies mentioned above have all been conducted in Iranian universities where the teachers have more freedom in choosing the materials and designing the tests. Therefore, it seems that an urgent need exists for studies on LA at high school level, where the syllabus, materials, and tests are prescribed to the teachers. Moreover, due to the paucity of research on high school teachers’ practices of LA, the researchers believe that the present study is of paramount significance. Thus, the following research questions were addressed: (1) What strategies do Iranian EFL teachers implement to promote their students’ autonomy? (2) Do gender, experience, and educational degree affect teachers’ autonomy-promoting practices? (3) What factors, in teachers’ opinion, affect their practices to enhance LA?
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3. Method 3.1. Participants 3.1.1. Questionnaire participants In order to have as many participants as possible, snowball sampling strategy, which requires identification of some participants and asking them to introduce their colleagues or other potential participants, was implemented. Then, the questionnaires were distributed, either by email or by hand, among 97 Iranian EFL teachers who were teaching at high school level. The participants were both male and female and held either an MA or a BA degree in teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL). They had different levels of experience too. After receiving the questionnaires from the participants, nine incomplete ones were eliminated. Therefore, 88 teachers constituted the final participants of the questionnaire survey. Table 2 represents the detailed information on the questionnaire participants.
3.1.2. Interview participants After completing the questionnaires, the participants were asked whether they were willing to take part in a follow-up interview about LA. Since the interview aimed at asking the participants about the possible effect of gender, educational degree, and experience on teachers’ practice of LA, it seemed reasonable to hear the voices of teachers who varied with regard to the three stated attributes. Therefore, among the 27 teachers who volunteered, 8 were chosen, as described in Table 3.
3.2. Instrument Chang’s (2007) questionnaire was adopted for collecting the data. It is a 10-item Likert-scale questionnaire asking the participants about their frequency of implementation of 10 autonomy-promoting strategies. According to Nakata (2011), Chang’s questionnaire includes the most common strategies for improving LA in succinct, understandable terms.
3.3. Procedures A version of the questionnaire was first piloted with 20 teachers at 7 high schools. Analyzing the questionnaires, further revisions were made and some items were elaborated on by providing examples for the relevant strategies. Moreover, to ensure the reliability of the questionnaire, Cronbach α was employed and a score of 0.8 was achieved. At the end of the questionnaires, the teachers were asked whether they were willing to participate in a follow-up interview. The questionnaires were distributed among the participants during two months. On completion of the data collection, descriptive statistics including mean and standard deviation were employed to investigate the frequency of implementation of the 10 strategies by the participant teachers. Later, Man–Whitney U tests were run to make comparisons between the experienced/inexperienced, male/female, and teachers with MA/ BA degrees. The second phase of the study consisted of follow-up interviews with the teachers who had volunteered and signed the ethics sheet indicating their voluntary participation and confidentiality of the data. The interviews were conducted in Persian (as the teachers preferred) and later translated into English by the researchers. Each interview lasted between 20 and 35 minutes and was, upon Table 2. Distribution of the questionnaire participants. Sex Males Females Total
Teaching experience 40 44 88
Less than 10 years More than 10 years
Educational degree 18 70
BA MA
36 52
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Table 3. Distribution of interview participants. Teacher Teacher A Teacher B Teacher C Teacher D Teacher E Teacher F Teacher G Teacher H Total
Sex
Teaching experience
Educational degree
Male Male Male Male Female Female Female Female
Less than 10 years More than 10 years More than 10 years Less than 10 years More than 10 years More than 10 years Less than 10 years More than 10 years 8
BA MA BA MA MA MA BA MA
the consent of the interviewees, recorded and later transcribed verbatim. Finally, the researchers sent a copy of the transcripts to each participant, and a few changes were made accordingly.
