Issues in the education of TESOL teachers by distance education

Abstract

Language teacher education by distance (LTED) has become a widespread and important practice in the preservice and in‐service education of teachers, and in language education internationally. The advent of the Internet has combined with developments in other information communication technologies, the globalisation of English, and the marketisation of education to afford a rapid increase in the number of TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of other Languages) teacher education programs, and greater variety in the ways in which teaching and learning is mediated in these programs. This article reports on an international survey of TESOL teacher education providers, and considers the status of language teaching qualifications earned by distance, changes in the institutional roles of language teacher educators, and the current state of research into LTED.

Keywords:

• teacher training
• language teachers
• TESOL
• language teacher education by distance
• globalisation

Notes

1. The survey uses the term TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages). TESOL is the universal acronym in the field, and in many TESOL programs, the content of the program is not language specific. We did not locate any LTED programs dedicated to teaching languages other than English. All respondents to the survey indicated that the language of instruction of their program was English.

2. International students are those who are not nationals of the country in which the institution is situated. Off‐shore students are those physically located in another country, regardless of their nationality.

3. For example: TESL Canada 〈http://www.tesl.ca/〉; TESOL/NCATE 〈http://www.ncate.org/〉 〈http://www.tesol.org/s_tesol/seccss.asp?CID=219&DID=1689〉; Accreditation Council for TESOL Distance Education Courses 〈http://www.actdec.org.uk/〉; International Accreditation of TESOL Qualifying Organisations 〈http://www.iatquo.org/〉; and the Open and Distance Learning Quality Council 〈http://www.odlqc.org.uk/〉.

4. Given that the response rate to the survey is approximately 20%, the numbers of language teacher educators and students in LTED programs could feasibly number in the thousands and tens of thousands, respectively.

5. This is not a view shared by all respondents, nor is it a view shared by the authors.

6. This is true also of respondents working in relatively low‐tech programs.