i
RUNNING HEAD: Value and Relevance of TESMC
A CASE STUDY EXPLORING THE VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF USING THE
TEACHING ESL STUDENTS IN MAINSTREAM CLASSROOMS (TESMC) COURSE FOR
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT RELATED TO TEACHING ENGLISH TO SPEAKERS
OF OTHER LANGUAGES WITH MAINSTREAM TEACHERS OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE
LEARNERS IN INTERNATIONAL SCHOOLS
by
Tiffany A. Crook
Master’s in Education Program
An exit project submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of
Master of Education
The School of Education
Bishop’s University
Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada
© Tiffany A. Crook 2013
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Abstract
An increase in the number of English language learners (ELLs) attending international
schools has led to different approaches being used to promote the professional development of
mainstream classroom teachers in teaching these students. One approach some schools use is the
adoption of a commercially developed course: Teaching ESL Students in Mainstream Classes
(TESMC). Based on surveys and follow-up interviews with eight recent TESMC course
participants at an international school in Northern Thailand, this bounded case study investigates
the value and relevance of using this course for professional development in Teaching English to
Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) with mainstream teachers of ELLS in international
schools. The main findings were that active learning, coherence, an increased awareness of the
needs of ELLs, the acquisition of TESOL-related knowledge and skills, and the provision of
extra time for such initiatives were important concerns. The study concludes with
recommendations for schools considering the adoption of such transposed professional
development initiatives.
i
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Dedication
This thesis is dedicated to my wonderful family. To my loving, understanding and patient
husband, Sean, who gladly put up with these many years of studies and smilingly stood by me
every step of the way. And to our children, Siarra and Kai, who are the joy of our lives. I give
my deepest expression of love and appreciation for the encouragement you each gave and the
sacrifices you made during this graduate program. Thank you for your endless support.
ii
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Acknowledgements
Completing this degree has truly been a marathon event, and I would not have been able
to complete this journey without the aid and support of countless people over the past seven
years. Several individuals, in one way or another, contributed and extended their valuable
assistance in the preparation and completion of this study.
I must first express my gratitude towards my advisor, Dr. Sunny Lau. Her leadership,
support, attention to detail, hard work, and scholarship have guided and helped me throughout
my research and writing of this thesis.
My sincere thanks to Dr. Catherine Beauchamp and the many faculty members of the
Graduate School of Education whose flexibility made it possible for me to complete this degree
from a distance. Also, to Linda Leblanc, who helped to coordinate everything so beautifully.
The good advice, support and friendship of my colleagues, Lydia Eckstein and Harold
Rinehart, have been invaluable on both an academic and a personal level, for which I am
extremely grateful. Thanks, as well, to several other colleagues in Thailand whose participation
in this study was pivotal to its success. I am likewise indebted to my former classmates, Randi
Heatherington, Suzanne Meesen, and Laura Pleavin, who were always willing to help.
I am most grateful to John Polias for providing me with statistical information related to
the TESMC course.
I thank my parents for instilling in me the confidence and the drive for pursuing my
M.Ed., as well as my brothers (and their lovely wives) for always supporting me and
encouraging me with their best wishes.
Finally, I would like to leave the remaining space in memory of Martha Ham (19612012), a fabulous friend and classmate.
iii
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Table of Contents
Abstract
i
Dedication
ii
Acknowledgements
iii
List of appendices
v
List of tables
vi
List of terms
vii
Introduction
1
Statement of the problem
2
Research question
5
Review of the literature
6
Methodology
14
Findings
19
Discussion
35
Limitations
41
Conclusion
41
References
45
iv
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
List of Appendices
Appendix A: Outline of TESMC 9 module course
50
Appendix B: TESMC - List of Between Module Readings (BMR)
51
Appendix C: TESMC - List of Between Module Activities (BMA)
52
Appendix D: Participant consent form
53
Appendix E: Participants’ online survey results
55
Appendix F: Tutor version of online survey
75
Appendix G: Semi-Structured Interview Questions
84
v
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
List of Tables
Table 1: International Schools Offering TESMC by Region
5
Table 2: Participants’ Background Information
17
Table 3: Evolution of Codes and Themes from Interview Transcripts
19
Table 4: Teachers’ Rating of Usefulness of TESMC Course Components
32
Table 5: Teachers’ Rating of Impact of TESMC Course on ELL-Specific Pedagogy
34
vi
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
List of Terms
BMA – Between Module Activities
BMR – Between Module Readings
CLA – Critical Language Awareness
DP – Diploma Program
EAL – English as an Additional Language
EIL – English as an International Language
ELL – English Language Learner
ELT – English Language Teaching
ESL – English as a Second Language
ESOL – English for Speakers of Other Languages
IB – International Baccalaureate
LFE – Lingua Franca English
MYP – Middle Years Program
PYP – Primary Years Program
TEFL – Teaching English as a Foreign Language
TESMC – Teaching ESL Students in Mainstream Classrooms
TESOL – Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages
vii
1
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Introduction
As a specialist teacher of English as a Second Language (ESL) working in international schools
for the past 12 years, I have both observed and worked with mainstream teachers who are struggling
to make their course content accessible to the English Language Learners (ELLs) in their classes.
Based on the informal feedback I have received while interacting with these teachers, in addition to
some of the recent literature I have read, I have come to understand that the challenges these teachers
face stem, in part, from a lack of Critical Language Awareness (CLA)1, negative attitudes toward
these students, an inability or unwillingness to collaborate with ESL specialists, or a lack of
awareness of the specialized knowledge and skills necessary to provide effective instruction for
ELLs in mainstream classrooms. In several cases these teachers have continued to struggle despite
having received training aimed specifically at mainstream teachers of ELLs.
A typical English-medium international school contains a significant proportion of students who
are learning English as an Additional Language (Shoebottom, 2009). Indeed, it is common for the
majority of students at an international school to have a mother tongue other than English2.
Therefore, while ESL specialists or ESL departments can and should be expected to provide
additional language support for many of these students, they cannot be held solely responsible for
ESL student learning across the school. All teachers will encounter nonnative speaking students and
must provide high-quality and appropriate instruction for these learners (Editorial Projects in
Education, 2009). Yet, many mainstream teachers do not have adequate preparation to provide highquality instruction to this particular population of students.
1 Critical Language Awareness (CLA) is defined as a conscious attention to how the properties of language are used to construct
identities and ideologies (Fairclough, 1992).
2 The EL Gazette (2005) states: 'The majority of students in international schools are non-native speakers of English. In the 2004
European Council of International Schools (ECIS) annual statistical survey, 297 schools with a total enrolment of 161,86376
students indicated that over half the student population (59%) spoke English as an additional language (EAL). Of these, 198
schools (67%) had 50% or more such students while only 21 schools had fewer than 10% EAL speakers. In 18 schools none of
the students spoke English as first language' (as cited in Carder, 2007, xiii).
1
2
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
It is also important to recognize that while the basic needs of ELLs remain consistent from
school to school, professional development programs must be designed to be appropriate for a
variety of contexts. In particular, these programs should take into account the sociocultural aspects
of the time and place in which they are being delivered.
Statement of the Problem
Several researchers in the field have noted the need for increased targeted professional
development for mainstream teachers of ELLs in order to increase their Critical Language
Awareness (Canagarajah, 2007; Cummins et al., 2006; Modiano, 2001), improve their attitudes
toward these students (Walker, Shafer & Iiams, 2004; Youngs & Youngs, 2001), facilitate
collaboration with ESL specialists (Arkoudis, 2006; Dove & Honigsfeld, 2010; Echevarria, Vogt &
Short, 2007; NWREL, 2008), and to equip them with the skills necessary to provide effective
instruction for ELLs in their classes (Lucas & Grinberg, 2008; McGraner & Saenz, 2009). HansenThomas and Cavagnetto (2010) point out that only a small number of mainstream teachers feel
prepared to teach ELLs in their content area classrooms. This deficiency will be further elaborated
on in the literature review which appears later in this paper. Ironically, studies by Clair (1995) and
Reeves (2006) have highlighted disinterest on the part of some mainstream teachers with regard to
training related to working with ELLs. Little research, however, has explored teacher perceptions of
this type of TESOL-related professional development in international schools. Furthermore, existing
qualifications such as the CLAD (Cross-cultural Language and Academic Development) Certificate,
or the California Teacher of English Learners® (CTEL®) Examination, tend to focus on ELLs in
American mainstream settings, and not in a more international setting.
When it comes to TESOL-related professional development, there are generally three approaches
that are adopted and endorsed by international schools. First, teachers might be sent away to
2
3
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
weekend workshops in TESOL, such as the ones offered at the annual European Council of
International Schools (ECIS) and the East Asia Regional Council Of Schools (EARCOS)
conferences. Second, some schools choose to develop their own in-house, in-service TESOL-related
training programs. Finally, there are commercial courses, such as the Teaching ESL Students in
Mainstream Classrooms (TESMC) course3, that take place in schools over a period of several
weeks/months.
While the first approach - weekend workshops - may be convenient and less time consuming
than full length courses, Darling-Hammond and Richardson (2009), in reviewing 20 years of
research on effective teacher learning and professional development, concluded that teachers learn
most effectively when professional development is intensive and sustained over time. Similarly, in a
study of what constitutes effective professional development for teachers, Garet, Porter, Desimone,
Birman & Yoon (2001) noted that most recent literature on teacher learning and professional
development calls for professional development that is sustained over time, arguing that a longer
length of time will likely allow for more “in-depth discussion of content, student conceptions and
misconceptions, and pedagogical strategies” (p. 921) and for teachers to try implementing the new
practices they’ve learned as well as obtaining feedback on these.
A second approach to TESOL-related professional development is for ESL departments to create
their own in-service programs. This was done by Paul Shoebottom (2007), the Upper School
coordinator for ESL at Frankfurt International School (FIS). This approach has the advantage of
being directly applicable to the particular situation of the school and its student body. The ESL
department at Beijing International School of Singapore (BISS) also developed their own in-house
3 The TESMC (2006) is a re-development of the original ESL in the Mainstream (1996) course and is currently marketed by the
South Australian Government's Department for Education and Child Development (DECD). The TESMC program is said to be
more generic than the original course in the sense that it does not only cater for the needs of teachers and students in Australia,
but also for those in international schools.
3
4
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
professional development program called Making It Comprehensible, in an effort to deliver more
specifically tailored TESOL training to their mainstream teachers. The obvious advantage of such an
approach is that it allows schools to adapt the training to their needs and places more responsibility
for improvement on classroom teachers. “School-based professional development not only ensures
local oversight of content, but also requires more accountability on the part of the staff” (Education
World, n.d., para 35). A major challenge associated with this approach is finding the time to fit such
a program into the already busy schedule facing most teachers and most schools.
A third approach to TESOL-related professional development in the international school context
is the use of commercial courses like TESMC, as mentioned earlier. This course claims to cater to
international educators seeking to meet the needs of their ESL students. The TESMC course is aimed
at educators worldwide seeking to develop understandings of the cultural and linguistic diversity and
experiences of ESL students, the central role language plays in learning and the teaching practices
which explicitly support the language learning needs of ESL students. The course is delivered by
trained tutors and involves 25 hours of face-to-face learning in nine modules. Apart from the core
content contained in these nine modules, which include a variety of topics such as an introduction to
the ESL learner, the role of scaffolding, oral and written language tasks, assessment, etc. (Appendix
A), the course also includes several Between Module Readings (BMR). The BMRs (Appendix B)
are a series of extracts and articles written for the TESMC course in order to “enable teachers to
develop deeper understandings of the language and learning theories presented in [the] modules, and
to gain additional practical ideas to try in their classrooms” (TESMC, 2006, p. 7). In addition to the
BMRs there are also several Between Module Activities (BMAs). The BMAs (Appendix C) are
included to allow for a process of trialing strategies that is similar to action research. Overall, the
combination of the face-to-face classes, the BMRs and the BMAs is equivalent to more than 50
4
5
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
hours of professional development. Many international schools are now offering the 50-hour
TESMC professional development course to their staff members as part of mandatory TESOL-
related professional development at their schools, which is strongly supported by the ECIS (ECIS enews, 2011). Table 1 shows the different ECIS and EARCOS schools offering such a program, over
half of which are international schools in Asia.
