THE PRACTICE OF ORAL PRODUCTION CONCERNING THE CONTINUING EDUCATION OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY

The scope of the present study is to comprehend the professional identity of a group of English Teachers. The research sought the answer to the following question: How does the mastery of the speaking aspect of the English Language influence teacher’s professional identity? The choice of the topic arose during a continuing education course offered by the authors of the present work, whose partakers were EFL teachers. The research took into consideration both, experiences observed during the continuing education course and relevant data collected with the help of an open questionnaire, which participants answered at the end of the course. Contemporary literature also supported the conclusions concerning teacher’s professional identity and its close relation to two important factors: the way teachers perceive themselves and how others see them. Regarding the English Language Teacher professional identity, the participants of the research stated that professionals from this area are not as valued as they should; in their opinion, the lack of oral fluency of most teachers is a key factor on the existence of a professional misrepresentation. Results have shown that, for them, oral fluency is essential for academic and social recognition of their profession. All participants stressed the need of continuing education in terms of oral practice, due to the lack of opportunity of practicing the English Language daily. They also pointed that teachers with limited-fluency tend to avoid the use of the target language in order to “hide their deficit” on EL; on the other hand, teachers that are fluent in English “feel safer and with self-steam”. We have concluded, from our research, that the oral fluency is indeed important for the constitution of English Language teacher’s professional identity, exerting a positive influence on it. On the other hand, the fact of not being fluent in English Language contributes for the so called “teacher’s professional identity crisis”. 

2020: A New Era of Sign Language Literature

 Summary: Sign language is the primary daily language of many Deaf people, yet sign language is not always included as a part of Deaf Education. Teachers of the Deaf in France in the late 1700s and early 1800s established using sign language in the classroom and yet generations later educators chose to revert back to oralism, not including any sign language when teaching Deaf children. And the trend continues to this day. Researchers in the 1960s, 70s and 80s proved that sign languages are natural languages, and yet this fact did not change the difficulties schools still have in reassuring parents and administrators that the Deaf students will learn to communicate, read and write a sign language as with your fellow listeners regarding oral languages that speak. Now, in the 21st century most educators and researchers are aware that sign languages are sophisticated languages with grammar, syntax and large vocabularies. Yet accepting sign languages as written languages has taken longer. Those who support the idea of writing sign languages feel that the availability of written literature and poetry in sign languages will lead to improved literacy in oral languages and in the long run, increase acceptance by the hearing world. Showing that sign languages have a written form helps establish sign languages as foreign languages in schools. With the advent of the internet and social media, writing sign languages is spreading quickly. The year 2020 is the beginning of a new era of sign language literature.Keywords: Sign Language; Literature; SignWriting; Deaf; Education.