Beginning EFL teachers’ beliefs about quality questions and their questioning practices

Abstract

Motivated by the scarcity of research that examines the impact of teacher beliefs on their actual practices in Vietnam, this study investigated the relationship between teachers’ beliefs about quality questions and their questioning behaviours in terms of questioning purposes, content focus, students’ cognitive level, wording and syntax. Thirteen beginning EFL (English as a foreign language) teachers working at Vietnam National University participated in the study. Qualitative data collected by means of an open-ended questionnaire survey and classroom observation were analysed using qualitative content analysis. Findings show that although there was a general congruence between teachers’ beliefs and practices, there were discrepancies – from moderate to substantial – between what the teachers believed and what they actually did in the class with respect to the four specified features. While much more research is required to understand the links between EFL teachers’ beliefs and practices about quality questions in Vietnam and other EFL contexts, it is expected that the insights will contribute to the literature on teacher questions, beliefs and practices.

Keywords:

• teacher beliefs
• teaching practice
• quality questions
• English as a foreign language
• beginning teachers
• Vietnam

Acknowledgements

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the teachers who participated in our study despite their heavy workload. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable feedback and comments.