Table 1
International Schools Offering TESMC by Region
Region
Asia
Europe
Middle East
U.K.
Number of schools offering
TESMC in this region*
17
10
4
2
Number of trained TESMC tutors
in this region*
235
104
42
34
* Note: Figures from November 2006 to August 2012 (J. Polias, personal communication, September 1, 2012)
While the TESMC approach has been widely adopted by international schools, there has not
been a systematic way of evaluating such an approach in meeting the needs of international
educators in teaching ELLs in their particular sociocultural and educational settings. Based on varied
informal feedback the author received from recent course participants, teachers had differing
opinions of the usefulness and relevance of the TESMC course.
Research question
The purpose of this study was to investigate mainstream teachers’ experiences and perceptions of
the effectiveness of the approach of using the TESMC course as a means of supporting mandatory
TESOL-related professional development. The main research question being explored was, “To
what extent is the approach of using the TESMC course to support mandatory TESOL-related
professional development useful and relevant in preparing effective mainstream teachers of ELLs in
the international school context?” This was followed by three sub-questions:
5
6
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
1.
In what ways did the participants think the approach of using the TESMC course
helped prepare them to be effective teachers of ELLs in their mainstream classes?
2.
What were the main components of the course that the participants deemed useful and
relevant, and what components were not as relevant with regards to the particular
school context? Why?
3.
What were the benefits or weaknesses of this approach and in what ways could it be
improved in terms of its course design, content, structure and delivery?
The author wished to investigate whether the approach of using the TESMC course as a means of
supporting mandatory TESOL-related professional development was perceived as being useful and
relevant by mainstream teachers who had completed the course. The aim of this study was to collate
the experiences and perceptions of mainstream teachers in regards to mandatory TESOL-related
professional development and to explore the advantages and challenges of one such program in a
way that could enable international schools to enhance such initiatives. Thus far, no other research
located has taken this perspective, either overseas or in Asia.
Review of Literature
A review of the literature in the area of TESOL-related professional development shows that
there are four categories of essential components for supporting mainstream teachers in teaching
ELLs in content areas. The four main categories are:

sociocultural and political foundations for teaching ELL students

mainstream teachers’ attitudes toward ELL students

collaboration between ESL specialists and mainstream teachers of ELLs, and

language-related knowledge and skills necessary for teaching ELLs
6
7
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Sociocultural and political foundations for teaching ELL students
Researchers have called attention to the idea that mainstream teachers need to acknowledge that
language is intimately tied to its sociopolitical context (Lucas & Villegas, 2011; Nieto, 2002). It is
argued that teachers must develop Critical Language Awareness. They must also understand that no
language or language variety is inherently better than another.
Youngs and Youngs (2001), Cummins et al. (2006), and Lucas and Grinberg (2008), believe that
teachers who accept linguistic diversity as a resource will experience a positive impact on their
teaching and interactions with ELLs. In an effort to help teachers understand the importance of
taking students’ linguistic backgrounds into account in their instruction, Cummins et al. (2006)
explore the role of affect, identity, respect, and human relationships in childhood learning,
specifically the learning and engagement of ELLs. They posit that instruction for ELLs should take
into consideration their pre-existing knowledge, aiming for deep understanding and encouraging
self-regulation and ownership of the learning process. Cummins et al. (2006) outline how the
creation of identity texts4 can be used to promote literacy engagement. TESOL-related professional
development initiatives that aim to enhance the ability of mainstream teachers to successfully teach
the ELLs in their classroom must introduce such activities in an effort to address the
psycholinguistic and sociocultural needs of ELLs.
Identity texts are just one example of a linguistically responsive pedagogical practice. Lucas and
Villegas’ (2011) present a framework designed to serve as a tool for preparing linguistically
responsive teachers. The authors suggest that this framework be used “as a guide for teacher
4
“Identity texts differ from more standard school assignments in both the process and the product. The assignment is cognitively
challenging, but students can choose their topics. They decide how they will carry out the project and are encouraged to use the
full repertoire of their talents in doing so.” (Cummins et al., 2005, p. 39)
7
8
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
educators as they reshape the curriculum to enhance the preparation of all teachers for teaching
language minority students” (p. 67). The framework covers such topics as: understanding the
connection between language, culture, and identity; awareness of the sociopolitical dimensions of
language use and language education; valuing linguistic diversity; willingness to advocate for ELL
students; learning about ELL students’ language backgrounds, experiences, and proficiencies; and
identifying the language demands of classroom tasks.
Linguistic responsiveness also resonates with what Canagarajah (2007) argues about the
validation of multilingual and multimodal situated communicative practices, as well as with
Modiano’s (2001) proposal that language instructors reconceptualise English Language Teaching
(ELT) practices so as to reposition English as an international language (EIL). Both authors would
support the idea that educational norms must be developed if lingua franca English (LFE) and/or
English as an International Language (EIL) are to achieve status as legitimate varieties in their own
rights (Modiano, 1999). Canagarajah (2007) advocates for pedagogical movements that facilitate
instruction that focuses on communicative strategies and language awareness (rather than on forms
of communication or mastering grammar rules). Similarly, Modiano (2001) is a proponent of a more
“macro approach to English…[which incorporates] a multiplicity of teaching practices, and a view
of the language as belonging to a broad range of peoples and cultures” (p. 340). Modiano (2001)
implies that implementing teaching and learning practices that are supportive of cultural diversity is
a difficult task. He urges the people responsible for language planning to review traditional practices
that compromise the cultural integrity of the non-native speaker with a view to positioning English
as an international language and conserving cultural pluralism. If mainstream teachers are expected
to effectively teach these new approaches to language acquisition to their students, they will require
8
9
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
TESOL-related professional development that includes learner communication strategies and
language awareness.
Mainstream teachers’ attitudes toward ELL students
Linked to the sociocultural and political foundations for teaching ELL students is the idea that
teachers should adopt affirming attitudes toward these students. Researchers (Hansen-Thomas &
Cavagnetto, 2010; Lucas & Grinberg, 2008; Walker, Shafer, & Iiams, 2004; Youngs & Youngs,
2001), have noted that teachers’ attitudes and beliefs about how their ELL students learn and use
language will influence their teaching of these students. These scholars agree that teachers
expectations of, and interactions with ELLs will be positively impacted if they possess affirming
views of linguistic diversity and an awareness of the sociopolitical dimension of language use and
language education.
One approach researchers have taken is to identify the types of language-related experiences
teachers need for teaching ELLs. Lucas and Grinberg (2008) identified the study of a foreign/second
language, as well as contact with people who speak languages other than English, as being important
language-related experiences needed by teachers of ELLs. Similarly, Youngs and Youngs (2001),
supported this idea stating, “The more…teachers are exposed to diversity through foreign language
courses, courses in multicultural education, ESL training, and work with culturally diverse ESL
students, the more positive teachers are likely to be about working with ESL students” (p.117). With
regard to TESOL-related professional development, Youngs and Youngs (2001) found that “teachers
who indicated that they had received some—that is, any—form of ESL training were significantly
more positive about teaching ESL students than those who reported having had no ESL training at
all” (p. 113).
9
10
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Walker et al. (2004) point to negative teacher attitudes as “obstacles in implementing quality
ELL programs” (p.143). These authors discuss how “mainstream teachers who have never had
training in working with ELLs often feel overwhelmed when an ELL is first placed in their
classroom” (p.142) and how they often “abdicate themselves from their role in the academic success
of ELLs” (p.146). Referring specifically to the international school context, Maurice Carder (2008)
echoes the sentiments of Walker et al., saying, “…it might be necessary to overcome resistance by
some mainstream subject teachers who express their reluctance to take on [learning about the needs
of their ELLs] with a dismissive ‘That’s for the ESL teachers’ (p.224). Carder believes that training
might well reverse the situation.
As mentioned above, Carder (2008) and Walker et al. (2004) have established that appropriate
training and a better understanding of ELL-related issues are necessary in order for mainstream
teachers to develop affirming attitudes toward ELLs. Hansen-Thomas and Cavagnetto (2010) have
likewise indicated a need for more extensive in-service teacher training with regards to improving
teachers’ attitudes, suggesting that “mandated research-informed ESL training is necessary to
support the increased language diversity in […] classrooms” (p.261). Hansen-Thomas and
Cavagnetto (2010) also found that the perceptions and desires of the teachers in their study
“illustrated their need for a better understanding of how ELLs learn and the corresponding pedagogy”
(p.261). The present study takes such perceptions into account as participants were asked to consider
whether the approach of using the TESMC course to support mandatory TESOL-related professional
development in their particular international school has helped prepare them to be more effective
teachers of ELLs in their mainstream classes.
Collaboration between ESL specialists and mainstream teachers of ELLs
With regards to collaborative teaching practices, Walker et al. (2004) recommend professional
10
11
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
development for all teachers and leadership training for ESL specialists to “enable them to work
constructively with mainstream teachers and school administrators” (p.154). They conclude that
“professional development efforts…must be comprehensive, appropriate, and long-term” (p. 156).
DelliCarpini (2009) also argues for ongoing collaboration between mainstream teachers and ESL
specialists who are constructively working together on real ELL-related issues inside classrooms.
She states that TESOL-related professional development should, “not only includ[e] course readings
and discussion on the benefits of collaboration and models of collaborative teaching partnerships,
but provid[e] explicit instruction on how to develop these partnerships” (Discussion, para. 1).
Furthermore, one of the ways Garet et al. (2001) assessed the coherence of a teacher's professional
development activity was the degree to which it “supports teachers in developing sustained, ongoing
professional communication with other teachers who are trying to change their teaching in similar
ways” (p. 925).
Enabling mainstream teachers and ESL specialists to work together constructively, however, is
challenging. Arkoudis (2006) argues that such collaboration is a complex process that requires ESL
teachers to have specialized skills to gain epistemological authority within mainstream curricular
frameworks. Furthermore, Dove and Honigsfeld (2010) outline the communication, instructional,
organizational and administrative challenges that co-teaching teams must face. These include finding
time to “accommodate professional conversations among teaching teams” (p. 11), “scheduling
constraints [and] lack of funding” (p.11), “insufficient targeted professional development” (p.12),
and “the identification of individual teacher roles and responsibilities” (p.10). With respect to this
last challenge, the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory [NWREL] 5 (2008) conducted a
5 NWREL is an organization that works with individual schools, school districts, teachers, administrators, policymakers, and
communities in the U.S. to identify needs, evaluate programs, and develop new solutions. This work ranges from training
teachers, to developing curriculum, to restructuring schools, to evaluating programs—taking a comprehensive look at education
and constantly striving to identify and address emerging needs and trends in teaching and learning.
11
12
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
thorough review of over 140 articles on effective instructional practices for ELLs and in it they
outlined that one of the ESL specialists’ main roles is to act as “a coach” (p.45) to mainstream
teachers in their effort to meet the needs of ELLs in their mainstream classes. Many mainstream
teachers tend to think that it is the sole responsibility of the ESL specialists to provide support to
ELLs, however research (DelliCarpini, 2009) shows that “creating opportunities for ESL and
mainstream candidates to develop collaborative relationships across disciplines had positive effects
on candidates’ skills and beliefs (Discussion, para. 10). In an effort to encourage more effective
collaboration between ESL specialists and mainstream teachers of ELLs, researchers have developed
several co-teaching models (Dove & Honigsfeld, 2010), including Echevarria and Short’s (2000)
SIOP® Model6. Using this model, ESL teachers and/or mainstream teachers teach ELLs in strategic
ways that make the subject matter concepts comprehensible while also promoting the students’
English language development. The SIOP® Model consists of eight interrelated components
including lesson preparation, building background, comprehensible input, strategies, interaction,
practice and application, lesson delivery, and review/assessment. Using instructional strategies
connected to each of these components, ESL and mainstream teachers can work together to design
and deliver lessons that address the academic and linguistic needs of ELLs. Inclusion and use of the
SIOP® model within a TESOL-related professional development program could serve as a starting
point for collaborative discussions between ESL specialists, mainstream teachers, and possibly even
supervisors and/or administrators.
