A study of secondary school English teachers’ beliefs in the context of curriculum reform in China

a Teachers’ beliefs about pedagogy

As described in the data analysis section, factor analysis yields two subscales measuring teachers’ beliefs about pedagogy, traditional and constructivist. In the subscale of constructivist teaching, the responses of all the items point to constructivist beliefs consistent with ECS. In the subscale of traditional teaching, the responses of most items fall in the inconsistent-with-ECS range, with only two exceptions: item 21 being undecided, and item 33 consistent with ECS. These results show that the secondary English teachers hold both traditional and constructivist beliefs about pedagogy.

This finding is supported by interview data. The interview participants generally welcome the constructivist ideas of student involvement and interactive learning, which bring energy and dynamism to the previously boring teacher-centered, lecture-based English classes. They consider these to be the biggest positive changes that the curriculum reform brings to secondary English teaching. However, the approval of constructivist ideas does not prevent the teachers from adhering to traditional beliefs, especially those in memorization and drill. All the interview participants require their students to memorize vocabulary, sentences or even texts. This practice is a basic element of English class in Chinese secondary schools, often reinforced by regular quizzes on a daily or weekly basis.

The interview participants also show a varying degree of approval for drill and practice, depending on factors such as teachers’ personal theory, student characteristics, and the pressure for test preparation. Although not every teacher uses drilling and practice throughout the three years of junior secondary teaching, they all agree that drill and practice is the most effective way for test preparation. Similarly, lecturing is also considered an important teaching form for test preparation because it is the most effective and efficient way to cover course content relevant to tests. These findings confirm the studies mentioned in the literature review section about teachers’ traditional pedagogy in the context of curriculum innovation (e.g. Waters & Vilches, 2008).

b Teachers’ beliefs about grammar and language form

The mean value of this subscale and most statements in it are under 3.0, indicating a traditional orientation inconsistent with ECS. The only exception is statement 26 about grammatical accuracy not as the major criterion for assessing students’ language output, which scores slightly higher than 3.0.

Interview data provide further insights into the teachers’ choice in this subscale. Generally speaking, the interview participants have favorable attitudes toward the curriculum goals of developing students’ communicative skills, but they also confess that for practical reasons, they tend to place more emphasis on grammar and language form than speaking because the senior high school entrance examination mainly assesses students’ knowledge of the language system such as grammar and vocabulary rather than the ability to communicate. This high-stakes exam has a strong washback effect on English teaching at the junior secondary level. In addition to the testing consideration, some teachers also indicate that knowledge of grammar and language form can help students lay a solid foundation for their overall language development. Although the reform has weakened the role of grammar in the curriculum, grammar should still have a place in the English class, because it can promote students’ language accuracy and indirectly improve their language fluency.

c Teachers’ beliefs about resources

The development and use of curriculum resources is an important part of the reform, which requires teachers to not only teach out of textbooks but also utilize a range of curriculum resources to support students’ learning. Although all the item responses in this subscale of the questionnaire indicate constructivist beliefs, subsequent interviews suggest that this topic is very complicated. Some questionnaire results contradict interview data, and a gap often exists between what teachers report in the questionnaires and what they practice in their classroom.

For example, in terms of instructional materials, textbooks are still the major teaching resource for most teachers, sometimes supplemented by other reading materials and exercise books, most of which serve the purpose of test preparation. Regarding the use of target language in class, there is great variation among the interviewees. Those from rural schools and ordinary urban schools report that although they are aware of the curriculum requirement to use a maximum amount of English in class, their actual use of English is limited by their students’ low language proficiency and sometimes by their own inadequate speaking skills. As to the use of computers and the internet, only about half of the interviewees, especially young teachers and those in the cities, often search the internet for teaching materials. The others either have no easy access to or no enthusiasm for using technology at all. Also, most interview participants rarely encourage their students to develop their own learning materials or take part in extracurricular activities for English learning because such opportunities are very limited in their schools. All these discrepancies call for extra care in interpreting the teachers’ self-report questionnaires, which might overlook individual differences in the teachers’ beliefs as well as possible gaps between the teachers’ stated beliefs and their actual practices.

