CHAPTER 1 THE SELF-DEVELOPED LANGUAGE TEACHER

Self-development means a process through which the individual takes the responsibility for his/her progress in a specific field/career by adapting certain measures to have a better understanding of the issues and more efficient performance. Within the notion of teaching, that defined as a process, through which the teacher:

breaks the wall of conventions in teaching methodology tries to explore and discover new ways of teaching and expand on his intellectual and pedagogical abilities achieves a self-actualization obtains in-personal understanding and definition of the issues becomes independent from external sources, and finally Gains the ability to make wise and enlightened teaching decisions.

The influencing factors on self-development as follows: 1) Time investment. It takes time to observe interaction in our classrooms to visit other teachers classes, as well as to write in a journal and to talk to others about teaching. If teachers believe that development is important, they need to make a commitment to devote time to their development. 2) Ongoing commitment. Development is not something that teachers do just while in a teacher education program or at the beginning of a teaching career. Rather, even the most experienced teacher can learn new things about teaching and development is enhanced when the teacher makes a commitment to ongoing development. 3) Problem solving skill. When teachers recognize problems and work at solving them, they can discover new things about teaching and about themselves as teachers. 4) The inclination for the exploration for the sake of exploration. Teachers can, indeed, discover much by exploring simply to explore, not to solve a problem. Such exploration can be based on pure interest. For example trying the opposite simply to see what happens or trying out an idea simply because it sounds interesting. 5) Learning and practicing the basics of ESL/EFL teaching. 6) Self-involvement in development. It can be done by talks with other teachers about teaching, read about teaching, and participates in other activities that give chances to reflect on the teaching and see new teaching possibilities. The more activities we experience related to teaching , and the more questions and answers we can come up with through this ongoing process, the more chances we have to develop our teaching beliefs and practices. 7) Team work and cooperation of others. It takes others who are wiling to observe, listen to, and talk with us (administrators, students, other teachers and friends). Without their cooperation selfdevelopment is very difficult, as there is neither any source for feedback nor any stimulus or ideas.