Confidence levels and concerns of beginning teachers of modern foreign languages

ABSTRACT

How beginning teachers learn to teach has been the focus of a substantial amount of research. The process is complex, and a number of theories and models have been put forward. For example, Fuller and Bown's (1975) well-known classification of beginning teachers' concerns into self, task and impact (and the sequential nature of these categories) has been tested, modified and developed by a number of researchers (Calderhead, 1987; Guillaume and Rudney, 1993; Capel, 2001; Burn et al 2003). Because of the subsequent research, it is now generally felt that the concerns identified by Fuller and Bown are actually not sequential, but that their significance varies as beginning teachers develop and that there is evidence of impact concerns (initially identified as the final stage in the sequence) even at early stages of the process. Investigations by researchers into teachers' concerns link closely with those on stages or phases in learning-to-teach. This paper considers the nature of these concerns and the possibility of identifiable stages for beginning modern foreign language (MFL) teachers, a group not frequently studied. Data were collected over a total of eight cohorts and the study involved over 200 student teachers from two separate institutions. Results concur with those of more recent research: there is no evidence in this study for discrete or sequential stages of development or concern, and beginning MFL teachers place a great deal of emphasis on subject knowledge (i.e. their linguistic competence and confidence) from the start.