Teacher training

EAQUALS work in this area has focused on two main developments:  

A. Providing training materials for use by EAQUALS members in their own schools. This is in the form of a ‘teacher's toolbox'. So far, it contains materials for in-service training on classroom management and language issues, such as:

• Using the mother tongue in the monolingual classroom 
• Reducing the use of mother tongue in the classroom  
• How to elicit 
• Classroom management 

and on the teaching of pronunciation, for example:

• Teaching pronunciation from the native/non-native teachers' point of view 
• What does our school believe about pronunciation? 
• How to create a ‘core list' of sounds with linked classroom activities 
• Introducing a chart of phonemic symbols

An exciting new resource for supporting teachers in the development of their ability to use ‘new technology' in their teaching is currently being prepared.

B. Providing an international tool for mapping and assessing language teacher competencies for use by EAQUALS members. This is in the form of a Profiling Grid which contains descriptors over three stages of a teacher’s career development, ‘basic’, ‘independent’ and ‘proficient’, for four key areas of competence: 

1. Language, including language awareness 
2. Qualifications, supervised teaching practice, and experience 
3. Core competencies: 
   • methodology – knowledge & skills, 
   • lesson and course planning, 
   • interaction with and monitoring of learners, 
   • assessment
4. Complementary skills, such as ICT and professional development.

You can see the EAQUALS Profiling Grid here.

This tool has been used by EAQUALS member institutions in a number of countries to assess the strengths and training needs of their teaching team, and in some cases teachers have been invited to use the Grid to assess their own competences prior to discussion of their development needs with managers.

An EAQUALS project is working on developing the concept into a full framework for language teacher training and development.

For further information about the EAQUALS Profiling Grid see the list of publications.