4. Results 4.1. The results of the questionnaire The results of the questionnaire survey revealed the frequency of implementation of the 10 strategies by the participant teachers. As the figures in Table 4 indicate, among the 10 items, items 2 ‘Help learners to set up their own learning goal’ and 10 ‘Give learners chances to offer opinions on what to learn in the classroom’ received the lowest mean scores. These results can be traced back to the situation of EFL teaching in Iranian high schools where the input in the classrooms are controlled, and rigid syllabi and predetermined exams (Ghorbani 2009) are prescribed to teachers. In such a context, there remains little opportunity for implementation of the 2nd and 10th strategies. On the other hand, the most frequently used items were items 8 ‘Give learners chances to offer opinions in their learning’ and 6 ‘Help learners to learn from peers, not just from the teachers’. It seems that, in spite of the contextual limitations, the EFL teachers provide the students with opportunities to offer opinions in their learning. As an illustration, the students could be asked whether they need more examples on grammar, or whether they wish to learn vocabulary through slide shows or other methods. Moreover, dividing the students into groups, teachers are able to direct the students toward learning from their peers. Table 3 provides information on the relative frequency of all the 10 strategies. Taken as a whole, it seems that the teachers do not employ many strategies very frequently, perhaps due to the inherent contextual constraints which are beyond the scope of this study. Further studies can investigate the issue more scrupulously. In order to answer the second research question, inferential statistics were employed. As the data were not normally distributed, the non-parametric Mann–Whitney U test was run to make three sets of comparison between the answers of male and female, experienced and inexperienced, as well as MA and BA teachers to the questionnaire items. As the results of Table 5 indicate, the difference Table 4. Descriptive statistics. Item number
Mean
SD
Question1 Question2 Question3 Question4 Question5 Question6 Question7 Question8 Question9 Question10
2.53 2.08 2.88 2.35 2.92 3.56 3.17 3.59 2.72 2.14
0.946 0.861 1.004 0.695 0.805 0.623 0.776 0.655 0.757 0.899
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between the experienced and inexperienced teachers in the use of the strategies was not statistically significant. In a similar vein, the scores of the MA teachers did not significantly outweigh those of the BA teachers (Table 6). As Benson (2010) argues, although teachers’ education plays a significant role in their practice, they sometimes confront working conditions which prevent them from putting their ideas into actual practice. However, comparisons of the strategies used by male and female teachers revealed a significant gap between the two in the frequency of implementing items 4 ‘help learners to evaluate their own learning and progress’, 7 ‘help learners to become more self-directed in their learning’, and 10 ‘give learners chances to offer opinions on what to learn in the classroom’ (Table 7).
4.2. The results of the interview In order to answer the third research question, interviews were conducted with eight high school teachers. The teachers were first asked whether they believed in the impact of experience, gender, and educational degree on teachers’ autonomy-promoting practices. Out of the eight teachers, five believed that experience can be beneficial in improving one’s practice of LA. In my idea, a teacher who has more experience can manage the time better, and knows the students better. As a result, in the limited time available, (s)he may be able to use many autonomy-promoting strategies which as you know usually takes more time. Unexperienced teachers are more likely to run out of time and, therefore, in my opinion, cannot employ autonomy-promoting strategies as effectively as experienced teachers. (teacher C)
Considering the above argument, the teacher believes that experience increases the teachers’ skills for time management, and as one can conclude from the excerpt, if time limitation is not a problem, the inexperienced teachers can also promote autonomy of their learners. This claim was proved when the teacher was asked whether by expanding the time the inexperienced teachers can also be good advocates of LA: Yes, … may be the biggest problem is time, and the unexperienced teachers have more anxiety managing it. So, if they are sure about the sufficiency of time, they can devote time for promoting LA more confidentially. (teacher C)
Although the five teachers claimed that higher level of experience leads to the teachers’ success in promoting LA, two teachers, out of the five, believed that the difference is not significant. Umm … there are many factors involved … We cannot say that experience is a determining and significant factor, maybe compared to many other issues, experience is not that much salient … You know, in any context, a combination of factors go hand in hand to shape the teachers’ practice, and experience is just one of those factors. (teacher F)
However, teacher D had a completely different idea about the role of experience. She believed that experience not only does not help the teachers promote their learner’s autonomy, but it can also make some problems. I think experience is not very important. Sometimes experienced teachers stick to previous old traditions in teaching and because of their experience, they are not willing to adopt new techniques, even if they are told about the weakness of their work, they are bothered and tell you that they have enough experience to know what to do. (teacher D)
The above excerpt resonates with Nakata (2011, 907) whose participant teacher referred to a situation in which a young teacher gave a suggestion to a senior teacher and received the experienced teachers’ unkind sentence ‘are you telling me what to do?’ Therefore, reluctance to change one’s old methods may be a problem for experienced teachers. Another question the teachers were asked was whether their educational degree was a factor affecting their autonomy-supporting practices. The teachers mostly believed that educational degree is not a determining contributor. In fact, MA teachers believed that although teachers’ level of education has its own effects on their practice, since the concept of LA was not under the focus of their MA studies, it is unlikely to be affected by their educational degree.
