| Learning reform has been proposed in Thailand as it is clearly specified in the national educational act of 1999 that the learning and teaching of all subjects at all levels shall be based on a learner-centered approach. A learner-center approach is new to Thai learners, teachers and educators who have been familiar to rote learning, and memorization. Therefore, it is important to investigate how a learner-centered approach has been defined and implemented in the classrooms teaching English.;This study used four different methods: document analysis, observations, interviews and stimulated recalls to triangulate the result of the study. The findings of the three research questions are following:;It was found that policy makers, policy distributors, supervisors and teachers had similar definitions of a learner-centered approach. All mentioned that the goal of teaching and learning was to develop learners to their optimal level. Learning and teaching activities were designed to meet learner's needs and interests. However, they all had different concepts of a learner-centered approach in terms of the implementation of a learner-centered approach in the classroom. The policy makers emphasized five major roles teachers should take in order to meet learners' differences. On the other hand, the Ministry of Education had its own interpretation of a learner-centered approach. In this interpretation, teachers' roles were decreased and learners' roles were increased. All supervisors and teachers received knowledge through policy distributors.;How did these three teachers actually teach English in their classrooms? Based on classroom interaction patterns in the three classrooms, it was found that none of the three teachers used group work or pair work, which is the most important feature of communicative language teaching. The three teachers were highly teacher centered, especially Teacher A who used 99% of her class time in whole class activity. Teacher B and C are less teacher centered because of the effort of decreasing whole class activities, and the use of activities such as Total Physical Response, and singing. However, they were trained to use only drill activities not communicative activities; as a result, there were no communicative activities or communicative tasks.;The use of target language in these three classes was not high. None of them used English more than 50%. The avoidance of using the target language was due to teachers' low English proficiency, teachers' lack of confidence, and learners' low proficiency.;These teachers reported these problems in implementation of a learner-centered approach: standard of teacher education, knowledge of a learner-centered approach provided, lack of training for teachers, supervisor qualifications, amount of administrative support, proficiency of learners. These teachers specified their personal problems such as heavy teaching load, low qualification and unsupportive working environment. |
