English Teachers’ Professional Development In Rural Middle Schools Under The New Curriculum Reform

Teachers’ professional development has been arousing great concerns, especiallysince the implementation of the reform of the new basic education curriculum inSeptember2001. In the past decades, however, some experts and scholars mainlyfocused their attention on the broad sense of teachers’ professional development,rarely discussing it with reference to a certain subject for further research, so thatteachers’ professional development of a certain subject lacks the guidance of theoryand practice, which undoubtedly affects and hinders teachers’ professionaldevelopment. With the reform of the new curriculum as background, the present thesistakes for example teachers’ professional development in the rural middle schools inMengcheng County of Anhui Province, and elaborates the current problems anddeficiencies of English teachers’ professional development in rural middle schoolsthrough investigations in local places. Moreover, through the analysis of the reason,the thesis also puts forward some corresponding solutions. The present study is aimedat improving English teachers’ professional development and teaching levels andfurther enhancing the English teaching qualities in rural middle schools.This thesis consists of seven chapters. Chapter One mainly expounds therationale for teachers’ professional development, the reason for selecting the topic,and the research methods. Chapter Two is the literature review, mainly involvingdefining what the teachers’ professional development is and then stating Englishteachers’ professional development, especially in rural areas, and the relateddevelopment at home and abroad in detail. Chapter Three is the theoretical part,mainly introducing the theory about constructivism, lifelong learning and actionresearch, and also making explanations of roles that the reform of new curriculumdemands English teachers to play. Chapter Four points out the existing problems anddeficiencies of English teachers’ professional development in rural middle schools inMengcheng County through investigations of the current situation. Chapter Fiveanalyzes the reasons that affect the English teachers’ professional development inrural areas, and then Chapter Six puts forward its corresponding solutions according to these reasons mentioned above. Finally, Chapter Seven summarizes the mainfindings of this thesis and gives some constructive suggestions for the future studies.