Language-related knowledge and skills
Researchers (Lucas & Grinberg, 2008; Lucas & Villegas, 2011; McGraner & Saenz, 2009) agree
that there is the need for effective mainstream teacher preparation programs to cover certain
6 The Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP®) is a research-based and validated model of sheltered instruction used
widely in all 50 U.S. states and a number of countries. It was designed to help teachers plan and deliver lessons that allow
English learners to acquire academic knowledge as they develop English language proficiency.
12
13
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
language-related knowledge and skills including knowledge of the foundations of Second-Language
Acquisition, knowledge for teaching academic content to ELL students (including both pedagogy
and content), and assessment practices and accommodations for ELL students. McGraner and Saenz
(2009) argued for the deepening of both teachers’ knowledge of content, as well as ELL-specific
pedagogy, in order to effectively teach academic content to nonnative speakers in a direct,
systematic and comprehensible way. Additionally, Lucas and Grinberg (2008) include items like
knowledge of second language development, as well as knowledge of language forms, mechanics,
and uses. Lucas and Grinberg (2008) also discuss the importance of incorporating language-related
skills, such as the ability to conduct basic linguistic analysis of oral and written texts and the ability
to design instruction that helps ELLs learn both language and content, into the curriculum of
programs aiming to prepare mainstream teachers of these students.
Lucas (2011) maintains that some thought must be put into how to organize learning experiences
to enact such curriculum content. She recognizes that professional development for practicing
teachers is notoriously disjointed and disconnected from teachers’ practice, and still too often
“delivered” in infrequent workshops with little or no follow-up (Lucas, 2011, p. 11). Arguing along
these same lines, Garet et al. (2001) propound that effective professional development activities will
provide opportunities for teachers to engage in ‘active learning’; the opportunity to link the
knowledge and skills introduced during professional development experiences to the teaching
context in which the teachers work. These authors affirm that opportunities for such active learning
can include peer observation and feedback, planning the implementation of new curriculum
materials and new teaching methods, reviewing student work and participating in reflective
discussions. They also maintain that alignment of the content and pedagogy emphasized in the
professional development activities with the curricular frameworks the teachers are working in leads
13
14
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
to improved coherence of the program, as does the extent to which it builds on what teachers have
already learned. Thus, conducting a needs assessment prior to beginning any professional
development initiative, in order to ascertain what knowledge and skills teachers have already
acquired in earlier professional development experiences is important, as is following up with
activities that build upon the knowledge and skills learned in the actual professional development
activity because “a professional development activity is more likely to be effective in improving
teachers' knowledge and skills if it forms a coherent part of a wider set of opportunities for teacher
learning and development” (Garet et al., 2001, p. 927). Professional development initiatives that give
teachers the opportunity to trial new strategies in their classrooms allow them to gain competence
and confidence in conducting pedagogically sound language lessons. Follow-up activities also give
them the freedom to research ways to further enhance their language teaching. Ultimately, such
opportunities lead to teachers being able to make informed educational decisions about English
language learners.
Finally, Lucas and Grinberg (2008) recommend that further research is needed to explore what is
being done to prepare classroom teachers to teach ELLs and to determine the characteristics of such
efforts. They point out that the current preparation of classroom teachers to teach ELLs is
inadequate, urging teachers and teacher-educators to question the quality, relevance and
sustainability of such professional development experiences.
Methodology
According to Freebody (2003), “case studies focus on one particular instance of educational
experience and attempt to gain theoretical and professional insights from a full documentation of that
instance” (p. 81). Stake (1994) maintains that an instrumental case study is used to examine a
particular case in order to gain insight into an issue. “The researcher focuses on an issue or concern,
14
15
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
and then selects one bounded case to illustrate this issue” (Creswell, 2007, p.74). This approach
helps to provide a general understanding of a phenomenon rather than of just the case itself.
Robert K. Yin (2003) suggests that case studies are the preferred research method “when the
focus is on a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context” (p. 1). The real-life context of
this study is an international school in Northern Thailand. This school has been using the TEMSC
course to support mandatory TESOL professional development for its staff members for six years.
The TESMC course is a program that claims to prepare classroom teachers to teach ELLs. This
study endeavored to determine the extent to which the approach of using the TESMC course to
support mandatory professional development in TESOL is useful and relevant in preparing effective
teachers of ELLs in the international school context.
As a small (< 400 students) international, International Baccalaureate (IB), university
preparatory school (one of 17 schools in Asia using the TESMC course, see Table 1), this school is
representative of several other international schools in the region; possibly even worldwide. A close
study of this typical case, a bounded case study, will help inform the relevance and effectiveness of
the approach of using the TESMC for TESOL-related professional development.
Research site and participants
The school is a non-selective, co-ed, K to 12, IB, boarding and day school in Northern Thailand.
The school employs an internationally recruited academic staff from at least 15 countries. All
teachers, new and experienced, are required to follow the TESMC course as a condition of
employment.
This school was selected for this study because of the significant proportion (over 35 %) of its
students who are learning English as an additional language, and the challenges this presents for the
mainstream teachers at this school. Additionally, it was chosen because it is committed to using the
15
16
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
TESMC course as a means of supporting mandatory professional development in TESOL for its
staff. The school runs the course for all its teachers, with classes meeting between 3:00 p.m. and
6:00 p.m. on the third Wednesday of every month, over a period of nine months. And, finally, the
site was chosen because the researcher worked at the school as an ESL specialist for three years,
hence having established trust from, and convenient access to, the participants.
The participants in this study (see Table 2) were a group of past participants in the TESMC
course that is conducted annually at the school. This study focuses on a recent cohort that was
comprised of 12 teachers. While all 12 members of this cohort were invited to participate in this
study, only eight members of the group accepted this invitation (see Appendix D). These eight
participants are referred to by pseudonyms throughout this report to ensure anonymity. No incentives
to participate in this study were offered to these teachers.
The collective group of participants in this study consisted of seven females and one male whose
years of experience in teaching ranged from 2 to 32 years. The subjects the participants were
teaching, both as they participated in the TESMC course and at the time of this study, included art,
music, physical education, French, Mandarin, English Language Arts and English for Academic
Purposes; five of these eight teachers are specialists. All of the participants were teaching at least
one class in the Middle Years Program (MYP) - Grades 6 to 10 - while five of them were also
teaching classes at the IB Diploma level - Grades 11 and 12 - and three were also teaching classes in
the Primary Years Program (PYP) – Kindergarten to Grade 5. All but one of the participants listed
English as their mother tongue language, and only two said they did not speak any other language in
addition to their mother tongue. Half the group had received some form of TESOL-related
professional development prior to their participation in the TESMC course. All but one of the
participants had prior experience teaching ELL students in their classes.
16
17
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Table 2
Participants’ Background Information
Pseudonym
Chloe
Grady
Hannah
Hilary
Jasmine
Melissa
Sandra
Skylar
Gender
F
M
F
F
F
F
F
F
Subject(s)
Mandarin
ESL/English
Art
English
Phys. Ed.
Music/French
English
Art
IB Level(s) taught
PYP MYP
DP
no
yes
yes
no
yes
no
yes
yes
no
no
yes
yes
yes
yes
no
yes
yes
yes
no
yes
yes
no
yes
yes
Years of Experience
Teaching Teaching ELLs
15
0
5
5
18
15
21
19
16
11
2
2
32
6
5
5
Mother
Tongue
Mandarin
English
English
English
English
English
English
English
Additional
language
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
no
no
Prior ESL
training
None
TEFL certified
None
TESOL certified
Workshops/courses
40 hour course
None
None
* Note: IB-International Baccalaureate, PYP-Primary Years Programme, MYP-Middle Years Programme, DP-Diploma Programme
Data collection, tools and procedures
Participants completed a 20-question survey (see Appendix E) that solicited some background
information and asked them about their opinions of this particular approach to teacher preparation.
The survey was distributed roughly six months after these teachers had completed the course. It was
assumed that by this time all course participants would have had the opportunity to experiment with
some of the strategies, or encounter and deal with some of the issues relating to TESOL that were
taught or had been discussed in the TESMC course. Their opinions on the effectiveness of this
approach would hence be more reliable. A modification of the survey (see Appendix F) was also
prepared and distributed to the TESMC course tutor for purposes of triangulation, however the tutor
chose not to participate in the study. The surveys were then followed by 45-minute, semi-structured
individual interviews (see Appendix G) to obtain a more in-depth understanding of survey
participants’ opinions. Two of these interviews were conducted using Skype, a voice over Internet
protocol (VoIP) and popular web-conferencing and audio-conferencing software that enables
Internet video and voice calls. The remaining six interviews were conducted face-to-face by the
researcher during a visit to Northern Thailand in December 2012. All interviews were recorded
using Garageband - a software application for Mac OS X that allows users to make audio recordings.
17
18
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Unfortunately, one of these recordings was lost due to technical difficulties, however the participant
forwarded notes to the researcher to provide a summary of her thoughts and responses. Memoranda
were written while listening to taped interviews, typing transcripts, and reflecting upon interviews.
Ongoing data analysis took place throughout the study. All taped interviews, memoranda, and notes
were entered into computer files. Individual interview transcripts were sent to each participant in
order to obtain respondent validation. Finally, a draft of the completed report was also sent to the
participants in order to obtain respondent validation.
Data analysis
The analysis of the data followed Creswell’s (2003) six steps for general data analysis. The first
step involved organizing and preparing the data for analysis. During this step the interviews were
transcribed, and the surveys were optically scanned. In order to obtain a general sense of the
information and to reflect on its overall meaning, the second step involved reading through all the
collected data multiple times. At this time general thoughts about the data were recorded in the
margins. All computer files of data were coded with descriptive codes, using colored highlighting
tools to mark the transcripts as needed. The result of this open coding was over 50 unique terms (see
Table 3). The third step involved more detailed analysis using a coding process to group data into
categories and labeling those categories with a term. This coding process was then used to identify a
smaller number of categories in an effort to reduce overlapping codes as well as to reduce the overall
number of codes. Ultimately, these codes were organized into five broad themes, three of which had
sub-themes associated with them. A review of the connections between the categories furthered the
researcher’s understanding of the professional development experiences of past participants of the
TESMC course and helped shape the organization of the data for portrayal in this final document.
18
19
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Findings
What follows is a summary of the major findings from both the online survey and the semi-
structured interviews with the eight participants. The themes, and sub-themes, that emerged out of
the coding process are outlined in Table 3. All findings were analysed according to these themes.
Table 3
Evolution of Codes and Themes from Survey Results and Interview Transcripts
Active Learning
Code
Practical
Useful
Applicable
Collegial follow-up
Able to see similarities
Practical suggestions
Transfer
Relevant
Use in my own practice
Challenge to adapt
Differentiation
Subject area
Curricular fit
Links
Needs
Superficial
Reflect reality
One size fits all
General vs. Specific
Jargon
Theoretical
Follow-up
Feedback
Content driven (forced)
Collaboration
Arbitrary
More aware
Learn more
Find out
Nature of the learners
Knowledge of the student
Cultural influences
Nationality
Cultural background
Awareness of needs
Reminded about ELLs
Brought to mind
Heightened my sensitivity
Reminded me
Variety of cultures
Reading strategies
Scaffolding
Techniques
Theoretical background
Timing
Time of day
Wasting time
Tired
Didn’t have time
Emerging theme
Associated Sub-themes
Implementation
Active Learning
Student Samples
Feedback and
Reflective Discussion
Assessing Prior Knowledge
Example
“We had to adapt [instructions for a task]. That
was very useful because it was practical. We
could change language on the actual paper.”
(Jasmine)
“Too much generic content could be replaced with
relevant case studies of [our] students.” (Hilary)
“We didn’t get any feedback on how we were
doing on the course or if we implemented
something or didn’t, so it was easy to not
implement anything into our curriculum.” (Skylar)
“Prior knowledge of the class members was not
considered and led to some disenfranchisement.”
