JURNAL PENDIDIKAN IPBA 2002 JILID 2: BIL.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF ESL TEACHERS IN PRIMARY

SCHOOLS

By

DR. MOHD SOFI ALI

Ketua Jabatan
Jabatan Bahasa Inggeris

1.0 Introduction

This article discusses some issues and concerns over the professional development
of the ESL teachers in the three primary schools in Malaysia. Primarily, it
emphasises the roles that primary schools can play to develop teachers. It
establishes that teachers can play their roles more effective in an ecology, which
treats them as learning and reflective professionals rather than just implementers
of mandated curriculum strictly adhering to a well-established external assessment
system. Professional development of teachers should be empowered to the school,
the panel and ESL teachers. The ESL teachers should be seen as the designers and
implementers of their own professional development in schools. (Clark, 1992)

2.0 The Urgency for Professional Development of ESL Teachers

In a study1, the writer observed that shortage of trained ESL teachers in those
schools has led to the deployment of trained non- ESL teachers to teach English.
This has made professional development of those instant ESL teachers essential. It
was also observed that beginning ESL teachers and `veterans’ required a variety
of professional skills and competencies (Eraut, 1994) to carry out their jobs
effectively in the classroom. Their needs, among others, were

• Personal language development skills: The ESL teachers, both

trained and untrained, found that they needed to improve their
English language proficiency to enable them to be more confident in
their spoken skills and communication. This language proficiency
problem was critical especially among the trained non-ESL teachers.
• Improvement in teaching: Non-ESL trained and beginning ESL
teachers in the schools claimed that they lacked exposure to ‘routines
and functional, subject and pedagogic content knowledge’ (Tickle,
2000) to help them to teach their pupils in the classroom. They
required these ‘practical’ and meaningful pedagogical skills to enable

1
The study was conducted over a period of three months at three primary schools in
Kelantan. Using the case study methodology, the study explored the roles of English
language panels on professional development of ESL teachers in the primary schools.
This article therefore portrays the findings of the study.

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them to teach English effectively. A particular area they found the

most demanding was the teaching of grammar.
• Study skills and examination skills for pupils: Tests and
examinations apparently became a dominant feature in the school
culture. As such ESL teachers were required to be trained in
motivational skills and examination skills, that is, effective ways of
making pupils excel in the examination. ESL teachers in the lower
and upper primary levels found that they needed related skills to cope
with ever demanding tests and external examination, the UPSR.
• Coping with curricular changes: Curricular changes required the
ESL teachers to adjust to new curricular needs and demands. These
include new technology in teaching, the use of ICT, problem solving
and thinking skills.
• Managerial needs: The school administrators and panel heads
required special skills to perform in the new roles vested in them.
These skills emphasised their roles as instructional and curriculum
leaders (to conduct supervision, to manage the panel, for instance) in
the schools. This, therefore, needed to an extent some managerial
skills on the part of the head panels and headmasters.
• Teachers as researchers and reflective practitioners: ESL teachers
were not being trained to be reflective practitioners, nor had they been
trained to be researchers in their classroom. Their only concern was
classroom teaching. However, they were expected to carry some
activity of research in English, as the study indicated, which in turn
required specific research skills.

The continuing demand for these new skills indicated there was an urgent need for
a professional development programme of ESL teachers in the primary schools.

At the policy level, the urgency for professional development of teachers could be
seen in a report of a group of twenty educational personnel from the Teacher
Education Division (TED) on `Programme on Effective In-service Training’. In
the introduction, the group reported:

“In the efforts to make Malaysia a knowledgeable society and

the commitment of Ministry of Education to realise the vision of
educational institution as a learning institution makes Continuing
Professional Development a new and relevant development to be
given attention to.” (KPM, 1997, p.1; translation)

The group consequently forwarded a twelve-point suggestion as a result of the

group’s observation and discussions of in-service development in England and
Wales. Some of the suggestions were as follows:

