Professional Identity Of Tuition-free Normal University Of English Majors From The Personal Knowledge Perspective

In order to improve the education level in rural areas, Chinese government began to implement free education in six universities under direct administration of Ministry of Education in 2007. This measure is regarded as a significant reform to attract more outstanding students to devote to the educational course of our country, to improve education in rural areas, to realize educational fairness, to recreate an atmosphere of respecting teachers, and to promote social harmony. Up till now. this policy has been applied more than three years. As pre-service teacher, their professional identity aroused great concern, because it determined weather the tuition free normal college students can dedicate to work in rural areas. Therefore, it is necessary to do some research on this aspect.To address a need for further understanding of tuition free normal college students' professional identity, this study adopted a mixed method to explore professional identity from personal knowledge perspective based on the research which was carried out in Southwest University. It made a comparison between prior and current professional identity, exploring the relevant experiences which can affect the formation of their professional identity, and the influencing factors which includes teaching context. experience and biography. The findings can provide constructive suggestions for English teacher education program.The author used questionnaire and document analysis to conduct the research. In order to collect the facts and perceptions about professional identity, the questionnaire for tuition free normal college student is based on the pioneer researchers, in order to assure the validity and reliability. A pilot study was conducted selecting 15 students.The research result showed that most students see themselves as the combination of three aspects, a significant difference was found between students prior and current professional identity. They believed that all the influencing factors play an important role in the formation of professional identity. However, some problems needed to be solved. First, like many other methods, using a questionnaire for the collection of this kind of data has its limitations. Other methods should be adopted in the future study. Secondly, it is necessary to make the relation between students" professional identity and influencing factors explicitly.The research findings have significant implications for training of tuition free normal college students. Firstly, English curriculum should be suitable for the training of tuition free normal college students, what is more, more attention should be paid to the subject matter knowledge, pedagogical knowledge and didactical knowledge. Secondly, it is necessary to develop students' ability to relate theory to practice in different ways to put personal theories into practice, improving the perception of teacher professional identity.