Exploring high school teachers’ and students’ perceptions of teaching for creativity in EFL classes

ABSTRACT

This study explored and compared the perceptions of high school English teachers and students regarding teaching for creativity (TfC) in EFL classes in Taiwan, with a focus on three dimensions: instructional objectives, instructional activities, and learning evaluation. It also investigated the effects of English teachers’ creative self-efficacy on their perceptions of TfC pedagogy. To these ends, 644 students completed a student perception survey, and 71 teachers filled out a teacher perception survey and a creative self-efficacy inventory. Results of the study present a comprehensive picture of both groups’ preferences regarding this pedagogy. In particular, the two groups held highly similar views regarding its design and implementation. In addition, the teachers with higher creative self-efficacy demonstrated stronger agreement with the survey items, suggesting that teachers’ creative self-efficacy influenced how they designed and conducted TfC pedagogy to some degree. Based on the results, pedagogical implications shed light on how to encourage TfC pedagogy in English classes.

KEYWORDS:

• Teaching for creativity
• instructional objectives
• instructional activities
• learning evaluation
• English as a foreign language (EFL)

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author would like to acknowledge the research grant from the Ministry of Science and Technology (currently named the National Science and Technology Council) in Taiwan in support of this research project (MOST 108-2410-H-003-056-MY2).

Notes on contributors

Hung-chun Wang

Hung-chun Wang (corresponding author), Ph.D. in English Teaching, is an associate professor in the Department of English at National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei City, Taiwan.