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(a) Each teacher should be given the opportunity to attend in-service at

least once a year; there should be a professional development agenda
for all teachers throughout the country;
(b) TED should be given the mandate to play a wider role as the main
agency to develop, plan and implement in-service programmes, and
to develop a paradigm shift with a special focus on in-service
programmes;
(c) School-based in-service professional development programmes for
teachers should be given priority;
(d) An in-service co-ordinator should be appointed at every school and
teacher training college;
(e) In-service funds should be allocated directly to schools for the
implementation of in-service professional development programmes;
(f) In-service should not be restricted to structured and formal courses
only, it should also involve alternative elements such as distance
education, project work, action research, and attachments. It is
suggested that the term `in-service’ be replaced with Continuing
Professional Development (CPD);
(g) All parties in the educational institutions should make CPD a part of
their personal career development plan. (ibid, 1997, p.20-21,
translation)
The need for professional development of teachers in Malaysia had even been
recognised by a special committee2 set up by the Education Ministry to look into
teachers’ professionalization, professionalism and professional development of
teachers in Malaysia. It recognised the importance of professional development of
teachers as a means to enhance the teaching profession. Some of the
recommendations for the professional development of teachers that the committee
forwarded were:
• Teachers should be encouraged to attend in-service courses
• Teachers are to be encouraged to further their education.
• Teachers should be given opportunities for study visits overseas to
study current developments in education.
• Induction programmes should be given to those teachers who were
appointed to new posts and new responsibilities.
• Management courses should be provided to those teachers who had
been promoted as head teachers.
• Staff rooms should be subject-based.

2
The committee, headed by the former Education Director General of Malaysia, was set up in 1995. It
studied issues and problems in the teaching profession. Known as Abdul Rahman Arshad report, it
provided recommendations to improve the teaching profession in Malaysia. As the report was
classified as confidential, the information described here has been gathered (bits and pieces) from the
media, discussion with some personnel, and the writer was present at one of the meetings with the
committee in 1996.

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• Teacher Centres should facilitate professional development for

teachers; they should be built at strategic locations, equipped with
modern technology, fully funded and adequately staffed.
In fact, thinking about and implementing a professional development agendum for
the teachers, as Hoyle (1980) argued, raised more important issues than just
`intents by principles’ in enhancing and assuring the quality of education in our
primary (and secondary) schools.

Do we care about society to invest sufficient resources and
imagination in the improvement of schools?

Do we care enough about each of our schools to see that they have the
resources to increase dynamism, creativity and skills of people who
work with children?

Do we care enough about teachers to provide them with the means to
stay vital and to reach out for continuous growth? (Hoyle, 1980, p.21)

3.0 Professional Development of ESL Teachers: At the Moment

It was observed in the three case study schools that ESL teachers’ development
was primarily self-made and discovered, a profoundly individualised professional
development pattern, in the workplace based on a restricted notion of teacher
professionality (Hoyle, 1980; Hargreaves & Goodson, 1996). The ESL teachers in
their quest for personal development, and indirectly organisation development,
acted more or less as isolated individuals. As they saw their own teaching a
private affair (Nias, 1989), often they identified their own needs and skills; they
prioritised them and discovered ways to meet their own development. Their
professional development, hence, occurred in a `random, almost haphazard way
through chance encounter with colleagues” (Bell, 1991, p.6).

In fact, most of them had developed their teaching skills and competence through
their initial education at teacher training colleges, an informal apprenticeship, and
years of teaching experience in the school. Aptly, as it was observed, methodology
came with the ESL teachers. They learned about their professional roles and
related skills `intuitively’ (Hargreaves & Goodson, 1996), and by talking to
colleagues (through informal talks and chats along the classroom corridor, at the
canteen, and in the staff room), and working with other teachers. They also
developed their classroom competence on past experience as students and by
emulating their former teachers as role models.

Taking over a new responsibility, post or duty, as head of panel for instance, was a
matter of ‘trial and error’ using traditional-based models. Once appointed as the
head, for instance, she manages the panel through the experience she receives
from her previous panel heads or from the panel heads of her former schools. It
was a self-discovery and a slow process through the teachers’ experience in the
workplace.

