Teacher Training : Reshaping the Future of Language Teaching

For wisdom will enter your heart and
knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will protect you and
understanding will guard you.
Proverbs 2: 10-11

The public and the teacher-education professionals both agree: the present system of preparing and developing America’s instructors for the pre-kindergarten through college classroom is not performing "up to standards." Assessments and measurements attest to low student achievement.

Among the chief culprits, recounted in anecdotes and articles, is the writers’ observation of inadequate and inferior teaching. The continuing calls for systemic educational reform come at the same time we are in the midst of an unrelenting teacher shortage. Raising teacher salaries and general working conditions to unheard-of heights would certainly improve the situation—but that infusion of billions of dollars into teachers’ pockets and our nation’s schools won’t happen.

This decade will be a period when the "certification establishment"—those involved in school governance locally and at the state level—will be pressured to reduce standards. They will be tempted to continue to increase the number of beginning teachers in classrooms whose preparations for the assignment will neither reduce nor negate the criticisms leveled against the teacher education establishment for producing intellectually shabby products.

Such "provisionally licensed" or "temporarily uncertified" instructors with few credit hours in either the specific subject matter or in general education will not make broad and substantive improvements any easier.

Foreign/second language education is not exempt from either the quality crisis or the teacher shortage. But we are looking for answers. We are currently embarked on attempts to resolve these crises in a tandem activity, and often by innovative means. Local and national media offer converging perspectives on the importance of language and culture studies for the young.1 While they feature stories on staffing needs, reports from elsewhere on possible solutions to the shortage are also investigated for local applicability. Extensive and informative surveys such as "Who Should Teach?" (Education Week, January 13, 2000), are commented upon in editorials. Indeed, programs of quality and promise are going understaffed and are endangered by the absence of an ample supply of teachers of promise.

Urban and rural language programs have long experienced similar teacher shortages as well as crises in quality and long-term commitment. Now, suburban districts, the post-1970s stronghold of second language education in our nation’s middle and senior high schools, find themselves offering previously unheard-of signing bonuses. This is due in part to the expansion
of programs—primarily and appropriately—at the K-8 levels, as well as to large numbers of retiring faculty. Schools are beset with uninstructed students; methods ins-tructors and supervisors encounter and must encourage under prepared or inappropriately prepared majors—the "literature vs. language argument" again—to stay the course. Typically, in the space of one semester, the majors become the struggling new teachers who give testimony to many weaknesses in subject area and/or pedagogy. The chorus of shortage woes remains consonant with the quality issue nationally: too few staff, too few qualified applicants, too few applicants and too many new or expanded programs. And, of course, there is the justifiable fear that the resurgence of language study and quality programming will soon evaporate.2

We should not seek out those who are liable for the present dilemma: in a sense we as a society all are, for allowing the state of education to become a crisis. Instead, let us look first to ourselves as professionals to identify factors that would assist in the reform of language teacher education. The authors offer no easy, quick-fix answers. There simply are none. As retired FL supervisors (K-12) currently serving as methods instructors, we do bring the combined perspective of the supervisor and long-time classroom observer/practitioner to the discussion as we ask, "Would we hire this person for a teaching post for our district?" If "yes," then why? What characteristics do we look for in the ideal candidate to teach our youngsters? And if "no," then why not? What do these candidates lack that would prevent them from achieving success as language teachers? Over the last twenty years, language teaching has undergone what must certainly be more than a generation of change. The most obvious example is the proliferation of technology in the foreign language classroom and in the inventive hands of teachers and students. The implications of technology for quality instruction and staffing needs are yet to be understood by the profession at large. Also, a significant gap remains between what language teachers know and are able to do, and what teachers at all levels with many years of experience say that young professionals embarking on their teaching career need.

Five key areas under current scrutiny in teacher education discussions reflect, we believe, the twin issue of quality and quantity that insists on immediate consideration:
(1) Language skills: How and where to acquire and maintain these at levels commensurate with our charge and our ideals as professionals engage in life-long learning? How do we define in precise terms what those skills are? Simply put: How "good" must "excellent" be?
(2) Admission into Apprenticeship: The relevance and availability of preparatory course work in pedagogy and language/ culture studies is undergoing inspection. What are the appropriate steps for a major in language teaching? How should these be packaged for future teachers?
(3) The Apprenticeship Period: How do we provide for a beginning language teacher to be exposed to observations and practice and cover information that is vital for the early years of teaching. Is the model we need to adopt extant? How vibrant and rewarding is the student-teaching experience? Much exposition remains before appropriate models appear and/or receive their due recognition.
(4) Where’s the Role Model? The concomitant concern of identifying the "master teachers" for the beginning language professional: How do we ensure that reflective, relevant, compassionate and competent mentors are available to our new colleagues-to-be? What are the "right kinds" of experiences that beginners need, and from how many different individual sources?
(5) Life-long Learning and Professional Development: How do we assist in identifying and providing appropriate activities: supplemental and "refresher" experiences that go beyond the generic or traditional "staff in-service?" What role must licensing agencies play in the states? How aggressive must certification officers become in insistence and assurance of appropriate linguistic skills from applicants?