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Mann–Whitney Asymp.sig (2-tailed)
Question 1
Question 2
Question 3
Question 4
Question 5
Question 6
Question 7
Question 8
Question 9
Question 10
359.500 .221
392.500 .389
442.500 .863
439.500 .825
397.500 .450
353.000 .108
428.000 .713
419.000 .575
377.500 .300
323.000 .089
Table 6. Mann–Whitney test – MA/BA teachers’ practices. Mann–Whitney Asymp.sig (2-tailed)
Question 1
Question 2
Question 3
Question 4
Question 5
Question 6
Question 7
Question 8
Question 9
Question 10
894.500 .545
903.000 .596
802.000 .157
921.500 .699
894.500 .535
820.000 .159
840.000 .264
941.500 .772
938.500 .824
957.500 .956
Table 7. Mann–Whitney test – male/female teachers’ practices. Mann–Whitney Asymp.sig (2-tailed)
Question 1
Question 2
Question 3
Question 4
Question 5
Question 6
Question 7
Question 8
Question 9
Question 10
930.500 .756
794.000 .109
871.500 .408
485.500 .000
863.000 .361
904.500 .547
565.000 .000
776.000 .053
913.500 .634
614.000 .002
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Table 5. Mann–Whitney test – experienced/inexperienced teachers’ practices.
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To be honest, I didn’t even hear of learner autonomy in my MA studies. I once read an article by Knowles and became familiarized with the concept. After that time, I realized the importance of autonomous learning and teaching and wondered why such an important concept has been largely ignored in our MA courses! (teacher D)
When other MA teachers were asked about their familiarity with LA during their MA studies, they all agreed with teacher D’s assertion. However, although the teachers mentioned a gap about familiarizing MA students with the concept, since this claim is only limited to our small number of MA teachers, we cannot make a general conclusion about the effect of teachers’ educational degree on their practice for autonomy. Therefore, the issue necessitates a large-scale investigation. The last factor the teachers were asked about was their gender. The teachers mostly believed that being a male or female on its own does not affect a teachers’ practice of autonomy. The following excerpt was stated by one of the teachers: In my idea, being a male or female teacher is not an important factor in this regard, but having male or female students may affect. I have had both female and male students and I sometimes find the females more willing and sensitive toward learning. In terms of group work or giving choice, etc, however, for example, when I give the students out of class activities, the female students like it and do them on time but the male students do not usually do them. You know, when you see what you do is not wanted by the students, you will not repeat it again … or for example, when I give my female students a choice over the order of teaching vocabulary or grammar, some boys make fun of it and, of course not in all classes, I prefer not to give them a lot of choice. (teacher A)
As the results of the questionnaire survey, Section 4.1, revealed, the female teachers outperformed their male counterparts in utilizing some of the strategies. The above assertion by teacher A seems to be a reasonable justification for the difference. In Iranian high schools, due to the Islamic rules, the female teachers only teach female students and male teachers mostly have male learners. That being the case, it is likely that the students have an effect on the teachers. Therefore, it is not being a male or female teacher that makes a difference, but having male or female students sometimes matters. Finally, the teachers were asked about the factors which, in their idea, affect their practices of LA. The teachers mostly referred to four important factors; namely, having resources, teacher training, freedom in making syllabi and tests, and finally, students’, parents’, and schools’ expectations.