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The prevalent form of professional development was therefore unstructured and

restricted in scope. It failed to some extent to provide teachers with the relevant
required professional skills and practice based on an appropriate role model, for
instance. Bell (1991) argued that the role models, which were available in the
schools, might not be appropriate for an inexperienced teacher to follow. This was
particularly apparent in the three case study schools. Beginning ESL trained
teachers and non-trained ESL teachers were unable to gain relevant experiences
and skills from the experienced ESL teachers in the schools (and vice versa). In
addition, the experience that a particular teacher would need in order to update his
or her skills and knowledge might not be present in the school. On top of that, this
approach to professional development was rather passive, and it was not consistent
with the need to manage the classroom in a coherent and structured manner.

The most common `planned’ approach to ESL teacher development in the primary
schools was in fact through a centralised professional development programme
initiated by the Ministry of Education and its professional divisions, namely,
through in-service courses. It was `generally’ expected that it was the
responsibility of the Ministry of Education to plan and implement courses (e.g.,
English Language for non-optioned ESL teachers, thinking skills, courses on
curricular changes) for the teachers. In the process, teachers were taken out of the
school, placed in a seminar room for a certain period (a day, a week, a month or a
year) for a course of a certain nature. This was essentially to `help’ teachers to
enhance their existing qualification, to further develop their existing skills (top-up)
or to help teachers in areas which they perceived to be experiencing difficulty.
On returning to their respective schools, the ESL teachers were expected to pass
on the information to their colleagues in the schools in the form of in-house
training sessions. This was as a part of the cascading professional model of the
Ministry of Education, helped to train other ESL teachers in the school. There was
indeed a clear in-house policy at the three case study primary schools.

Teachers have been assumed as deficient in certain aspects (Clark, 1992;

Hargreaves, 1989; Tickle, 2000) and they were required to be re-vitalised. This
form of professional development, Bell (1991) argued, assumed that change in
schools could be brought about by changing selected or randomly self-selected
individuals within those schools, who would be expected to successfully generate
change in others to such an extent that the school itself would be transformed; i.e.,
the cascading effects. As my cases showed, due to workload constraints and other
priorities (assessment pressures, time constraints, role ambiguity, for instance),
such cascading efforts through in-house training sessions seldom occurred in the
primary schools however.

The external course-based teacher professional development carries a great deal of

negative undertones (Clark, 1992). It implies, to Clark (1992, p.75), “a process
done to teachers; that teachers need to be forced into developing; that teachers
have deficits in knowledge and skills that can be fixed by training, and that

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teachers are pretty much alike”. The limitations could be clearly seen in my three
case study schools.

• It emphasised the role played by experts outside the schools; the ESL
teachers did not see themselves or their peers in the school as experts.
There was, to some extent, mistrust among the ESL teachers for
internal teacher experts. They believed that the external experts would
be able to perform better than the internal experts; i.e., the ESL
teachers themselves.
• Only a limited number of ESL teachers were able to attend those
courses. The number of places available depended on the allocation of
funds for the course. It was impeded by “a relatively small funding
base” with “ small (number) agencies are attempting to provide
services to an enormous number of teachers working in a very large
number of schools” (Joyce, 1980, p.23). As the allocation for
professional development of teachers was greatly reduced in 1998,
less external courses were organised.
• There was also a mismatch between the needs of teachers and/or their
schools and the content of the courses. To them, some courses were
irrelevant, impractical and redundant. State and districts were
authorised “to bring attention to specific curriculum areas” and “a
large proportion of the authorised funds be used to educate teachers in
the area of concern” (Joyce, 1980, p.23). Teachers were therefore left
without choice. Often they were available at courses as passive
audience.
• Courses were too theoretical, that they would not have any practical
application in the classroom, especially in a foreign language context.
As an ESL teacher in one of the primary schools indicated, the
`theory’ had not been tested for its effectiveness at the school level.
• The provision of the course was unsystematic and unplanned as the
providers (district, state and Ministry of Education) determined
choices. Often the priorities of the course organisers and providers of
in-service courses dominated the provision of in-service activities for
the ESL teachers. Teachers were left without much choice in
determining their own professional development. The locus of control
of teachers’ professional development still remained with the Ministry
of Education.
• The cascading model of in-service activities (as envisaged by Ministry
of Education, Malaysia) explicitly encouraged dissemination of
information through various means. One was through in-house
training sessions at the school level (KPM, 1994b). This initiative,
however, in the first place diluted the information received by the
teachers. A three-day input, for instance, was delivered to the teachers
in half an hour (the extreme case, a five-minute briefing at the panel
meeting). Secondly it was seldom implemented at the school due to

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time, work constraints and other priorities. It was further marred by

the lack of fund allocated for professional development of teachers in
the school.

