Investigating Student Teachers’ Perceptions of English as a Lingua Franca and Its Teaching in Mainland China

ABSTRACT

The significance of English as a lingua franca (ELF) has been promoted widely in English language teaching worldwide and has driven scholarly attention to English language teachers in Mainland China. However, little attention has been paid to English teachers’ perceptions of ELF-informed teaching during the pre-service stage of their careers. To narrow the gap, the present study aims to investigate English student-teachers’ perceptions of ELF and its teaching in a national key Chinese normal university through a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. Results indicated that the participants held an insufficient understanding of ELF, and lacked support in their teacher education programmes regarding how to implement ELF-informed teaching practices. Additionally, the study revealed some contextual challenges encountered by the participants in relation to ELF-informed teaching. The study concludes with suggestions about promoting student English teachers’ ELF awareness and developing ELF-informed pedagogies in China.

KEYWORDS:

• student-teachers’ perceptions
• English as a lingua franca
• teacher education programmes
• universities in China
• English in China

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the study participants whose dedicated participation made this research possible and two anonymous reviewers for their suggestions on an earlier version of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.