A Study On Autonomy Of Novice College English Teachers

College English Curriculum Requirements calls for the changes of teaching mode from teacher-centered pattern to student-centered pattern. However this teaching mode does not mean to weaken teacher responsibilities, instead, the reorientation of teacher roles. As the expansion of college English major enrollment, the number of English major undergraduate and graduate students also increases ceaselessly and a considerable proportion of them become the backbone of English teachers. Therefore, novice teachers with unique features: lack of teaching experience, lack of confidence, lack of security and so on, draw many researchers and scholars' attention. Novice teachers will meet lots of difficulties in teaching and professional development, which cause some of them to leave the profession. Researchers and scholars are striving for solving the problems novice teachers confronting in their teaching and professional development, and they find that teacher autonomy is an effective way to solve difficulties of novice teachers'.The study aims to investigate the degree of novice teacher autonomy from two perspectives: one focuses on the degree of novice teacher autonomy in teaching; the other focuses on the degree of novice teacher autonomy in professional development. It reviews the definition of novice teacher and teacher autonomy, the stages of novice teachers'professional development, and explores the characteristics of novice teachers'and teacher autonomy, and traces the degree of teacher autonomy, factors affecting teacher autonomy and the relationships between teacher autonomy and teacher development. As a result, the strategies for developing their autonomy will be put forward.The methodologies employed in this study are the quantitative and qualitative study in order to explore the degree of novice teacher autonomy in teaching and professional development, factors influencing novice autonomy and the strategies for developing their autonomy. And the data collection methods are questionnaires, interviews and journals. Totally, 30 novice teachers are randomly chosen from one college in the city of Tai Yuan. And the study lasts for one semester from September 2010 to January 2011. The research shows that the novice teachers have weak understanding about the conceptions of teacher autonomy: most of them have only heard the term, but do not understand its meaning. As for the degree of novice teacher autonomy in teaching, novice teachers have shown good autonomy in some areas, while the situation of novice teachers'professional development autonomy is not very satisfactory. The study finds that motivation, working experience, professional ability and age have influence on autonomy. School or administrator's management, the curriculum and the assessment to some extent constrain novice teacher autonomy. Based on the research results, the study proves that promoting novice teachers'awareness of autonomy, increasing professional knowledge and competence, carrying out reflective teaching, implementing collaborative teaching and conducting action research are proved to be effective strategies for the development of novice teacher autonomy.