5. Resources As many studies have pointed out (e.g. Motteram 1998; Figura and Jarvis 2007), computer-based programs can be helpful resources in promoting LA. Although Iranian high schools have recently been equipped with computers, there are not any Internet-based approaches to learning English. One of the teachers remarked as follows: I once read an article on the new methods of teaching English in um … I think it was China. The system was totally internet-based and there you could find what we really mean by learner autonomy. Everything was left to the students and they took responsibility of their own learning. However, in our context such approaches are not practical since it needs having a computer for each student which is not, in our real situation, possible … . (teacher B)
6. Teacher training Another factor which, in the interviewees’ ideas, contributes to a better practice of LA was teacher training. Although scientific investigation of this issue was beyond the scope of this study, the researchers asked 20 teachers about the inclusion of LA in their training and all teachers had a negative answer. Moreover, 20 MA students of TEFL in 5 universities were asked whether they were instructed LA in their MA courses or not. Unfortunately, all of them complained about the absence of the concept in the books, articles, and materials they were supposed to study in university. That being the case, there seems to exist a big gap in teacher training in the Iranian context. As
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teacher F outlined, familiarizing language teachers with the concept, its importance, and ways of improving it are very important steps which should be taken as soon as possible. You can ask a number of teachers and even MA students or graduates about their familiarity with the concept of LA and its importance. When teachers are not aware of its significance, we should not expect to find high levels of autonomy among students. The teachers play a significant role, and to play this role effectively, they should be given due attention. (teacher E)
Since LA is on a continuum, and considering context-specificity of the concept (Nakata 2011), what level of autonomy is desirable and practical differs in various contexts. Therefore, teachers should be informed about the ways they can foster it in their present/real situation.
7. Freedom in syllabus and test making The teachers also believed that if they were given more freedom in choosing/making the material, content, and tests, they could improve their learners’ autonomy more successfully. Teacher G’s remark is a good example: A very important factor is having freedom in the inputs of teaching, I mean, the teacher knows the students’ needs and abilities and can herself/himself select good books and materials for them. The books we have are sometimes too easy for a class and difficult for another. The students can also bring their favorite material. I know this is not possible in our context but they can at least reduce 20% of the books and let the students decide what they need. This can affect the exams, too. The teacher can be allowed to write 20% of the exam questions from the material she or her students selected. With such a fixed syllabus and such predetermined exams, I don’t think the teachers think about promoting autonomy.
The above teachers’ comments resonate with Namaghi (2006) who states that, in Iranian high schools, both the input of teaching and its output are strictly controlled by the prescribed curriculum. By controlled output Namaghi means the national scheme of testing which affects the teachers’ practice. Considering the washback effect of tests on teaching, the teachers have to teach in a way that their students achieve the best results. This kind of teaching, as the teachers expressed, is not likely to provide opportunities for improving autonomy.
8. Students’, parents’, and principals’ expectations The last factor mentioned by the teachers was the expectation of students, their parents, and the schools’ principals. According to Ghorbani (2009, 132), in the Iranian context, a higher score in exams is culturally considered as an indicator of the higher achievement and the teaching and learning processes are highly controlled by ‘grade pressure from students, parents, and school principals’. This is what a number of teachers in this study referred to when they were asked about the factors which affect their practice of LA. In our country, the students’ main aims are getting good scores. If you are the best teacher but your students do not achieve high scores at the end of the term, all your efforts are degraded. The teachers are judged not by how much choice or independence they give to their students, but by how many students in their classes get good results in exams. If you do not get good results, you will be blamed by the students, their parents, and even school principals (teacher H).
