A Study Of Teacher Agency In High School English Curriculum Reform

In January 2018,the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China has enacted the “General High School English Curriculum Standards(2017 edition)”,marking a significant milestone in the course of high school English curriculum reform.Since then,basic English education has officially stepped into a new age of development.Most relevant researches on foreign language education policy and planning have largely adopted top-down approaches to investigate the macro issues of policy formulation,policy implementation and effects.However,relatively little is known about how teachers respond to the reform.The present study focuses on teacher agency in English curriculum reform from a micro view.With theoretical frameworks of Activity Theory,the ecological approach to teacher agency and Teacher Change Theory,this research adopts a mixed-method approach of qualitative study and quantitative study,and employs both embedded research design and sequentialexplanatory research design.The research aims to explore three questions as follows: 1)What kind of agency do high school English teachers exercise in curriculum reform? 2)What are the influencing factors of high school English teacher agency in curriculum reform? 3)How do high school English teachers enhance their agency in curriculum reform?The research defines high school English teacher agency in curriculum reform in terms of personal agency,relational agency and change agency.Meanwhile,“The Questionnaire of High School English Teacher Agency in Curriculum Reform” is formulated and validated to collect data from a sample of English teachers from model high schools and ordinary high schools in Jiangsu,Hebei,Guangxi,Guangdong and Guizhou Provinces.Results show the general teacher agency in the High School English Curriculum Reform is high-level with change agency at the top.Professional titles of English teachers correlate positively with their agency.And teachers from model high schools enjoy a higher teacher agency than teachers from ordinary high schools.Furthermore,support from teacher development environment,pedagogical beliefs and professional identity have a statistically significant direct effect on their agency.The research adopts case analyses consisting of four English teachers who were born respectively in the 1970 s,1980s and 1990 s to further investigate main factors of teacher agency in responding to curriculum reform.Based on methods of interview,class observation,teaching journal and other tools of qualitative research,the research identifies seven significant factors,namely,personal experience,developmental objectives,practical knowledge,emotion and identity,beliefs,teachers' classroom practices and school cultures which are subject to the influence of teacher agency.The path of teacher agency promotion constitutes teachers' learning and teaching reflection.The research reveals that English teachers construct agency development by making ‘choice',adopting ‘action' and ‘transition' throughout professional learning.As for professional learning inclinations,Pedagogical Content Knowledge(PCK),practical knowledge,TPACK and reform knowledge are four major choices of teachers.And two major models of teachers' professional learning are self-autonomous learning and cooperative learning.Likewise,conducted by diversified reflection strategies,the objects of English teachers' reflection are multifarious and complex,which causes different practices of teacher agency.Finally,the change and development of English teacher agency in curriculum reform could be phased as stages of agency confusion,agency adaptation,agency enhancement and agency creation.Drawing on the above discussion of findings,this study has some implications for English teachers to facilitate their agency and participate in English curriculum reform in depth:(1)Persisting in the foreign language education policy of Curriculum Reform and integrating with localized educational characteristics;(2)Promoting information technology knowledge and literacy;(3)Valuing opportunities of mutual cooperation and develop more learning activities with colleagues.As for some reform-related departments in power,this study advocates these strategies :(1)High schools should guide and support their staff to take initiatives in their curriculum reform and to keep similar policy discourses with national foreign language education policy discourses;(2)Educational administrative branches and teaching research officers in the jurisdiction should take responsibilities for the enactment of “General High School English Curriculum Standards(2017 edition)”;(3)the Ministry of Education should expedite the construction of national assessment system coordinating with values of key competences and filling the gap between assessment system proposed by Curriculum Reform and the one in practice.