Study On The Professional Development Of The Junior Middle School English Teachers In Zhengding County

As a world-wide language, English is used in the most countries with the development of the knowledge economy and the information technology. More and more people have started to pay attention to English since China entered WTO in 2001. Therefore, English teaching is also becoming even more urgent and important. English teachers have to improve their own professional quality to adapt to the needs of society and development.The new curriculum reform of elementary education is implemented in the 21st century. The English teachers as the participants play an important role in the reform. It has brought the great challenges for them since the English Curriculum Standard was implemented, and the new teaching materials are used and some teaching methods are proposed. Therefore, English teachers should improve their own professional level in order to meet the demands of the new curriculum. English teachers'professional development is not only the need of era development but also the key which decides the success or failure on the new curriculum reform of elementary education.The thesis explores the present situation of professional development of junior middle school English teachers in Zhengding County. People can understand present situation of professional development of English teachers through survey, interview and classroom observation. The method of percentage calculation is adopted in the process of the obtaining data. The thesis points out the existing problems and analyzes the reasons. Then the researcher puts forward proposals for professional development of junior middle school English teachers in Zhengding County.This thesis mainly consists of six parts: introduction, literature review, theoretical bases of teacher professional development, research design and findings, proposals and conclusion. First, the thesis introduces the significance of the research, and then reviews the study at home and abroad. It discusses the theories of teacher professional development from several aspects which include the teacher professionalization, teacher professional development, teacher training and development, constructivism learning theory and lifelong education theory. The objects of the study are all the junior middle school English teachers in Zhengding County. Research was conducted from July to October in 2007. 238 English teachers who are from 23 junior middle schools were investigated in the study, of which more than 40 English teachers were interviewed. The researcher observed 30 English classes of different teachers. The first-hand resources are collected on English teachers'professional development. The results present the existing problems clearly. Firstly, English teachers'academic attainments do not reach agreement with graduation diplomas. There is a great gap between these teachers'professional quality and English teaching requirements. Secondly, the English teachers'understanding of the new curriculum is not intensive. They lack systematic theoretical knowledge. Thirdly, some English teachers'teaching ability is too poor to control the teaching materials and meet the teaching needs. Fourthly, English teachers lack sufficient consciousness, are unaware of necessity of professional development, so they don't concern about obtaining the relevant English teaching knowledge and training their own ability of listening, speaking, reading, writing. Fifthly, English teachers can not understand scientific research completely. Sixthly, the trainers of professional training and continuing education don't care about actual effect. At last, according to the problems, the thesis puts forward the proposals which will promote professional development of junior middle school English teachers. It includes two parts. One is the proposal for the English teachers. Firstly, English teachers should enhance consciousness of self-development. Secondly, English teachers carry out self-development by means of self-study, reflecting on teaching, writing teaching diaries, video record. At the same time, English teachers should pay attention to co-operative development with the colleagues which can improve teaching and research ability through peer observation, case study and project research. The other is the proposal for the training department. Professional training should pay attention to actual effect. Training contents are chosen based on the English teachers'professional level. The variety of training forms can promote English teachers'professional development. The thesis will provide the theoretical bases and practice for the current professional development of junior middle school English teachers. It will offer some real data and methods of English teachers'professional development in junior middle school. In addition, they can encourage the English teachers'development through displaying teachers'achievements and holding all kinds of competitions.