d Teachers’ beliefs about students’ roles

The curriculum reform calls for student autonomy in language learning and a shift of students’ roles from passive receivers to active constructors of knowledge. This is incongruent with the Chinese educational culture which values teacher authority and thus may present a challenge for secondary school teachers. In this study, although the responses to all the items in the subscale about student roles indicate constructivist beliefs, interview data suggest that some of the constructivist beliefs the teachers agreed to in the questionnaire may not really be practiced. It is true that under the influence of the curriculum reform there has been increasing student participation in class, but students still have very limited freedom in deciding what to learn, how to learn, and how to be assessed.

One salient example concerns teachers’ tight control of students’ learning. To many interview participants, the idea of learner autonomy seems to be impractical for students at the junior high school level who are seen as incapable of studying English completely on their own. The teachers share the belief that it is of paramount importance for students to follow teachers’ instruction in class in order to learn best. T1 explains that ‘teachers’ methods are usually effective, so students must listen to their teachers.’ No matter how students learn after class, they must ‘follow the pace of their teachers during the 45-minute class time’. In order to keep students focused on teachers’ instruction, many teachers apply strict discipline to ensure that students do not get diverted from the lesson. It seems that the ability to control and lead a class is seen as a core qualification of secondary school teachers. Almost all the teachers cite this ability when they talk about effective teachers in the interviews. This has also been found in several studies carried out in traditional cultural contexts (e.g. Orafi & Borg, 2009).

a Teachers’ beliefs and curriculum reform

The curriculum reform has a great impact on secondary school English teachers’ conceptions of teaching and learning. For many teachers, it offers valuable professional learning opportunities that help them develop a sound knowledge of the constructivist approach to language teaching and learning. The middle-aged teachers, who started teaching around the launch of the curriculum reform, tend to attribute their professional growth largely to the curriculum reform. In the nationwide effort to implement curriculum innovation, they took part in many pedagogy and textbook training programs held at both national and local levels, observed demonstration lessons, entered into teaching contests, and sat in teacher qualification tests that test teachers’ knowledge of ECS. As T4 describes, in places that encourage curriculum innovation, ‘teachers accept the reform ideas naturally because they are immersed in an environment with extensive exposure to constructivism-oriented conceptions and practices.’ Younger teachers who received their teacher education after the inception of the reform are also aware of the new curriculum requirements because knowledge of the new curriculum and textbooks is often an integral part of their pre-service teacher education programs, which have also been updated to meet the requirement of curriculum innovation. In comparison, veteran teachers who have been deeply influenced by the traditional grammar-translation approach tend to have a harder time accepting the new teaching concepts. But they generally do not feel too much pressure to change their teaching beliefs and practices because their years of teaching experience have enabled them to be very good at preparing students for tests, which is an important criterion for teacher evaluation in many schools.

b Teachers’ beliefs and high-stakes testing

The most salient, though not striking, finding of this study is that despite the massive effort invested by the policymakers to change the old test-driven curriculum, high-stakes testing still exerts a huge impact on how teachers conceptualize and approach English language teaching. In the context of junior high schools, the most important test is the senior high school entrance examination. The importance of this exam can be seen from the metaphors that the teachers in the study use to describe it, such as ‘lifeline to schools’(T1), indicating that it concerns the survival and prosperity of schools, and ‘baton of teaching’(T5), suggesting its centrality in guiding English teaching at junior high schools. As Madaus and Kellaghan (1992) pointed out, testing may supersede other factors in shaping teachers’ beliefs and practices when the testing results are linked to important decisions regarding students, teachers, administrators, and schools. These decisions may include ‘graduation, promotion or placement of students, evaluation or rewarding of teachers or administrators, allocation of resources to schools or school districts, and school or school-system certification’ (p. 139). Although these two scholars wrote two decades ago, their description still holds true for the situation in Chinese secondary schools today.