(Hilary)
Making Connections
“[I was] reading the literature, and you know
trying to make links...I found it was really hard to
make those links.” (Melissa)
Follow-up
“And, just expecting people to go away after the
course is all over and magically be able to modify
their programs, um, individually is, I think is
ridiculous.” (Sandra)
Culture and Identity
“I think it’s like there are common points for
language teachers to understand the students’
diverse backgrounds in order to support students
learning more effectively.” (Chloe)
Coherence
Awareness
Need to Accommodate
“I found the course informative on how to apply
scaffolding.” (Hannah)
Knowledge
And
Skills
Time
“Well, just having more awareness of what their
needs are, and how to structure some content
material in lectures or in written material that
assists their learning.” (Hannah)
19
“But in real life it’s very hard to make time to
[support other teachers] because my own schedule
is very tight and everyone else has a lot of things
to do so it’s very hard to make time.” (Grady)
20
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Opportunities for active learning (Garet et al., 2001), especially meaningful discussion, planning, and
practice were found to be lacking in this programme. This emerged through the participants’ comments
regarding their frustration with an inability and/or lack of opportunities to link the ideas introduced during
this particular professional development experience to the teaching context in which they actually work,
their desire to review more representative student work, requests for more opportunities to discuss and
reflect on the ideas presented in class more deeply, and a lack of feedback and follow-up on activities and
ideas learned in the TESMC course.
Implementation. Several participants in this study felt that what they were learning and doing in the
TESMC course had little or no connection to their daily lives in the classroom. One reason given for this
perceived ‘disconnect’ included insufficient opportunities to develop curriculum and plan for
implementation within the course itself.
In her interview, Skylar, a secondary school art teacher, said:
It was a challenge to adapt the content of the curriculum into our classes. So, I think it didn’t
use our time efficiently because we weren’t linking it to our classes. We didn’t walk away with
strategies we could implement. We had to go and think about how we were going to change it
from junior school to high school. And so, that was a challenge and not an effective use of our
time.
She went on to say:
If we had been given the time to design things and then gone and implemented them, then that
would have probably made me a better teacher than just talking about it and then leaving it
behind.
Hannah, who also teaches art at both the primary and secondary levels, commented during her
interview about the need to make stronger links to individual teachers’ contexts:
To make it more relevant to an art teacher, or a specialist teacher, I think that you have to work
within that classroom unit. What is the material that you are dealing with? How would you
make it work within the classroom?
Hannah’s colleague and fellow specialist, Jasmine, a physical education teacher, echoed these
sentiments in one of her survey responses, saying:
20
21
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
The topics themselves are useful for teaching, but most of the details in the actual TESMC
course were not so practical and/or useful to a wide range of subjects…Most of it was very
applicable if you were teaching English.
She elaborated on this in her interview, saying, “In my case, in P.E., we use language but.…we can’t
spend 40 minutes on a language context, so it wasn’t very relevant to my teaching context.” Jasmine was
not alone in her struggle to see the relevance of the course as it applied to her specific subject area.
Melissa, a music teacher who teaches in both the primary and secondary school, expressed a desire for
more “practical” and “tangible” outcomes, stating, “[I] would have loved to have some templates or other
things….to guide my own inquiry on how to be a better teacher….for example, finding ways to make
reflections more accessible.” Melissa was clearly frustrated when she added, “And so nothing related. I
can’t think of anything that related.” Melissa later qualified this in relation to her own subject area, saying,
“There’s not a lot of written work in what I [do], because I teach music.”
It is interesting to note, however, that some of the teachers who participated in this study were able to
make links to their own contexts. For example, Grady, an ESL specialist who also teaches English
Language Arts in the high school, thought “the case studies were very, very helpful because I was able to
see similarities between my own life and the students I teach and ways that I could deal with certain
problems.” When discussing the applicability of some of the TESMC course content, Sandra, another
English Language Arts teacher in the secondary school, said:
This course definitely did help me to realize some new skills as a teacher, and to have those
ideas in my mind when I am planning work for students – international school students –
especially some who have difficulties with the language.
Yet, even a more appreciative participant like Sandra would like to have spent more time during the
course focusing on curriculum and implementation, as evidenced by this comment:
We were sent away to look at some of the readings, and to comment on those readings. What I
think would have been far more useful would be to comment on how you could incorporate
those ideas and those concepts in your own teaching. And even set a task that we go away and
do and then come back and respond to how successful that was.
21
22
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Student samples. The participants in this study would have liked more opportunities to analyse their
own students’ work. Hilary, a high-school teacher of English Language Arts, effectively summarized the
thoughts of most of this cohort when she said there was “too much generic content [that] could be
replaced with relevant case studies of [our] students”. Based on several of the participants’ responses, the
general feeling seemed to be that the student samples or illustrative examples presented in the TESMC
course were not representative of the actual students these teachers were teaching. Chloe, the high-school
Mandarin teacher, suggested “the sample students’ works used for this course were so advanced,”
indicating she felt the level of ability of the ELLs at this particular site might have been lower than those
modeled in the course and therefore require a different teaching approach. “Why not some sample work
from our school’s students?” she wondered. Melissa also agreed with this suggestion, referring to how
these student samples could provide useful links between content and context.
We had a guest come in [to one of our TESMC classes] and he actually brought in some
student examples. That was probably the only thing that was useful…having more practical
student examples, from students that we knew, even…I would like to have spent some time
analyzing those.…especially things that would have touched me.
The participants seemed to want more opportunities to interact with more authentic or representative
student samples. They didn’t see as much benefit in working with more generic samples, as voiced by
Skylar during her interview:
Sometimes we’d be working with samples that were geared towards different ages or different
subjects. That’s not as beneficial as working with content that would be in our own subject
matters.…If we could have brought in our own and then instead of working with just a random
text that came from the course, working with our own text during that time so that we could
think about it. And there were maybe two times that we brought in our own text or unit to look
at, but that was it.
It became quite clear that the participants, when given the chance to work with ‘real’ student samples,
found these activities more useful and relevant. However, other comments like this one from Jasmine,
would imply that this did not happen regularly in this TESMC course.
22
23
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
The only time we did something from our particular teaching thing was there was one
assessment task that we had to analyse, and there was one other…like a case study of language;
different things which I think [were] quite useful.
With regards to both of the above sub-themes, ‘Implementation’ and ‘Student Samples,’ it should be
noted that the TESMC course does require participants to carry out several Between Module Activities
(BMAs) and complete brief BMA reflections, as mentioned previously. The purpose of these activities, as
stated in the Tutor’s manual of the TESMC teacher development course (2006), is to “allow for a process
of trialing strategies which is similar to action research” (p. 7). Thus, while the course itself seems to
encourage participants to trial strategies in their classrooms and to critically reflect on the course and on
their own teaching materials and practices, these participants did not make these connections. Or,
possibly, they did not complete these suggested activities. Hilary had this to say: “If we were encouraged
to try the BMAs, I missed that suggestion. Also, the BMAs were not a part of discussion or review from
class to class.”7
Feedback and reflective discussion. Finally, another element of active learning is the opportunity for
teachers to observe each other and obtain feedback, which often leads to reflective discussions. This subtheme emerged as several participants mentioned they would like to have had more collegial discussions
throughout the course. When asked what she thought would have made the TESMC course more relevant
to her, Jasmine responded, “Just sharing, everybody sharing from their particular context, or everyone sort
of brainstorming on how [cases or illustrative examples] could be used in everybody’s areas.” During her
interview, Sandra suggested that the inclusion of peer observation within the course might have been
beneficial:
Somebody watching you put it in place, and then hav[ing] time for discussion afterwards about
the advantages and disadvantages. What went well? What didn’t? What would you do in
future? How could you modify it for a different activity? How well did the students respond?
7 All students were required to submit several BMA reflections to the course Moodle site.
March 3, 2013)
23
(Course tutor, personal communication,
24
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Were they engaged? All those sort of things where a peer observer in the classroom would be
very useful.
Responses like this one reflect a genuine desire on the part of the participant to engage in meaningful
discussions linking theory and practice. The following comment, made by Skylar during her interview,
suggests that the absence of such feedback might have led to discouragement or apathy for some
participants:
If we had been given time during the course to.…design things to be implemented into our
units and then we went away and implemented them, and then went back and reflected on them
as a group, that would have been more beneficial.…We didn’t get any feedback on how we
were doing on the course or if we implemented something or didn’t, so it was easy to not
implement anything into our curriculum.
Contrarily, Grady’s experience in this area was, once again, more positive:
Part of our assignments were to comment on these Moodle discussion boards, and we were
invited to give our own experiences and we gave each other ideas on what the reasons might be
behind certain challenges we had with students, and how we might be able to fix them. So, it
was very helpful [and] relevant to my teaching experience at the time I was taking the course.
This approach, however, seemed less successful with other members of the cohort. Chloe, for
example, was disappointed when she did not receive feedback on the forum from the course tutor. “We
were asked to do the assignment and we have to post it on the Moodle page. But there is no comment
given by the instructor.” She also indicated that she felt her classmates’ feedback was not heartfelt, stating,
“Their comments are there just because they were asked to do that. No one is really thinking [about] it
seriously.” This general feeling of a lack of consistent feedback and follow up was in line with the survey
result which showed that only 1 of the 8 (12.5%) participants surveyed agreed the course provided
participants with adequate feedback on their progress (Question 14).
Coherence
Several of the teachers in this study felt the TESMC course lacked coherence in terms of the
design of the professional development program being built on practitioners’ prior knowledge and
supporting their continual and sustained growth and development (Garet et al., 2001;Lucas, 2011).
24
25
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Assessing prior knowledge and needs. A common thread in the participants’ responses reflected
a desire for a needs assessment to have been conducted leading up to the beginning of the course in order
to take the cohort’s prior knowledge into account. For professional development to be coherent it should
build on what teachers have already learned (Garet et al., 2001). Half of the members of this cohort had
some previous training in TEFL/TESOL, ranging from past workshop experiences and/or classes taken as
part of their teachers’ certification, to full TEFL/TESOL certification (see Table 3). Yet, according to
Hilary, who is TESOL certified,
Prior knowledge of the class members was not considered and led to some
disenfranchisement….Most of the time, course content seemed remedial for the average
international school teacher. It seemed the presumed audience was at a beginning level.
Similarly, it seemed presumed knowledge was significantly underestimated.
Sandra, a very experienced English language teacher with no prior TESOL-related training, echoed
these sentiments, saying:
I disagreed that [the structure of the course] suited this particular cohort because some of us have
been teaching for a long time and several had been in several other international schools in the past
and had found that they were doing a lot of these things whether they’d had a course or not.
Finally, Jasmine, who has attended several TESOL-related workshops and studied TESOL as part of
her degree, agreed adding, “[The course] took the middle road, I think, and didn’t sort of allow for, um,
variations in teaching needs and training.”
In their responses to Question 14 of the survey, only 1 of the 8 respondents (12.5%) agreed that the
structure and delivery of the TESMC course, to the extent possible, allowed participants choices in the
learning based on their individual needs. Only two (25%) agreed that it was relevant and meaningful,
focusing on skills, knowledge, or behaviors that teachers needed in this context. Five of the eight
respondents (62.5%) disagreed that the structure and delivery of the course was valid based on this teacher
population and their training needs, considering the teachers' levels of knowledge and skill, and the
student needs driving this training.
25
26
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Grady, an ESL specialist qualified in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL), was asked
whether the course had improved his ability to work with ELL students. He answered, “Well, learning
how language is acquired wasn’t a big surprise to me, because I already learned this stuff before.” And
while Chloe, who holds a Masters degree in foreign language teaching, conceded that some common
pedagogy exists that can be applied to all language teaching contexts, and agreed that all teachers in a
school must support ELLs, she nevertheless felt that as a teacher of Mandarin, this course was not very
useful or relevant to her because “in true teaching context.…I never have a chance really to help the ESL
students.”
Making connections.
As most participants agreed, the challenges associated with the adoption of a ready-made,
commercially developed course such as the TESMC were that it tended to be quite formulaic (1 strongly
agreed and 7 agreed), the course content was not relevant to their context (3 strongly agreed, 3 agreed and
2 remained neutral), and the course did not respond to their specific training needs (5 strongly agreed, 1
agreed and 2 remained neutral).
