Research On College English Teachers’ Autonomous Professional Development

In existing literature and study, research of college English teachers’ professionaldevelopment mainly focuses on theoretical research, and more attention is paid toteachers’ disciplinary knowledge and competence, professional quality, teaching andscientific research. Less literature involves teachers’ autonomous professionaldevelopment. This study, from the perspective of teacher autonomy, combines"teacher autonomy" with "teachers’ professional development" together, emphasizesself-consciousness and subjective initiative in professional development. Aftersummarizing existing literature and study, this paper rebuilds the theoreticalframework of this research. Through questionnaire survey and statistical analysis, theresearch analyzes the current situation of English teachers’ autonomous professionaldevelopment, explores existing problems and puts forward strategies from five aspectsin order to promote college English teachers’ autonomous professional developmentand provide reference for college English teaching reform.This research mainly adopts two kinds of tools, questionnaire and interview, toinvestigate English teachers of five universities in Xi’an. The main part of thequestionnaire includes five aspects, a total of forty-five items. All the items arepresented in the form of the Richter scale. Respondents range in age from twenty-fiveto fifty-five years old, including men and women; education degrees consist ofbachelor’s degree and master’s degree; professional title comes from teaching assistant,lecturer, and associate professor to professor.Interview is used to supplement the questionnaire, and it involves five openquestions, aiming to understand respondents’ experiences and views of autonomousprofessional development. Nine effective college English teachers from the same fiveuniversities are involved in the interview.They are all professors and associateprofessors with teaching age of more than twenty years and rich in teaching experience. They also have reached certain achievements in the field of scientificresearch, and students have a higher evaluation for them.Using SPSS17.0, the paper firstly carries out data reliability and validity analysisof the questionnaire. Then, it gives descriptive statistical analysis from five aspects ofteachers’ autonomous professional development. Finally, the paper carries outcomparison and analysis of the sample means of teachers with different teaching age.Research shows that: teachers have a higher satisfaction with their career; theyhave urgent demand for autonomous professional development. At the same time,there exist some problems: teaching and scientific research ability should be furtherimproved; teachers seriously need reflection on teaching; teachers are not satisfiedwith less opportunity to participate in academic conferences and training programs;teachers with different teaching age have obvious differences in stages of autonomousprofessional development.According to the theoretical model proposed by current researcher and researchfindings, combining with existing research and present researcher’s teachingexperience, this paper puts forward the overall strategies for English teachers’autonomous professional development: establish a strong consciousness ofdevelopment; set clear development goals; continuously optimize knowledge structureand enhance professional ability. This research also offers four specific approaches:build teaching reflection model; establish lifelong education concept; carry outcooperation and communication among teachers and carry out teacher trainingprogram.The innovation of this paper lies in that: the research rebuilds the systematictheoretical framework for teachers’ autonomous professional development, designsthe questionnaire according to the theoretical framework proposed, compares thedifferences of the teachers with different teaching age in professional development,puts forward overall strategies and specific approaches for teachers’ autonomousprofessional development.