A Research Into College Students' Perceptions Of Native And Non-native English-Speaking Teachers In EFL Teaching

Over the few past decades,the number of English learners around the world has risen dramatically owing to globalization.In the context of China,although non-native speaker teachers take the most proportions of English teachers,native speaker teachers have been considered as the authority of English users because of their standard pronunciation and fluent and idiomatic expressions.In universities of China,the question,who is the most effective English teacher,the native or the non-native,has been discussed by many scholars based on English major students'perceptions.However,few studies have compared English and non-English major students' perceptions.Thus,it is of great importance to investigate this field.This study employs a quantitative and a qualitative methods.The quantitative research is based on a questionnaire completed by 132 subjects(68 English majors and 64 non-English majors)from Southwest Petroleum University and the qualitative is a semi-structured interview to 6 of the participants(3 English majors and 3 non-English majors).All the data collected from the questionnaire,including mean,standard deviation and paired sample t-value,are processed by software Statistical Product and Service Solutions version 22.0(SPSS 22.0).The current study attempts to explore:1)students' general perceptions of the Native English Speaking Teachers(hereafter NESTs for short)and Non-native English Speaker Teachers(hereafter NNESTs for short)in EFL teaching context;2)differences and similarities between students' perceptions of the NESTs and NNESTs;3)differences and similarities between English majors' and non-English majors' perceptions on NESTs and NNE(?)Tes.main results are as follows:1)the subjects can recognize both types of weaknesses and strengths in different areas;2)both English majors and non-English majors show a preference for NESTs.3)English majors and non-English majors in their perceptions of their English teachers in terms of language competence,knowledge,classroom organization and management and feedback and evaluation.The differences between native and NNESTs are as follows:1)In terms of personal quality,the findings show that NESTs are considered to be more cheerful,humorous,easy-going and enthusiastic than NNESTs by both English and non-English major students.Being serious is cited as a NNESTs' personality.Standard pronunciation,fluent and idiomatic utterance,and familiarity with English culture are seen as the advantages for NESTs;2)while for NNSTs,in terms of language competence and cultural knowledge,a good command of English grammar and familiarity with Chinese culture are viewed as merits by the students;3)With regard to teaching ability,NESTs tend to be more student-centered than NNESTs in teaching practice.Besides,NESTs are reported to use more teaching tools and emphasize stimulating leaners' interest in language learning by means of different kinds of classroom activities.In NNESTs' classes,students find the teaching content more coherent and better-connected.Furthermore,teaching content of NNESTs better matches students' level;4)With respect to classroom organization and management,students agree that NNESTs are more capable of managing the classroom discipline and completing the teaching tasks as planned than NESTs;5)As for assessment and feedback,NESTs praise students more frequently and they do not put emphasis on correcting students' mistakes promptly while NNESTs are more competent in realizing students' learning difficulties and willing to correct students' errors.Based on all the findings,implications and enlightenments are generated as firstly,both NESTs and NNESTs have their own merits and demerits,so they should give full play of their own advantages and be proud of their teaching professions.At same time,both types of teachers are supposed to update their teaching methods and overcome their shortcomings in English teaching.Secondly,considering the fact that both teachers have their own teaching advantages,the collaborative work of native and non-native speaker teachers is necessary to complement each other,which requires regular interaction and cooperation between native and non-native speaker teachers.Thirdly,when employing English teachers,teaching ability and professional quality should be taken into account instead of their nationality only.Fourthly,the teachers assigned are supposed to match different courses well.Finally,for the courses offered to non-English major students,suitable class size is recommended so as to better implement teaching activities.