Course content. It was clear from both the survey results and the interviews that several of the
participants felt the TESMC course was “formulaic” and “content-driven,” thus not allowing for much
adaptation or connection to their particular context. In response to Question 17 of the survey regarding the
challenges of adopting a ready-made, commercially developed program like TESMC, 7 of the 8 (87.5%)
participants agreed that the course was too formulaic, and 1 (12.5%) strongly agreed. Additionally, three
participants (37.5%) agreed and three more (37.5%) strongly agreed that the course content was not
relevant to their context. Finally, 5 of the 8 (62.5%) strongly agreed that the course did not respond to
their specific training needs. In the interview, Hilary stated she felt the course was “text-driven rather than
based on [the] needs” of the group, and Melissa supported this in saying she felt the tutor was “constrained
26
27
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
to the material.” Melissa also made mention of “soldiering through content and meaningless exercises.”
Sandra thought they were “plowing through the readings,” and said she “felt like it was just being shoe-
horned, and sort of pushed into us.” Skylar recollected “working through chapter by chapter,” while Chloe
remembered feeling that the course was trying to cover too much, saying, “It’s too broad. It’s too far away
from us.” The general consensus seemed to be that these teachers felt overwhelmed by the content rather
than connected to it.
During her interview, Jasmine referred to the usefulness of the various course components within
her teaching context, stating, “There was a lot of good content [but] it was all sort of, sort of left in the
air.” Melissa commented on the Between Module Readings (BMRs) that were part of the course, saying,
“I was reading the literature, and you know trying to make links...I found it was really, um, hard to make
those links.” These teachers seemed to believe there was little transference between the course content and
their professional practice.
Based on what participants had to say in the interviews, it seems that part of what made it difficult
for them to connect with the content of this course was the terminology it employed. The TESMC course
includes a range of linguistic and grammatical terms and concepts. For example, Module 2 of the course
introduces Halliday and Martin’s (1993) functional model of language. Within this model are terms such
as ‘genre’, ‘field,’ ‘tenor,’ and ‘mode.’ Later, in Module 7, the course focuses on the register continuum
and on understanding of the nominal group, introducing more technical language with terms such as
‘pointer,’ ‘numerative,’ ‘classifier,’ and ‘qualifier’ (TESMC, 2006). Several of the participants in this
study referred to these types of words as incomprehensible “jargon” in their interviews. The specialist
teachers, like Melissa, who teaches music, felt such terminology was aimed at language teachers:
[We were] reading a lot of what I felt was jargonistic material that…yeah, and it could be useful –
like, I’m not trying to put it down, but I don’t, didn’t have the time to kind of look up all those
words and to figure out what the person was saying.
Jasmine, a physical education teacher, felt the same way:
27
28
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
We were sitting in different tables and we were discussing the content, so it was like, ‘What does
this mean? What does this mean?’…it was good stuff, but it wasn’t very user-friendly,
definitely….Another teacher was an English teacher, and knew all the jargon and basically had to
help us then who didn't know all the jargon in the English language.
And yet, all three of the English teachers also mentioned struggling with terms that they felt were
“unnecessarily academic” (Sandra) when they were interviewed.
Interestingly, though, the above reactions were not reflected in the survey responses. When asked
about Halliday & Martin’s (1993) functional model of language, or nominal groups and nominalization
(Question 9), only 1 of the 8 (12.5%) survey respondents disagreed about the usefulness of such course
components.
As most participants agreed, the challenges associated with the adoption of a ready-made,
commercially developed course such as the TESMC were that it tended to be quite formulaic (1 strongly
agreed and 7 agreed), the course content was not relevant to their context (3 strongly agreed, 3 agreed and
2 remained neutral), and the course did not respond to their specific training needs (5 strongly agreed, 1
agreed and 2 remained neutral).
Curriculum. Curricular alignment is another important aspect of coherence. Although 5 of the 8
respondents (62.5%) surveyed reported that they thought the re-assessment of their unit plans in order to
incorporate ideas from the TESMC course into their personal professional practice was a useful
component of the course (Question 9), several of their interview responses indicated otherwise. “In terms
of, just in creating IB (International Baccalaureate) units, I didn’t find the course very helpful,” responded
Grady. Amongst the participants who teach both the Middle Years Program (MYP) and the Diploma
Program (DP), there was general agreement that the strategies presented in the TESMC course were more
applicable within the MYP curricular framework. “I saw more relevance in the information I got from the
course at the MYP level…lower MYP levels,” said Sandra. Indeed, only 1 of the 8 teachers (12.5%)
surveyed disagreed that the TESMC course fit with the MYP curricular framework (Question 15), whereas
28
29
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
none of the DP teachers felt it fit that curricular framework. Reasons given for this had to do with the
sheer volume of content that makes up most DP courses. The DP teachers felt they would not be able to
get through their courses if they slowed down in order to integrate some of the ESL-friendly strategies
taught in the TESMC course. This was less of a problem for teachers in the Primary Years Program
(PYP). Of the four PYP teachers who responded to the survey, two remained neutral regarding the “fit”
between the TESMC and the PYP curricular framework, while one agreed there was a fit, and a fourth,
Hannah, strongly agreed, saying “I combined [knowledge from the course] with knowledge I’ve just
learned for PYP, so that helped. I can combine both that course and the PYP course.” Overall, the
participants who teach in the MYP and DP felt that most of the examples or models provided within the
TESMC course were “drawn from younger age groups” (Melissa) and that “a lot of the samples and
strategies that were used seemed to be more applicable for upper elementary, and less for high school
students” (Skylar).
Colleagues. The coherence of a professional development initiative is also related to the degree to
which it encourages professional communication and collaboration amongst its participants (Garet et al.,
2001). Not one of the participants surveyed agreed that the TESMC course had led to more collaboration
between themselves and their colleagues. Jasmine reported:
We talked a little bit amongst our group, but it was never, collaboration was never a focus of the
course. So, it was never, ‘Ok, we do this in our department, you do that in your department. Let’s
see how we can help each other.’ It was just the content that was represented. So, it was never…I
didn't feel that collaboration was a focus at all.
And Hannah felt the same way:
I think it would be great if the course allowed time for a group to get together and say, ‘We’re
going to do a Unit of Inquiry that includes all the specialist areas, plus language and math and
whatever,’ and go through that whole lesson.
29
30
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Sandra felt that it would have been “far more useful” for the members of this TESMC cohort if they’d
gotten together with other teachers from the same subject area to actually break down the questions and
concepts presented in the course, and to look at how these ideas could be used within their subject areas.
Follow-up. Teacher participants found that the TEMSC course did not seem to encourage the
development of ongoing collaborative and mentoring relationships among the course participants. Sandra
voiced these sentiments, saying she felt they needed more follow-up activities that built upon what was
learned in the course.
I find what is really successful in PD is follow-up [and] it needs to be collegial follow-up and
there needs to be support given because these are…for some teachers these are new ideas, and
you’re trying to change pedagogical practice, you’re trying to change people’s understandings
and it won’t happen in a 2-hour session and then people being sent home to do it all by
themselves.
Skylar had a similar reaction:
We didn’t set up any strategies that we could continue to use in our class. We were in the
course during the course time and then closed our books and left kind of thing. So, there was
little connection to our curriculum in the course and little connection afterwards or outside of
the course.
It would appear that these participants desired professional development that extended beyond the
course itself, providing opportunities for them to try out new practices in their classrooms, and
allowing them to maintain on-going discussions and reflections even after completion of the course
(Darling-Hammond & Richardson, 2009; Garet et al., 2001).
Awareness
Participants’ responses to the survey question asking them whether taking the TESMC course
had changed their attitude or approach toward the ELLs in their classes (Question 12) were quite
varied, with no clear theme emerging. Three agreed that they had changed, two remained neutral, two
disagreed and one strongly disagreed. Yet, when interviewed, respondents reported a general feeling
30
31
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
that the course had made them more aware of issues related to teaching ELLs in mainstream
classrooms.
Cultural identity. Regardless of the age level or subject area taught by the teachers in this
study, they acknowledged the importance of being aware of students’ culture and identity and how this
might relate to students’ prior knowledge and language abilities. Question 9 of the survey showed that
50% of the participants strongly agreed that exploring culture and identity and understanding ESL
students' diversity was a course component that was useful to them in their teaching context. As
Jasmine reflected on this same question in her interview, contemplating which components of the
course she deemed most useful and relevant, she said, “Exploring culture and identity. I think that was
quite useful. Just getting into the nitty-gritty of what impacts the students and also us who teach the
kids.” Sandra, who had been teaching ELLs for only six years, agreed:
A lot of the concepts and ideas that were coming through in this course have made me a lot
more aware of the different, um, perhaps difficulties that the students that we find in
international schools have. I’ve become a lot more aware that I need to find out and be aware
of what their prior experiences have been for maximum understanding of those students.
Generally, all the teachers were of the same mind as Hilary who felt the TESMC course
effectively explored the “reality of the nature of the learners” and that this module (Module 1) of the
program benefitted them as professionals.
Need to accommodate. In many instances the teachers, when interviewed, commented on the
fact that the course brought to mind the need to consider and plan for the ELLs students in their
classes. Here is what Skylar had to say:
I think it just brought up things that I already did or that I’d used in the past but had forgotten
about and just reminded me to use different strategies for those students and to be more aware
that they might be so far behind or might be really struggling to keep up with concepts that
other students find really easy.
Jasmine said she thought the course had made her more aware of the importance of how she
teaches the ELLs. “Not only my verbal teaching, but written things and written assignments and
31
32
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
altering exams and things like that. I’ve tried to have that as my focus these last six months.” Again,
the participants viewed the resultant awareness of the need to accommodate the ELLs in their
classrooms, after having taken the TESMC course, positively.
Knowledge and skills
According to the survey results for Question 9 (see Table 4), the main components of the
course that the participants deemed most useful or relevant included methods for scaffolding (three
strongly agreed and three agreed), the teaching and learning cycle (two strongly agreed and five
agreed), the review of how to incorporate ideas from the TESMC course into current professional
practice (two strongly agreed, three agreed and two neutral), the strategies used to support ELLs in
reading (one strongly agreed and five agreed) and, finally, the introduction to Halliday & Martin’s
(1993) functional model of language (one strongly agreed and four agreed). The exploration of culture
and identity (four strongly agreed and four neutral), as discussed above under the section on
Awareness, was also considered to be highly useful and relevant.
Table 4
Teachers’ Rating of Usefulness of TESMC Course Components Within Their Teaching Context
Course components
Exploring culture and identity
(understanding ESL students' diversity)
Halliday's functional model of language
(genre, field, tenor, mode)
Teaching and learning cycle
(context, deconstruction, modelling, joint and independent construction)
Methods for scaffolding
Impact of genre in writing across the curriculum
Strategies used to support ELL students in reading
Nominal groups and nominalisation
Strategies for assessing student texts
Re-assessment of Units of Inquiry
(incorporating ideas from TESMC into personal professional practice)
ESL Scope & Scales
(language across the curriculum)
Between module readings
SA
A
N
D
SD
4
0
4
0
0
1
4
2
1
0
2
5
0
1
0
3
0
1
0
1
2
3
3
5
3
2
3
2
4
1
4
4
2
0
1
1
1
1
0
0
0
0
0
0
1
1
3
3
1
0
1
2
4
1
0
* Note: SA-strongly agree, A-agree, N-neutral, D-disagree, SD-strongly disagree.
32
33
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Based upon responses received during the interview process two of the above components seemed
to stand out: several of the teachers mentioned the usefulness of gaining more knowledge about
scaffolding for ELLs, and others expressed appreciation for having learned more about the strategies
used to support ELLs in reading. However, Jasmine felt the need to justify her mostly positive
responses to the survey with the following comment:
The topics themselves are useful for teaching, but most of the details in the actual TESMC
course were not so practical and/or useful to a wide range of subjects. Hence it looks like I've
rated them high as the topics were useful, but the actual content of the course was not so
useful.