Given the supremacy of the entrance examination to senior high school, any practice that can help students do well in the test becomes a good choice. This partly explains why the teachers tend to hold such traditional beliefs and practices as emphasis of linguistic knowledge over linguistic skills, drill and practice, and lecturing. The washback effect of high-stakes examinations on teachers’ beliefs has been reported by many studies carried out in diverse contexts, such as Orafi and Borg (2009) in Libya, Choi (2008) in South Korea, and Underwood (2012) in Japan. It highlights the necessity to adjust the focus of the exams according to ECS. Otherwise, ‘policy changes in pedagogy not supported by changes in assessment may have little practical impact in the classroom’ (Orafi & Borg, 2009, p. 252).

c Teachers’ beliefs and traditional cultural values

As Bruner (1996) noted, culture shapes mind. When examined beyond the surface, many traditional beliefs held by the teachers reflect deep rooted cultural values and conventions. In the Confucius tradition, teachers are considered authorities of knowledge and deserve high respect. Good teachers should be knowledgeable, capable of passing on knowledge to students effectively. As a famous eighth-century Chinese scholar, Han Yu, put it, a teacher’s role is to ‘spread wisdom, impart professional knowledge and resolve doubts’. This classic statement about the transmissive role of teachers still enjoys widespread popularity in China even today. Good teachers should also be moralistic and strict, with a strong sense of responsibility (Wu, 2005). In the interviews, several teachers explained their reason for exercising strict discipline by quoting a famous Chinese saying that goes ‘strict teachers produce outstanding students’. This traditional value has stood the test of time and is still well accepted in the contemporary Chinese society.

Another important aspect of this Confucian tradition is love for learning, by which students are encouraged to read extensively, memorize and practice (Gu, 2003). This kind of educational culture was strengthened by the Civil Examination System, which was the major means of selecting officials in China for over 13 centuries. Although no longer in existence, this exam tradition has had far-reaching consequences for Chinese society. Education is considered the only legitimate route for upward social mobility, and in the test-centered educational culture, successful education is reflected mainly in good test performance. Since exam results can determine an individual’s future, rote-learning, teacher instruction, and book-centered approach are practiced without being much questioned. In view of these deeply ingrained cultural values and conventions, which have widespread support in China, it is no surprise that the English teachers in this study still embrace traditional beliefs about language teaching and learning.

d Teachers’ beliefs and schools types

School environment has a direct influence on the teachers’ beliefs, professional development, and performance. Specifically, this study suggests that the teachers working in schools with an innovative school culture, supportive administration, well-trained colleagues, high-achieving students, and rich resources tend to hold more constructivist beliefs because these factors foster a favorable environment for change. These favorable conditions are more likely to be found in urban schools than in rural schools, in key schools than in non-key schools, and in eastern developed areas than in middle and western less developed areas, reflecting the uneven allocation of resources and the deeper-level problem of educational inequality in China.

e  Interaction of contextual factors in shaping teachers’ beliefs

The aforementioned factors are strongly intertwined to shape the complex nature of the English teachers’ beliefs. On one hand, many factors work concertedly to facilitate the development of teachers’ constructivist beliefs, such as various curriculum reform initiatives, professional training, innovative school culture, and collegiality. On the other hand, some contextual factors seem to contradict each other, causing tension and confusion in the teachers’ belief system. This strained relationship manifests most obviously between the ambitious goals of the curriculum reform and the realities of secondary education in China (e.g. test-oriented education, inequity regarding access to quality language instruction and resources). The differences between Chinese cultural traditions, established conventions and Western ideas also have a bearing on the shaping of teachers’ beliefs. Similar findings have been reported in several recent studies (Nunan, 2003; Underwood, 2012; Waters & Vilches, 2008), predominantly within Asian contexts, suggesting that Western-based curriculum innovations have encountered challenges in the process of negotiating their way into the local context. How to adapt Western theories of teaching and learning to the local culture and teaching reality has become a major challenge for ELT practitioners in these contexts.