9. Discussion One of the aims pursued in this study was to investigate the strategies implemented by Iranian EFL high school teachers for autotomizing their learners. The results provided adequate evidence that, among the 10 strategies, items 2 ‘Help learners to set up their own learning goal’ and 10 ‘Give learners chances to offer opinions on what to learn in the classroom’ received the lowest mean scores. On the other hand, items 8 ‘Give learners chances to offer opinions in their learning’ and 6 ‘Help learners to
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learn from peers, not just from the teachers’ gained the highest mean among the teachers. These findings can be rooted in contextual factors. Actually, Iranian high school students are taught through a controlled system in which both the input and the output of learning are controlled (Ghorbani 2009). However, although the ‘what’ of learning is predetermined and the students and teachers are, to a large extent, deprived of voice in the content of learning, they can be empowered to make decisions on ‘how’ to learn. Therefore, the teachers can provide them with opportunities to express their ideas about the ‘how’ of their learning. Another area investigated in the study was whether variables such the teachers’ gender, level of experience, and educational degree have a significant effect on their autonomy-supportive practice. The findings indicated that among the three variables, gender was the only one which had a significant effect. Although many studies have revealed significant differences between experienced and inexperienced teachers’ practices (e.g. Woolfok and Hoy 1990; Siebert 2006; Ghanizadeh and Moafian 2010), the effect of experience is likely to be restricted by contextual factors. As Nakata (2011) claims, a higher amount of experience in exam-oriented educational contexts is not likely to have a positive effect on the practice of autonomy by teachers. According to Namaghi (2006), in Iranian school settings, sociopolitical forces play a significant role in the performance of teachers. The teachers’ input is prescribed by the curriculum and the teachers cannot choose the materials which are suitable for their students’ needs. Moreover, the outcome is largely controlled by the national testing scheme and the teachers cannot design the tests with positive washback effect on autonomous teaching and learning. Finally, due to the cultural belief which judges a student’s achievement by the score he/she obtained at the end of the term, the whole teaching and learning process is controlled by the pressure of schools imposed on the teachers. That being the case, the teachers’ roles change into the implementers of schemes, policies, and programs rather than initiators who use their knowledge and experience for maintaining the classroom in the way which best suits the particularities of their setting. Therefore, the teachers’ educational degrees and levels of experience, as the results indicated, did not play a significant role in the performance of teachers. However, the female teachers significantly outperformed their male colleagues in utilizing a number of strategies. This may not necessarily be related to the teachers’ genders but, as one of our teachers who had the experience of teaching both male and female students argued, the difference can be due to the students’ genders. In other words, since the students’ expectations, styles, and interests are likely to affect their teachers’ practice, it is possible that the female students were more interested in independent learning and it consequently led to their teachers’ better performance in this regard. As Koçak (2003) claims, for deciding the objectives of their course, most male students give responsibility to their teachers while the females mostly agree to share the responsibility. Similarly, Arabski (1999) concluded that females were more willing to do out-of-class activities than male students. Arabski further claimed that the participant female students were more eager to improve their language outside the classroom. As an illustration, they showed more enthusiasm for reading story books, listening to songs, watching movies, and talking to foreigners in the foreign language. In another study, Varol and Yilmaz (2010) compared the autonomous activities of male and female students and concluded that females outperform males in activities such as trying new things in class activities, studying on their own, taking opportunities to speak English in class, and noting down new words and their meaning. Finally, Hajizadeh, Nakhle, and Naghavi (2013) focused on gender differences of Iranian EFL learners’ autonomous activities and concluded that females tend to show a higher degree of autonomy in deciding contents of the syllabus while males are more dependent on the teacher. Therefore, it is possible that the female students’ behavior elicited more autonomy-supportive strategies on the part of their teachers.