Course components that were deemed less useful or relevant included the impact of genre on
writing across the curriculum, the review of nominal groups and nominalisation, strategies for
assessing student texts, ESL scope and scales, and the Between Module Readings. One of the teachers
commented (in the survey) that the Between Module Readings “became labour intensive and therefore
not useful to the teaching process.” She went on to say that she was not motivated to do these readings
as she felt they had no practical application.
In responding to Question 11, rating the impact of the TESMC Course on their ability to work with
ELLs in their classes (see Table 5), five of the eight participants (62.5%) either agreed or strongly
agreed that the TESMC course had improved their ability to work with these students by teaching
them how to adapt content instruction for these students, and 6 of the 8 (75%) either agreed or strongly
agreed that the course taught them about a variety of methods to use when teaching ELLs in their
content classes. Where items such as learning about Second Language Acquisition or setting language
objectives in content classes were concerned, responses were quite evenly spread across the range
between agreement and disagreement. Half of the respondents agreed or strongly agreed that that
course taught them how to provide alternative assessment for their ELL students, while 25% disagreed
with this statement, and 25% remained neutral. The majority of those surveyed (5 of 8) gave a neutral
33
34
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
response when asked whether the TESMC course taught them how to assess what the ELLs in their
content classes could do (taking language demands into consideration); one respondent agreed they
had learned how to do this, while two disagreed. Overall, 4 of the 8 teachers surveyed (50%) felt that
the TESMC course had helped prepare them to be a more effective teacher of ELLs in their
mainstream classes (Question 18); two disagreed with this statement, one remained neutral, and one
strongly disagreed.
Table 5
Teachers’ Rating of Impact of TESMC Course on ELL-Specific Pedagogy
The TESMC course improved my ability to work with ELLs by
teaching me how...
second/additional languages are acquired
to set language objectives in content classes
to adapt content instruction for ELLs
to use a variety of methods to use when teaching ELLs in content
classes
to provide alternative assessment for ELLs in my mainstream classes
to assess what ELLs can do in my content classes, taking language
demands into consideration
SA
A
N
D
SD
1
0
1
2
2
3
4
4
3
2
1
1
2
3
2
1
0
0
0
0
1
0
3
1
2
5
2
2
0
0
3
4
0
0
1
to respond appropriately to culturally diverse learners
* Note: SA-strongly agree, A-agree, N-neutral, D-disagree, SD-strongly disagree.
Time
Layered throughout all of the themes that emerged in the data was the participants’ constant
struggle with time. Whether is was the time of day/year when the course took place, the time involved
in actually attending the course, the time required to get through the course content or to implement
some of the suggested strategies from the course, or the need for more collaborative planning time, all
of the teachers surveyed felt time was an issue.
This may, at least in part, help explain why some of these teachers felt little connection to the
course content. As Melissa mentioned, “I didn’t have the time, so I had to do all my reading at a very
quick pace and superficially.” This approach is unlikely to have led to a deeper appreciation of the
subject matter at hand.
34
35
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
As far as active learning was concerned, it was generally agreed that time needed to be set
aside to allow for the actual implementation of ideas and strategies suggested within the course.
Skylar, an enthusiastic teacher who is relatively new to the profession, demonstrated her frustration by
saying, “I think when you are in the course and talking about things you come up with a lot of
strategies, but then you’re never given the time to implement them.” Sandra, despite her many years of
teaching experience, summed it up in a similar tone:
You need a lot of time to actually plan and prepare and implement different strategies and
different things that you’re doing in the classroom. And for some people it can be quite a
challenge to do something different from the previous pedagogical strategies that they’ve
always used. And there needs to be time within the course itself, before moving on to the next
concept or idea, to give teachers time to put it into practice.
Hilary’s suggestion to “combine course assignments with ongoing curricular development
obligations” seemed like a reasonable way of economising on time, as well as endeavouring to make
the course seem more coherent and connected to the daily professional lives of these teachers,
especially since several of them mentioned that it was hard to find the time to complete their TESMC
homework in addition to all of their other responsibilities. Being able to “slow down” (Skylar) long
enough to properly implement ESL-friendly strategies without the risk of running out of time to cover
the content of the courses they were teaching was another concern. Time was also the main reason
given for why participating in the TESMC course had not led to more language-focused collaboration
amongst the teachers at this school. Finally, it should be noted here that while the TESMC course is
designed to be conducted weekly, over a period of nine weeks, the course the participants in this study
followed was conducted monthly, over a period of nine months.
Discussion
The purpose of this study was to investigate mainstream teachers’ experiences and perceptions
of the effectiveness of the approach of using the TESMC course as a means of supporting mandatory
TESOL-related professional development in an international school context. Specifically, the research
35
36
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
question being examined was: “To what extent is the approach of using the TESMC course to support
mandatory TESOL-related professional development useful and relevant in preparing effective
teachers of ELLs in the international school context?”
Participants in this study were asked to consider how the TESMC course helped prepare them
to be effective teachers of ELLs in their mainstream classes. Based on this study, one benefit of the
approach of using the TESMC course to support mandatory TESOL-related professional development
appears to have been a development of heightened awareness amongst participants of the importance
of considering ELLs cultural backgrounds, and the need to provide accommodation for these students.
These teachers felt that the course made them more effective teachers of ELLs by encouraging them to
explore the varied cultures and identities of their ELL students, and by increasing their awareness of
the specific needs of this particular student population. This affirms what Youngs and Youngs (2001),
Cummins et al. (2006), and Lucas and Grinberg (2008) argued, as these teachers clearly acknowledged
linguistic diversity as a resource and consequently reported experiencing a positive impact on their
teaching and interactions with ELLs. Furthermore, Canagarajah (2007) would agree that courses such
as the TESMC are an integral part of pedagogical movements that facilitate instruction that focuses on
communicative strategies and language awareness. Thus, the course did encourage the teachers in this
study to acknowledge that language is tied to its sociopolitical context.
According to the participants in this study, another benefit of this approach is that the TESMC
course includes valuable content covering language-related knowledge and skills that teachers in an
international school setting recognise as being relevant to their context. Participants felt that
acquisition of such specialized knowledge and skills would help make them more effective teachers of
their ELL students. The course components they found most useful, apart from the one exploring
students’ culture and identity, were the methods for scaffolding, understanding the teaching and
36
37
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
learning cycle, the reassessment of their unit plans and the strategies used to support ELLs in reading
(see Table 4). These participants’ responses echoed what the researchers (Lucas & Grinberg, 2008;
Lucas & Villegas, 2011; McGraner & Saenz, 2009) have said about the need for effective mainstream
teacher preparation programs to include these types of language-related knowledge and skills. The
teachers in this study recognized the need to develop their ability to design instruction that helps ELLs
learn both language and content, which is what McGraner and Saenz (2009) and Lucas and Grinberg
(2008) recommend.
One interesting finding, however, regarding the acquisition of language-specific knowledge
and skills was participants’ somewhat mixed responses towards the introduction and use of linguistic
and grammatical concepts. While in the survey over half of them (1 strongly agree and 4 agree)
believed that Halliday and Martin’s (1993) functional model of language was useful, in the interview
almost all of the participants expressed frustration with the use of terminology that they felt was
“incomprehensible” or “unnecessarily academic.” Both the specialist teachers and the English teachers
shared this challenge. This may suggest that while the functional model of language itself helps
teachers to identify the different aspects of language use (e.g., the right register for the right context or
“field” and social relationship or “tenor”), the teachers in this study found themselves spending more
time trying to figure out what these technical terms meant rather than on how to apply the concepts
behind them in their own teaching. This perceived disconnect between the terms and their application
seems to have led to several of the participants developing negative attitudes toward what they referred
to as the ‘jargonistic material’ of the course. These negative attitudes with respect to the use of jargon
in the course may have acted as obstacles to the successful implementation of the course (Walker,
Shafer, & Iiams, 2004) by keeping participants from fully appreciating the messages being conveyed
37
38
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
by the more technical terms employed throughout the course. As it was, the teachers involved in this
study found the theory contained in the TESMC course difficult to access due to such jargon.
Another contradiction between the survey results for Question 9 (see Table 4) and the reported
responses to this question obtained during the interviews, was that while the participants’ survey
responses show recognition of the value and relevance of the topics of study included in the TESMC
course, during their interviews many of them reported an inability to link or transfer several of these
components to their professional practice. While this reflects a positive attitude toward TESOL-related
professional development among the participants, it also shows a genuine need for focused attention in
helping them build connections between theory and practice. Several of these teachers struggled to
make connections between the theory presented in the course and its more practical applications. They
expressed a desire for an increased focus on how to incorporate the ideas and strategies they learned in
the course into their daily professional practice. This is in line with Garet et al’s (2001) assertion that
active learning is a “core feature of effective professional development [which] concerns the
opportunities provided by the professional development activity for teachers to become actively
engaged in meaningful discussion, planning, and practice,” and “involves the opportunity to link the
ideas introduced during professional development experiences to the teaching context in which
teachers work” (p. 925). Most of the teachers in this study felt that spending more of the allocated
course time (as opposed to their own personal/working hours) in collaborative discussions about how
to make this transfer from theory into practice would have been beneficial. Conceivably, the Between
Module Activities at the end of each module of the TESMC course were designed to help teachers
make such connections and therefore improve the overall coherence of this course. However the
teachers in this study still reported the lack of provision of adequate time and opportunity to use the
knowledge learned in the course in the planning and implementation of lessons designed to support
38
39
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
ELLs in their classes as a weakness of this approach. Perhaps it was due to a lack of emphasis, followup and feedback on those Between Module Activities that most of the group members in this study felt
that the program was disjointed and disconnected from their practice.
This study also raised the issue of time requirements and limitations. On the one hand, as the
course was designed to be conducted over an extended period of time (9 weeks), it claims to allow
enough time “to take in what is presented, to reflect on what has been suggested and to try out and
reflect again on the classroom trials” (TESMC Tutor Program, 2007, p. 13). Yet, despite participating
in a TESMC course that was extended over 9 months, most of the participants in this study still felt
they did not have adequate time to dedicate to the course itself, nor to implement what they learned in
the course into their daily practices, or to collaborate with other teachers in their subject areas. Perhaps
what was actually lacking was the inculcation of an approach to teaching ELLs that was inherently
more collaborative and therefore more coherent. The findings from this study suggest that the TESMC
course does not provide enough explicit instruction on how to develop collaborative partnerships. One
measurement of the coherence of a teacher's professional development activity is the degree to which
it “supports teachers in developing sustained, ongoing professional communication with other teachers
who are trying to change their teaching in similar ways” (Garet et al., 2001, p. 925). Lucas (2011)
concurs, arguing that professional development initiatives that encourage this type of collaboration, as
well as “ongoing mentoring and coaching relationships solidly grounded in the professional lives of
the teachers” (p. 10) will be more meaningful. This study supports prior research (DelliCarpini, 2009)
that has shown that teachers must develop both declarative and procedural knowledge of the skills
required for effective collaboration. Had the TESMC course placed more emphasis on ongoing
collaboration between mainstream teachers and ESL specialists constructively working together on
real ELL-related issues inside classrooms the teachers in this study might have found the content more
39
40
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
meaningful and consequently might have dedicated more time toward implementing what they had
learned in the course into their daily teaching practices. Finally, with regards to one of the elements of
active learning (Garet et al., 2001), the participants’ responses in this study indicated that the course
content might have seemed more compelling had the amount of time spent reviewing and working
with authentic students samples during the course been increased. They felt this would have helped
make them more effective teachers of ELLs.
This study revealed a desire on the part of the participants for a needs analysis, including the
assessment of participants’ prior knowledge in TESOL, to be conducted before the beginning of the
course. The omission of such an analysis was seen as a weakness of the course, leading to a lack of
coherence stemming from a “one-size-fits-all” approach that didn’t consider individual needs or allow
for differentiation. Specialist teachers reported seeing less relevance to their particular teaching
contexts and, similarly, Diploma level teachers and teachers of students in the upper years of the MYP
felt that the strategies suggested in the course were more suitable for those teaching younger students.