A formal sampling or survey undertaken by the authors in 1998-99 suggested that "needed" qualities and "delivered" candidates are still far apart, despite massive efforts and exemplary contributions by our professional FL organizations in the five critical areas. The respondents reaffirmed the points above by asking for mandatory inclusion of the following in teacher preparation reforms:
(1) Language usage and skills of the teacher that are needed (conversational ability, phonetics training, stylistics, and grammar—the specifics of competency need detail.
(2) Culture knowledge that is broad, and encompasses both the little "c" culture as well as the big "C" culture, and anything in between.
(3) Strategies and activities that enhance the delivery of language as a means of communication in consonance with the other four "Cs" of the National Standards Goals Areas: Comparisons, Communities, Cultures, and Connections.
(4) Technology and its implications for attaining the standards and for improving teaching techniques.
(5) Study/travel abroad and its value to the classroom experience.

Language teachers must become familiar with the acronyms of significant and impending change. Foremost among these are NCATE, INTASC, and NBPTS. NCATE (The National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education) develops standards for the approval of the teacher education institutions themselves. This accreditation is in turn accepted by over 40 state departments of education as part of their gatekeeper function in certifying individual applicants. NCATE, therefore, is a "big player." INTASC, the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (part of the Council of Chief State School Officers—CCSSO) is in the process of creating entry-level teacher standards that will be based on the NBPTS accomplished teacher standards. The NBPTS (National Board for Professional Teaching Standards) is that multi-year, multi-discipline project aimed at developing teacher standards for the accomplished professional that will have a say in what defines quality. The first draft of the Foreign Language Teachers was issued in November 1999, and contains fourteen principles of excellence. The tie-in to the "big players" by our profession is a milestone in language teaching reform.3

The National Standards in Foreign Language Education Project Collaborative (the creative group which issued both the generic standards in 1996 and the language-specific, K-16 standards in 1999, was admitted to NCATE in 1998. ACTFL serves as the Collaborative’s representative to NCATE. The NBPTS draft is the product of 15 FL professionals; many of them are the same men and women who played major roles in the formation of our National Standards. This tie-together of visions is important for future changes in foreign language teacher education.

These are the elements of cooperation and continuity and access. They are the needed connection to the establishment that can make quality reform happen.

Which role does each of us have as we prepare, like marathon runners, for the race ahead? What influential activities can be undertaken by our representative organizations? One significant response is that of ACTFL and the National Foreign Language K-12 Resource Center at Iowa State University: "New Visions."4

This 1999 initiative is a series of meetings on a reformed FL teaching profession. The next gathering, in June 2000, in the Washington, D.C. area, will seek to determine major issues in the profession and identify responsibilities for producing reform. "New Visions" goes beyond a "priorities conference" or a "proceedings book." Many of the points touched upon in this article will be discussed or even rejected—from the fresh perspectives of 200 committed professionals. "Who can do what—and when and how?" is an unsettled challenge, replete with macro- and micro-changes. Assigning roles and tasks is a hoped-for outcome of the June meetings, with further deliberation at ACTFL 2000 (Boston), and, surely, at ACTFL 2001 (Washington, D.C.). The points below are offered as a means to engender further discourse at professional meetings, and, hopefully, to make the difference between dusty irrelevance and relevant action.
(1) What will we do to improve FL teachers’ language and culture skills? We need to utilize appropriate funding and technology to assist us in this, and call to mind the infusion of funding and activities of the "NDEA days" of the 1960s. What can we do about professional development of in-service and pre-service teachers to create an up-to-date cadre of skilled professionals who continually cultivate their skills?
(2) What entry-level skills do the thoughtful teachers in the field and methods instructors suggest be obligatory for the new professional? What must a beginning professional command in terms of language and culture, and at what measurable level? How will this be translated into course work and related activities at the accredited institutions and their departmentalized structures, where the generalization (unfair as it may be) is that activities in both education and foreign languages are truly from a different century. Here, the matter of literary studies as the predominant major course of preparation may well be challenged as a result of feedback from the field in tandem with the demands by state governance authorities seeking to improve student achievement at the pre-K-12 level.
(3) How do we resolve the problems of the apprenticeship period? Why do beginning professionals find such varying qualities in cooperating teachers, from the seven-year veteran who dismisses the value of lesson planning to the 30-year veteran who insists that student teachers be responsible for work at 6:30 a.m. each school day and gradually take on the classroom period? What is the "best length" of time in an apprenticeship? How many different experiences in the schools should the beginner have?

The answers to these questions are in the minds of those who help change to take place. As the poster says, "Some people make things happen, some watch things happen, while others wonder what has happened." Where we, as a profession, fall on this energy-inertia continuum will determine whether these questions remain unanswered. There are more "New Visions" opportunities out there besides the examples here. We need to continue discussions in order to formulate the training and preparation necessary to run the marathon, and, even, possibly to win it.