A Study On The Influencing Factors Of Senior High School English Teachers’ Professional Development

Teachers’ professional development, as one of the most important research area in teacher education, has reached the unprecedented heat in China since the 21st century. Although an increasing number of achievements have been made, the researches on the factors which influence teachers’ professional development are very limited, especially on the senior high school English teachers. In order to fill the blank in this area, it is necessary to explore the factors which influence senior high school English teachers’ professional development.Based on the qualitative and qualitative method, the present study adopted questionnaires and interviews. The selected subjects are 43 English teachers in No.l Senior high school of Ru’nan County. The survey was conducted to investigate the factors which influence their development by looking into the present situation and the existing problems of their professional development.The study highlights three major factors:the personal factors, including the deficiency of professional knowledge, the deficiency of professional competence and the inconsistency between teachers’belief and their teaching practice; the school factors, including the lack of support from school leaders, the lack of cohesion of development activities and the shortage of resource and information; and social factors, including the lack of financial support and the lack of a sound evaluation system. The three dimensions of factors contribute to teachers’ low level of self-development consciousness and teachers’ reluctance to engage into development activities.After identifying the factors, some suggestions were put forward to promote senior high school English teachers’ professional development from three aspects. For teachers themselves, they should follow Wallace’s reflective model by enhancing their consciousness of self-directed professional development. For the school, the school leaders should give more concern to teachers’ development, provide more training opportunities for teachers and reinforce the construction of modern distance education. For the society, the administrative department should offer financial and policy support.