Hewton (1988) summed up the limitations of the external course-based

professional development,
“First, there was too often a mismatch between the needs of the
teachers (whether personal or those arising from the school
context) and the content of the course. Such mismatch arose
partly from inadequate analysis or understanding of problems by
course organisers, partly by inadequate description of the course
content in advertising materials and partly from unsystematic
ways in which teachers selected courses. Secondly, even when a
mismatch did not occur and a course was of potential value to
the participants they were often unable to utilise new knowledge
and skills acquired because they were unable to influence what
was happening in their schools whether for reasons of status,
lack of resources, lack of appropriate feedback mechanism from
the course to the schools or combination of both.” (Hewton,
1988, p.6)

4.0 Challenges to Professional Development in the Workplace

What could have possibly been antagonistic to the development of ESL teachers’
professionalism in the primary schools? I could see several factors at play in
determining the implementation effectiveness of professional development
programmes of ESL teachers. Workplace professional culture, teachers’ isolation,
individualism, collegiality and shared technical culture, funding and support
structures could be some of the variables contributing to the failure of the process
of teachers’ professional development.

4.1 Personal Development versus Organisational Development

In the designing and delivery of professional development, there is a tension
between personal and organisational development within the school context. The
individual ESL teacher requires a process that caters to his or her personal self
improvement as a teacher and which acknowledges the difficulties and
complexities of the job (Bell, 1991, p.5) whilst school administrators have their
own priorities in the organisation. They have to be accountable, they “ will want a
form of development that reflects their assessment of needs of the school and the
demands on it which emanate from parents, governors and other stakeholders in
its activities.” (Bell , 1991, p.5)

However tests and examinations have become the over-riding concern in most
primary schools, this organisational priority has become dominant over teacher
development. Professional development of teachers has been relegated to a lower

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priority or none at all, and if there is any, it is mainly examination-related.

However, to document the concern for examinations as the single variable, is
unfair and unjust. Other factors have to be considered as well. Cost could be one
as it would be cheaper to develop an educational technology based on testing than
to develop teachers as professionals.

The district and state education authorities want to ensure that their priorities are
given prominence while the Ministry of Education (through its professional
divisions) sets and resources its own national priorities for the development of
teachers. These different perceptions, as Bell (1991) argued, determine the nature
of support and assistance that have been provided for teachers to create a
framework within which choices about professional development are made. Such
choices depend upon and, at the same time reflect sets of assumptions about the
appropriate nature of and provision for teacher development.

4.2 Individualism, Isolation and Collegiality in the Workplace

“Teachers are individualistic,” I recalled a remark by a Deputy
Head of a primary school in Perak. “They would not want to
work in a team. They refuse to share ideas, and they refuse to
accept new ideas, too.”

The nature of the teaching profession and how teachers see themselves and their
work in the school determine their relationship with others and how they see
others in the schools. It also determines the nature of collegiality in the school, as
well as their attitudes towards a networking or, for that matter, the panel.

Nias (1989, p.18) has argued that primary teaching is “an activity which for
psychological, philosophical and historical reasons can be regarded as
individualistic, solitary and personal, inviting and in some senses requiring high
level of self-expenditure”. The manner in which each teacher behaves is unique.
“The minute-by-minute decisions made within the shifting,
unpredictable, capricious world of the classroom and judgement
teachers reach when they are reflecting on their work depends
upon how they perceive particular events, behaviours, materials
and persons” (ibid, 1989, p.13)

Nias (1989) has contributed to several factors inviting primary teachers to be self-
referential in the ways in which they conceptualise and carry out their jobs in the
schools. They are the historical, financial and philosophical traditions of primary
teaching, the culture and physical context of the school.