Furthermore, most of the participants in this cohort were relatively experienced teachers: 5 out of 8
had more than 15 years of teaching experience, 6 out of 8 had more than 5 years’ experience in
teaching ELLs, and half of the participants had received some form of TESOL training. Yet they felt
their existing experience and expertise were not capitalized on; this led to feelings of
disenfranchisement, especially on the part of the more experienced teachers. In the same manner, those
participants with less overall teaching experience seemed less satisfied with their experience in the
course. While it is important to note that more experienced teachers are not necessarily more effective
teachers of ELLs, professional development programs like this one should allow participants the
opportunity not only to share their current teaching practices, but also to explore and reflect on them to
see if they are aligned with research. The execution of a needs analysis prior to implementation of a
40
41
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
commercially developed professional development initiative is important in order to allow for contentspecific adaptations to be made to such courses, thus achieving an effectively differentiated program
that does not overlook the particularities of its participants.
Limitations
This study is not without limitations; the most notable being the absence of the tutor’s voice.
Several of the participants’ comments throughout the study related to the specific delivery of the
course and these comments could only have been verified by the tutor themselfcorroborated by the
tutor’s feedback. Had the tutor agreed to participate in this study the author could have triangulated the
data, thus increasing the credibility and validity of the results. Additionally, the inclusion of ‘neutral’
as a response on the Likert-scale responses in the survey resulted in less definite results in some areas.
Furthermore, I am a novice researcher, so the data obtained during the interviews might have been
richer had I been more willing to stray from the semi-structured interview questions. The loss of the
recording of one of these interviews was also problematic. Nonetheless, despite its limitations, the
present study does provide some useful information for those considering using the TESMC course for
TESOL-related professional development for mainstream teachers in an international school context.
Conclusion
The findings of the present study include important information for those considering the
approach of employing ‘transposed’ professional development initiatives within their school
environment, and specifically for anyone involved with mandating the use of the TESMC course as a
means of TESOL-related professional development for mainstream teachers of ELLs in an
international school. It is clear from the present study, and other studies discussed (Garet et al., 2001;
Lucas & Grinberg, 2008; Lucas & Villegas, 2011; McGraner & Saenz, 2009), that participants in such
a professional development course require content that is accessible, transferable, and readily
41
42
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
implemented into their daily practice. They also require on-going feedback and follow-up in order for
the benefits of the course to be fully realised. Based on the findings of the present study the author
wishes to conclude this paper with recommendations related to the overarching goals of TESOLrelated professional development initiatives, as well as recommendations for consideration at both the
school level and for the TESMC course itself.
One goal of taking on such an initiative is to create an organic and sustainable professional
development environment within the school where it is introduced. When teachers have opportunities
to learn with and from one another, a culture of collaboration can emerge. The content, structure and
delivery of a professional development program, therefore, must fit in with the overall goals of the
school. This is why it is not enough for a school to simply make a course (such as the TESMC)
compulsory. Schools must then work to adapt whatever program is selected to meet these goals on a
more ongoing basis.
Additionally, within the course itself, there should be activities and structures in place to help
formulate such a collaborative community. Teachers in the TESMC course should be encouraged to
bring student samples to class and to engage in communal reflect-act-evaluate cycles, in an effort to
combine course assignments with ongoing curricular development obligations. The author, therefore,
recommends that the amount of time dedicated to the creation of (and subsequent reflection on)
Between Module Activities with colleagues, during course time, be emphasized and increased. These
activities should focus on combining course requirements and curriculum development at the
participants’ school. This should allow for more meaningful and sustained collaboration. Allowing for
this “sharing of methods, discussion of written work, and reflection on problems and solutions, may
foster a better understanding of the goals for student learning that proposed changes in teaching imply”
(Garet et al., 2001, p. 928). Furthermore, considering all of the above suggestions, it is recommended
42
43
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
that further study be conducted to investigate how TESMC Tutor training is conducted, paying
specific attention to the degree of focus placed on instilling awareness of the importance of contextual
needs in these trainees.
Another suggestion for the future direction of the program is to have TESMC tutor training
place a stronger focus on the need to contextualise the program and respond specifically to the
particular needs of the context participants work in. In an effort to adapt to the aforementioned
contextual needs, a needs analysis should be conducted before a course begins to determine the prior
knowledge and experience potential participants have in general, and specifically in relation to TESOL
and working with ELLs, thus responding to the needs of each unique school context. This approach
would allow for improved alignment between professional development and ongoing curricular,
instructional and assessment considerations. On the school level, such an analysis would allow for
working groups to be established within the cohort based on past experience, subject area, grade levels
taught, and so on, thereby allowing for a degree of differentiation and a consideration of individual
needs. An approach that builds on teachers’ prior knowledge acknowledges their skills and expertise
and so teachers are less likely to end up feeling disenfranchised. Coordinating a needs analysis with
the above-mentioned differentiated approach would mean that the working groups that were formed
would last beyond the duration of the course, providing on-going feedback and follow-up.
If administrators in international schools really expect their mainstream teachers to become
more effective teachers of the ELLs in their classes following the completion of the TESMC course, or
other similar commercially developed professional development initiatives, they must set aside time
for these teachers to plan, collaborate, implement, and reflect on what they learned in the course. Not
only the time required to attend the course itself, but additional release time to work on transferring the
theory into practice.
43
44
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
And, finally, while the inclusion of technical terminology to convey specialized knowledge and
skills is inescapable, an effort should be made to translate this jargon into layman’s terms in order to
provide increased access to the concepts they represent.
There are several challenges associated with adopting a ready-made, commercially developed
course such as the TESMC as a means of providing professional development. In order for such an
approach to be successful it must be designed to be adaptable to the context in which it is employed.
Content must be relevant to the specific context and the course must respond to the specific training
needs of the participant population.
44
45
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
References
Arkoudis, S. (2006). Negotiating the rough ground between ESL and mainstream teachers.
International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 9(4), 415-433. doi:
10.2167/beb337.0
Ballantyne, K.G., Sanderman, A.R., Levy, J. (2008). Educating English language learners: Building
teacher capacity. Washington, DC: National Clearinghouse for English Language Acquisition.
Available at http://www.ncela.gwu.edu/practice/mainstream_teachers.htm.
Canagarajah, S. (2007). Lingua franca English, multilingual communities, and language acquisition.
The Modern Language Journal, 91, 923-939.
Carder, M. (2007). Bilingualism in international schools: A model for enriching language education.
Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Carder, M. (2008). The development of ESL provision in Australia, Canada, the USA and England,
with conclusions for second language models in international schools. Journal of Research in
International Education, 7(2), 205-231. doi: 10.1177/1475240908091305
Carter, R. (1990) The new grammar teaching. In R. Carter (Ed.) Knowledge about Language and the
Curriculum. London: Hodder & Stoughton.
Clair, N. (1995). Mainstream classroom teachers and ESL students. TESOL Quarterly, 29, 189–196.
Creswell, J.W. (2003). Research design: qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches, 2nd
edition. Lincoln: Sage Publications.
Creswell, J. W. (2007). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five approaches
(2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Cummins, J., Bismilla, V., Chow, P., Cohen, S., Giampapa, F., Leoni, L., Sandhu, P., Sastri, P. (2005).
Affirming identity in multilingual classrooms. Educational Leadership, 63(1), 38-43.
45
46
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Cummins, J., Bismilla, V., Chow, P., Cohen, S., Giampapa, F., Leoni, L., et al. (2006). ELL students
speak for themselves: Identity texts and literacy engagement in multilingual classrooms
[Electronic Version]. Retrieved March 22, 2012 from
http://www.curriculum.org/secretariat/files/ELLidentityTexts.pdf.
Darling-Hammond, L., & Richardson, N. (2009). Teacher learning:
What matters? Educational Leadership, 66(5), 46–53.
DelliCarpini, M. (2009, May). Dialogues across disciplines: Preparing English-as-a-second-language
teachers for interdisciplinary collaboration. Current Issues in Education [On-line], 11(2).
Retrieved from http://cie.ed.asu.edu/volume11/number2/
Dove, M., & Honigsfeld, A. (2010). ESL co-teaching and collaboration: Opportunities to develop
teacher leadership and enhance student learning. TESOL Journal 1(1), 3-22.
Echevarria, J., Vogt, M.J., & Short, D. (2007). Making content comprehensible for English language
learners: The SIOP model (3rd ed.). Boston: Allyn and Bacon.
Editorial Projects in Education (2009). Quality counts 2009: Portrait of a population: How English
language learners are putting schools to the test. Education Week, 28(17). Special issue.
Education World: Schools Bring Professional Development In-House . (n.d.). Education World: The
Educator's Best Friend. Retrieved March 13, 2013, from
http://www.educationworld.com/a_admin/admin/admin415_a.shtml
European Council of International Schools (2011, April 11). Re: DECS’ Unlocking The World
Programs [online newsletter article]. Retrieved from
http://edmundo.ecis.org/new/publications/enews/april2011.htm
Fairclough, N. (1992). The Appropriacy of 'Appropriateness’. In Fairclough, Norman (Ed.), Critical
Language Awareness. London: Routledge.
46
47
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Freebody, P. (2003). Qualitative Research in Education: Interaction and Practice. Thousand Oaks,
CA: Sage.
Garet, M. S., Porter, A. C., Desimone, L., Birman, B. F., & Yoon, K. S. (2001). What makes
professional development effective? Results from a national sample of teachers. American
Educational Research Journal, 38(4), 915-945.
Halliday, M. A. K. (1982). Linguistics in teacher education. In R. Carter (Ed.) Linguistics and the
Teacher. London: Routledge.
Halliday, M.A.K. (1993). Towards a Language-based Theory of Learning. Linguistics and Education,
5, 93-116.
Halliday, M.A.K., & Martin, J.R. (1993). Writing Science: Literacy and Discursive Power. London:
Falmer Press.
Hansen-Thomas, H. & Cavagnetto, A. (2010). What Do Mainstream Middle School Teachers Think
About Their English Language Learners? A Tri-State Case Study. Bilingual Research Journal:
The Journal of the National Association for Bilingual Education, 33(2), 249-266.
Hopper, P. (1987). Emergent grammar. Berkeley Linguistics Society, 13, 139–157.
Johnson, K. (2006). The Sociocultural Turn and It Challenges for Second Language Teacher
Education. TESOL Quarterly, 40 (1), 235-256.
Keen, J. (1997). Grammar, metalanguage and writing development. Teacher Development: An
International Journal of Teachers' Professional Development, 1(3), 431-445.
Krashen, S. (1982). Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition. New Jersey: Prentice
Hall.
Larsen-Freeman, D., & Long, M. (1991). An introduction to second language acquisition and
research. London: Longman.
47
48
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
Lucas, T., & Grinberg, J. (2008). Responding to the linguistic reality of mainstream classrooms:
Preparing all teachers to teach English language learners. In M. Cochran-Smith, S. FeimanNemser & D. J. McIntyre (Eds.), Handbook of research on teacher education: Enduring
questions in changing contexts (pp. 606- 636). New York: Routledge.
Lucas, T. & Villegas, A. M. (2011). A Framework for Preparing Linguistically Responsive Teachers.
In T. Lucas, (Ed.), Teacher preparation for linguistically diverse classrooms. A resource for
teacher educators (pp. 55-69). New York, NY: Routledge. Kindle Edition.
Making It Comprehensible. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://makingitcomprehensible.weebly.com/index.html
McGraner, K. L., & Saenz, L. (2009). Preparing Teachers of English Language Learners. National
Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality, 1 – 24.
Modiano, M. (2001). Linguistic Imperialism, cultural integrity, and EIL. ELT Journal, 55(4), 339-347.
Moll, L., Amanti, C., Neff, D., & Gonzalez, N. (1992). Funds of Knowledge for Teaching: Using a
Qualitative Approach to Connect Homes and Classrooms. Theory Into Practice, 31(2), 132141.
Nieto, S. (2002). Language, culture and teaching: Critical perspectives for a new century. Mahwah,
NJ:Lawrence Erlbaum. Kindle Edition.
Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory (NWREL) Center for Research, Evaluation, and
Assessment. (2008). What teachers should know about instruction for English language
learners – A report to Washington state. Retrieved from
http://educationnorthwest.org/resource/669
Perera, K. (1987) Understanding Language. London: National Association of Advisers in English.
