A Comparative Study Of Professional Development Of Urban And Rural EFL Teachers In Junior Middle Schools:

The influence of a nation’s foreign language education on the country’s development has attracted the attention of the worldwide countries. Teachers are so critical to the success of a nation’s education that many governments have implemented a series of policies facilitating teacher professional development. Since teaching became a profession authorized by UNESCO in1966, teacher professional development has been a worldwide tendency. Teacher professional development is a most effective way to improve teaching quality. In recent20years, teacher professional development has already caught more and more people’s attention.The enforcement of the new English curriculum provides good chances for the development of EFL teachers and brings forward the challenge to the quality of EFL teachers. There exists a(?) big gap between the quality of EFL teachers in urban and rural junior middle school. In recen years, the imbalance of educational levels between urban and rural middle schools has becom<more serious. The main reasons are the differences of professional development between urba(?) and rural middle school EFL teachers. In order to further implement quality education an(?) further promote the development of basic compulsory education, it is important to improve th(?) quality of education in rural areas, ease the gap between urban and rural education, and promot(?) professional development of rural EFL teachers.This research intends to make a comparison of urban and rural EFL teachers’professiona developments in Shangqiu, Henan province through survey and interview. This paper aims t(?) build a workable platform for solving the problems in rural EFL teachers, improving the loca(?) level of English teaching and easing the gap between urban and rural education.In the study, from a theoretical point of view, the author starts by defining some key term and theories on connotation of English teacher professional development. From a practical poir of view through questionnaires and interviews, the author has conducted a survey of EFL teache professional development in junior middle schools in Shangqiu area which involve48schools and150teachers (50urban teachers,50county teachers and50rural teachers). It covers five aspects:the general situation of the surveyed teachers, EFL teachers’ view on the career and ethic devotion, view on EFL teaching, their EFL Pedagogical Content Competences and view on teacher learning and development.18teachers were interviewed including6urban English teachers,6county English teachers and6rural English teachers. The purpose of the interview is to find out more information on EFL teachers’ professional development.The data of the investigation shows that the comprehensive level of the junior middle school EFL teachers in this area is comparatively low:1) teachers’ ethic devotion needs to be strengthened;2) teachers’ teaching concepts are out of date;3) teachers are short of basic professional knowledge;4) teachers’ awareness of reflective teaching needs to be improved urgently. Finally, on the basis of the combination of the theoretical study and the practical investigation, the author puts forward the ideas of promoting the junior middle school EFL teacher’s professional development from three parts. The first one is the proposal for EFL teachers:EFL teachers should improve their self-development ability. The second one is the proposal for junior schools:schools should take some measures to promote teachers’ professional development. The last one is the proposal for educational administrative departments: administrative departments should adopt appropriate strategies to ensure sustainable development of Junior English teaching.