10. Conclusion The present study aimed to investigate LA in the Iranian high school context with regard to (1) the practices employed by teachers, (2) the possible difference between the practices of teachers with different
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educational degrees, genders, and levels of experience concerning their practice of LA, and (3) the factors which, in teachers’ opinion, led to their better performance for promoting their learners’ autonomy. The results of the questionnaire survey revealed the frequency of the teachers’ usage of the 10 strategies which, according to Chang (2007), contribute to LA (Table 4). Mann–Whitney tests detected no significant difference between the performance of the MA/BA teachers and the performance of experienced/inexperienced ones. However, a significant difference was reported when the results of male and female teachers were compared. Later, the teachers’ ideas about the possible effect of education, gender, and experience on their autonomy-promoting practices were sought. The results revealed that the teachers believed experience helps the teachers manage their time in a better way and devote more time to implementing the strategies. However, being male or female, in their idea, was not a functional factor for employing the strategies, while the students’ gender, in some cases, could affect their practice. Moreover, criticizing the absence of the concept of LA in their MA studies, the teachers mostly believed that having an MA degree does not make any difference in practice. Finally, the teachers referred to three factors (resources, teacher training, and freedom in syllabus and test making) which are likely to improve their practice of LA. Considering the sample size of the study, the obtained results cannot be generalized. However, the study provides useful implications for teacher educators. As the interview results implied, there is a big gap in teacher education programs for Iranian EFL teachers. Therefore, there exists a challenge for teacher educators to support language teachers through lectures and workshops, with the purpose of presenting practical methods to improve LA within the constraints while working to remove them. According to Parkhurst and Bodwell (2005), in order to familiarize the teachers with new concepts and methods, institutional support such as offering professional development, expanding the time, and devoting funds for teachers are needed. By providing examples from the teachers’ actual practice, Nasri et al. (2015) claimed that in contexts such as Iran where the constraints impede implementation of many autonomy-supportive strategies, there is still room for the teachers to maneuver. For instance, although the content of instruction is predetermined, teachers can divide students into groups and let them learn the lessons together and correct each other’s mistakes, while they themselves are walking around and monitoring them. At the end of the session, they can pose some questions for the students to answer. In some sessions, the students can volunteer to teach the new lesson to their classmates. As for evaluation, the teachers can ask them to write their own questions and hand them over to them to make the final selection. Furthermore, after the exam, the papers can be distributed among the students, with each one to take the responsibility of evaluating one paper. Moreover, although the books are predetermined, the teachers can ask the students to provide supplementary materials such as power points to add more flesh to the content of the lessons. Finally, despite the fact that incorporating an idea like LA appears to be demanding in the Iranian EFL context where the input, output, and students’ roles are rigidly controlled (Eslami-Rasekh and Valizadeh 2004; Namaghi 2006; Ghorbani 2009), EFL teachers need to understand their students, to find intrinsic motivation in promoting their autonomy, and to implement appropriate strategies which suit the specifications of their context. The onus is also on teacher education authorities to take a great leap forward to equip the teachers with required skill and knowledge for the pursuit of this goal.
Disclosure statement No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors Najmeh Nasri holds a Ph.D. in TEFL from the University of Isfahan, Iran. Her main areas of interest include sociolinguistics and learner/teacher autonomy.
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Hossein Vahid Dastjerdy is currently an associate professor in the Department of English, Islamic Azad University, Shahreza Branch, Iran. He is the author of many books and has published various articles. His main research interests include discourse analysis and translation. Abbass Eslami Rasekh is currently an associate professor in the Department of English, University of Isfahan. He has written various books as well as articles which are mainly about sociolinguistics, discourse analysis, and English for specific purposes (ESP). Zahra Amirian holds a Ph.D. in TEFL from the University of Isfahan, Iran. She is an assistant professor at the University of Isfahan. Her research interests are intercultural rhetoric and genre analysis.
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Appendix. The questionnaire
Pleas rate how often you use the following in your classrooms: 1. rarely 2. sometimes 3. often 4. very often 1. Help learners to identify their strengths and weakness themselves 2. Help learners to set up their own learning goals 3. Help learners to decide what to learn outside the classroom 4. Help learners to evaluate their own learning and progress 5. Help learners to stimulate their own interest in learning English 6. Help learners to learn from peers, not just from the teachers 7. Help learners to become more self-directed in their learning 8. Give learners chances to offer opinions in their learning 9. Help learners to discover knowledge in English on their own rather than waiting for knowledge from the teacher 10. Give learners chances to offer opinions on what to learn in the classroom Thank you