Reeves, J. (2006). Secondary teacher attitudes toward including English Language Learners in
48
49
VALUE AND RELEVANCE OF TESMC
mainstream classrooms. Journal of Educational Research, 99, 131–143.
Shoebottom, P. (2007). Helping ESL students achieve academic success. A Guide to Learning English.
Frankfurt International School. Retrieved from http://esl.fis.edu/teachers/fis/index-w.htm>.
Shoebottom, P. (2009). Academic success for non-native English speakers in English-medium
international schools: The role of the Secondary ESL department. NALDIC Quarterly, 7(1), 1318.
Stake, R.E. (1994). Case Studies. In N.K. Denzin & YS Lincoln (Eds.) Handbook of Qualitative
Research (pp. 236-247). Thousand Oaks, Sage Publications.
Teaching ESL students in mainstream classrooms: language in learning across the curriculum.
(2006). Adelaide: Dept of Education and Children's Services.
Walker, A., Shafer, J., Iiams, M. (2004). “Not in my classroom”: Teacher attitudes towards English
language learners in the mainstream classroom. NABE Journal of Research and Practice, 2(1),
130-160. Retrieved from http://njrp.tamu.edu/
Yin, R. K. (1984). Case study research: Design and methods, 3rd ed. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
Youngs, C.S. & Youngs, G.A., Jr. (2001). Predictors of Mainstream Teachers’ Attitudes Toward ESL
Students. TESOL Quarterly, 35(1), 97-117.
49
50
Appendix A
Outline of the Teaching ESL Students in Mainstream Classrooms 9 module course
Module 1: ESL students and learning in a second language
• Who are ESL students and what are some of the factors that may impact on their success at school?
• How are culture, language and identity related and how can we draw positively on the cultural capital which ESL
students bring?
Module 2: Language and learning and the role of scaffolding
• The relationship between the language of a text and the context in which it is used.
• The significance of simultaneously learning a language, learning through that language, and learning about that
language.
• A teaching and learning cycle that provides an explicit focus on language and a framework for scaffolding
students.
Module 3: Oral language: How the task shapes the talk
• The central role of oral language and the crucial role of teacher interaction in supporting and scaffolding students.
• A range of classroom tasks which provide opportunities to use and develop oral language as an integral part of
teaching a subject effectively.
Module 4: Using oral language: Interpreting and producing oral texts
• Ways to scaffold students to become more effective listeners and speakers.
• Oral language assessment tools.
Module 5: Working with written and visual texts
• Genre as part of an explicit approach to teaching and learning.
• Strategies that could be used to build students’ understanding about texts they encounter in their classrooms.
Module 6: Working with written and visual texts at the text level
• The connection between purpose, schematic structure and language choice.
• Key language resources that writers use to organise their texts so that readers have a sense of what will follow.
Module 7: Developing knowledge of genre and language at the language level
• The language choices, such as the nominal group and nominalisation that are available to make technical and
abstract meanings in written texts.
Module 8: Assessing written texts
• Published print texts used in classrooms.
• Student texts with a focus on how teachers can make assessment a supportive strategy for all.
Module 9: Programming and whole-school models of support for ESL students
• Teacher programs, incorporating strategies considered in the course.
• Involving and working in partnership with families and the community.
• Working collaboratively on whole-school models of programming, reporting and support for ESL students.
51
Appendix B
Teaching ESL students in mainstream classrooms: language in learning across the
curriculum (Between Module Readings)
Contents
Module 1: ESL students and learning in a second language
Reading 1 (8 pages)
ESL students: some factors influencing their school experiences and learning outcomes, by Debra Burke
Reading 2 (8 pages)
ESL students: changing and re-shaping identities (identities under construction), by Bronwyn Custance
Reading 3 (3 pages)
What ESL students may bring to the learning context by Bronwyn Custance
Module 2: Language and learning and the role of scaffolding
Reading 1 (12 pages)
Scaffolding language and learning by Pauline Gibbons
Reading 2 (4 pages)
A functional model of language by Bronwyn Custance
Module 3: Oral language: How the task shapes the talk
Reading 1 (11 pages)
From speaking to writing in the content classroom by Pauline Gibbons
Reading 2 (5 pages)
Using small group work (adapted from the ESL in the mainstream course, 1991)
Module 4: Using oral language: Interpreting and producing oral texts
Reading 1 (18 pages)
Talk about literacy in the content areas by Pauline Jones
Module 5: Working with written and visual texts
Reading 1 (5 pages)
Supporting ESL students with written and visual texts across the curriculum by John Polias
Reading 2 (6 pages)
Multiliteracies in literate futures (extract from Chapter 13 ‘Literate Futures: Reading’. Education Queensland)
Module 6: Working with written and visual texts at the text level
Reading 1 (8 pages)
Reading for meaning across the text by Brian Dare
Module 7: Developing knowledge of genre and language at the language level
Reading 1 (14 pages)
Perspectives on vocabulary by John Polias
Reading 2 (8 pages)
Nominalisation: meaning making in the written realm by Brian Dare
Reading 3 (4 pages)
How accessible are the texts we use? By John Polias
Module 8: Assessing written texts
Reading 1 (8 pages)
Making assessment supportive by John Polias
Module 9: Programming and whole-school models of support for ESL students
Reading 1 (5 pages)
Reviewing ESL provision within a culturally inclusive curriculum (extract from Guidelines for Catholic Schools in the
Archdiocese of Melbourne. (1997))
51
52
Appendix C
Teaching ESL students in mainstream classrooms: language in learning across the
curriculum (Between Module Activities)
Module 1: ESL students and learning in a second language
Develop a student profile of an ESL student in one of your classes.
Module 2: Language and learning and the role of scaffolding
Observe a student in an oral interaction.
Module 3: Oral language: How the task shapes the talk
Plotting activities on the mode continuum.
Designing/adapting and implementing an oral language task.
Module 4: Using oral language: Interpreting and producing oral texts
Option 1: Developing and implementing oral language assessment criteria.
Option 2: Scaffolding students as listeners.
Module 5: Working with written and visual texts
Option 1: Review of a student task that proved difficult for students. Discussion probing understanding of purpose
of genre and its schematic structure.
Option 2: Reflection on linguistic and visual demands of a text.
Module 6: Working with written and visual texts at the text level
Option 1: Re-examination of student writing. Identification of use of foregrounding in student writing.
Option 2: Development of an activity or series of activities to support ESL students in reading a piece of text.
Module 7: Developing knowledge of genre and language at the language level
Option 1: Develop and trial a set of activities on nominal groups and nominalization.
Option 2: Analysis and comparison of two student texts (one weak student and one strong student) for the use of
nominal groups and nominalization.
Option 3: Development of a Dictogloss activity.
Module 8: Assessing written texts
Option 1: Use of Questions from Session 2 (How accessible are the texts we use?) to assess a website often used by
students.
Option 2: Use of a set of assessment criteria from Module 8 to assess student writing of a sequential explanation or
an argument to then develop a set of teaching points.
Option 3: Development of assessment criteria for another genre based on those presented in this module. Refer to
Resource Note 5 in Module 5 for the schematic structure of some genres.
Option 4: Developing a shared understanding of assessment criteria with ESL students. Should be informed by
examples.
Module 9: Programming and whole-school models of support for ESL students
Option 1: Complete a program of work (begun in Session 2) that you plan to implement in the near future,
incorporating ideas and practices engaged with over the course.
Option 2: Work with colleagues from same year level or same faculty to reassess a program of work that covers a
semester or even a year. Begin to explore how a more explicit focus can be introduced.
Option 3: Establish a plan of action of how you might work within your school to move the school up the levels in
the School Evaluation Framework.
52
53
APPENDIX D
CONSENT FORM
An Investigation Into the Value and Relevance of Using the Teaching ESL Students in
Mainstream Classrooms (TESMC) Course for TESOL-related Professional Development with
Mainstream Teachers of ELLs in International Schools
Please read the following information about the study to be conducted and sign below if
you agree to participate.
I agree to participate voluntarily in a project being conducted by Tiffany Crook, a graduate
student in the Department of Education at Bishop’s University, Sherbrooke, Quebec. The
objective of the project is to investigate the perspectives of international school teachers on the
effectiveness of using the TESMC course as a mandatory professional development program in
Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) as part of their preparation as
teachers of English Language Learners (ELLs) in mainstream classrooms.
As a participant in this project, I will be asked to complete an online survey comprised of 20
questions (20 to 30 minutes), and to participate in a follow-up interview (via Skype) to elaborate
on my responses to the initial survey (45 minutes). I am aware that at all times, I have the right to
withdraw from the project without negative consequences.
The data collected will only be accessible to Tiffany Crook and her Exit Project Advisor, Dr.
Sunny Manchu Lau. This data will be kept in a password-protected personal computer and will
be destroyed after 3 years. All data collected will be confidential and the property of the
researcher, and will be used strictly for the above-mentioned project. Upon request, I may have
53
54
access to the data I provided. I am aware that academic publications and presentation(s) may
result from this project, that my identity will be kept confidential, and that the data I provided
may or may not be published, at the discretion of the researcher. In order to be informed of any
publication, I may give my address and phone number to the researcher.
There are no serious risks involved in the study. The potential benefits resulting in my
participation include an opportunity to learn more about this current topic in education, and
possibly gain a better understanding of approaches to TESOL-related professional development.
Tiffany Crook can be reached on her personal mobile phone at (852) 5412 0356, or by email at
tiffanyanncrook@gmail.com. The University’s Research Ethics Board approved this project on
October 1st, 2012. If I have any concerns regarding this project, I may contact Dr. Christopher
Stonebanks, Chair of the Research Ethics Board of Bishop’s University (819-822-9600, ext.
2203) or Dr. Benoit-Antoine Bacon, Associate Vice-Principal of Research (819-822-9600, ext.
2546).
I agree to participate in this project and I have made this decision based on the information I
have received about it. I have read and understand the present consent form and I accept its
stipulations.
Participant name: ______________________
Participant signature: ____________________________
Date: ___________________________________________
54
55
Appendix E
Participants’ Online Survey (including results)
55
56
56
57
57
58
58
59
59
60
60
61
61
62
62
63
63
64
64
65
65
66
66
67
67
68
68
69
69
70
70
71
71
72
72
73
73
74
74
75
Appendix F
Tutor Version of Online Survey
75
76
76
77
77
78
78
79
79
80
80
81
81
82
82
83
Tutor’s version of survey can be found at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/779JNXN
83
84
Appendix G
Semi-Structured Interview Questions:
1. You indicated that you __________________ (strongly agreed-strongly disagreed*) that
_________________ (component from list) was useful in your teaching context. Could
you explain why?
2. You ranked ______________ as the first criteria in evaluating the usefulness of the
course. Could you please further explain the reasons for your choice?
3. You indicated that you ____________ (strongly agreed-strongly disagreed*) that the
TESMC course improved your ability to work with ELLs by teaching you how to
__________________ (knowledge or skill from list). Could you explain how?
4. You indicated that you________________ (strongly agreed-strongly disagreed*) that
your attitude toward the ELLs in your classes has changed as a result of taking the
TESMC course. Can you elaborate/give an example of this?
5. You indicated that you _______________(strongly agreed-strongly disagreed*) that the
TESMC course has increased your awareness of collaborative practices and/or led to
more collaboration between you and other teachers. Can you explain or give an example
of such collaboration?
84
85
6. You indicated that you __________________ (strongly agreed-strongly disagreed*) that
the structure and delivery of the TESMC course __________________________ (item
from the list). Can you elaborate on this?
7. You indicated that you __________________ (strongly agreed-strongly disagreed*) that
the TESMC course fit with the PYP/MYP/IB-DP curricular framework. Can you explain
why/why not?
8. To what extent, do you think the TESMC course helped prepare you to be an effective
teacher of ELLs in your classes? Could you give some examples to illustrate?
9. In what ways do you think an in-house TESOL-related professional development
program might be beneficial/challenging?
* Where participants indicate disagreement, suggestions for changes and/or improvements will
be solicited.
85