A Study On EFL Teacher Identity In Junior High School

Although many factors are involved in the top-down English teaching reform,teachers are undoubtedly the determinate factor in its successful implementation,for they are the decision makers and executors in the class.For a long time,academic studies emphasize external rules and requirements,and focus more on the role of teachers as a tool,but less on their internal emotions and cognition.These studies neglect teachers' value as an independent individual.Identity provides a new perspective to examine teachers themselves while studying the identity of teachers serves as a shortcut to understand them.Therefore,in recent years,the research on EFL teacher identity has been a hotspot at home and abroad.China's new curriculum reform in 2000 has brought big challenges to EFL teachers' identity in junior high school,but meanwhile it also provides a huge space for research.There are a large number of junior high school EFL teachers in China who are in unique situation and bearing much pressure,so their identity has unique research value.However,the research status on junior high school EFL teachers is severely mismatched with the quantity of them.For these reasons,the current study chooses junior high school EFL teachers as the research subjects so as to follow the development of the new curriculum reform and the studies of English teacher education.The theoretical bases of this study are sociocultural theory and community of practice theory and the study comprehensively uses qualitative and quantitative research methods.By adopting questionnaire survey of 173 EFL teachers,semi-structure interview and classroom observation of 4 EFL teachers from 13 junior high schools in Taiyuan,Shanxi province,this study attempts to answer the following three questions: 1)What is the status quo of EFL teacher identity in junior high school? Are there any differences among teachers with different gender,year of birth,years of teaching experience,educational background,professional title and income? 2)What are the factors that influence EFL teacher identity in junior high school? 3)What measures can be taken to develop EFL teacher identity in junior high school?The results show that the overall level of junior high school EFL teacher identity ishigh.There are significant differences in identity among EFL teachers with different gender,year of birth,and educational background,while those with different years of teaching experience,professional title and income have no significant difference in identity.Based on quantitative research,four teachers were chosen to participate in the qualitative research.In general,these four teachers have a relatively high level of identity,among whom,the teacher born in 1960 s is at the highest level,followed by the teachers born in 1970 s and in 1980 s,while the teacher born in 1990 s is relatively at the lowest,proving that the year of birth has exerted a significant influence on identity.The result of qualitative data analysis basically remains consistent with that of the quantitative data analysis.Factors influencing EFL teacher identity in junior high school can be examined from three perspectives: microscopic,intermediate and macroscopic perspective.The individual factors of teachers in microscopic perspective include attitude of family and life values.School-related factors in intermediate perspective include pressure from administrative system,opportunities of professional development,and the quality of students,while policy and institutional factors in macroscopic perspective include senior high school entrance examination,new curriculum reform,and the performance-based pay system.To eliminate these adverse factors that hinder junior high school EFL teacher identity,three approaches regarding their development are proposed in this study centering on teachers' professional development and on the basis of community of practice theory: 1)transforming the mentoring system into the micro community of practice;2)reforming teaching and research group into the small community of practice;and 3)strengthening online learning to form the online community of practice.