“As a result, teachers expect the job to make extensive calls upon
the personality, experience, preferences, talents, skills, ideas,
attitudes, values, and belief of each individual. Equally, they

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expect the freedom to ensure that the ways in which, and still to
some extent what, they teach are consistent with the values
which are most salient to them. Primary teaching as an
occupation makes heavy demands upon the self.” (Nias, 1989,
p.26)

In fact Lortie (1975) established that personal pre-dispositions are not only
relevant, but in fact stand at the core of becoming a teacher. Hence, the heavily
personal and private nature of primary school teaching tends to result in
individualism, isolation and contrived collegiality (Hargreaves, 1998), which
influence pupil-teacher, and teacher - teacher interactions. Hence it explains:

“No matter how pervasive particular aspects of a shared social or

occupational culture may be or how well individuals are
socialised into it, the attitudes and actions of each teacher is
rooted in their own ways of perceiving the world.” (Nias, 1989,
p.14)
Schools have long being identified as loosely coupled systems in which the
various components, while responsive to one another, preserve their own identity
through some degree of separateness (Weick, 1976). Hence, this relative
independence of operation provides teachers with autonomy to make individual
judgements to deal with the uncertainty and complexity of classroom
environments. (Temperley and Robinson, 2000).

Goodlad (1984, p.186) claimed that although teachers functioned independently,

“their autonomy seems to be exercised in a context more of isolation than of a rich
professional dialogue”. Inside the schools, “teacher-to-teacher links for mutual
assistance or collaborative school improvement were weak or non-existent”.

Individualism, isolation and the absence of supportive collegiality among the

teachers explained the occurrence of several phenomena in the school. This has
led to the absence of a shared technical culture among the ESL teachers. This also
explained why teachers refused to be observed; why a task/tasks agreed upon in a
meeting were abandoned, why supervision by the panel head was unwelcome; and
why interdependence did not work in the school.

4.3 Status, Promotion and Teachers’ Career Development

Teacher development, in terms of teacher career ladder, has not been clearly
charted, either as a policy or as an action plan at school, district, state or central
levels3. A beginning teacher, for instance, would be given a workload and

3
At present, MOEM has three promotion systems for teachers: through seniority and
qualification, time-based promotion and promotion as expert teachers. The present form

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responsibility (administrative and instructional) as a teacher who has served for

twenty years and vice versa. An ESL teacher who has not been trained in English,
for instance, would immediately assume responsibilities without proper induction
to `search for his or her soul’ into the most practical ways of making his or her
pupils learn English effectively. It has been taken for granted that they could
perform in the classroom (armed with their initial education from teacher training
colleges). They were expected to perform well. On the other hand, experienced
ESL teachers who have served for more than twenty years were left disappointed
without proper career recognition. ESL teachers who have been teaching for more
than twenty years were treated the same as beginning teachers.

It was apparent in the study that the primary ESL teachers were concerned about
their status. They saw themselves as ‘support’ staff rather than ‘professionals’ in
the field. To them, the professionals (i.e., graduate teachers) led, and they, as the
support staff, supported the programmes or innovations. They did not plan; they
were mere technicians. They would be the ones who would implement
programmes at the school level.

The career cycle, that is, how the teaching career unfolds, is another concern for
the teachers. Huberman (1988, 1991) described the career path for the teachers:
teachers go from survival to discovery (the first three years), to focusing down
(Years 4 – 6), to experimentation and diversity (Years 7-8), to focusing down (19
or more years). In the latter group, Huberman (1988) found three further sub-
patterns in the latter group, which he labels “positive focusing” (doing my own
things), “defensive focusing (withdrawn and critical), and disenchantment
(withdrawn and bitter)”.

Nias (1989) claimed that teachers are also concerned about their own career and
especially about their long term prospects for promotion.
“Teachers spoke with anxiety ‘good people get stuck’, of ‘those
who haven’t got promotion, being bitter and frustrated and worse
teachers because of it’, of ‘good teachers losing heart because
they have nowhere to go…For these teachers diminished career
prospect appeared to relate much closely to an expressed dread
of professional stagnation than they did to material incentives.”
(Nias, 1989, p.125)
In Malaysia, for instance, career promotion among teachers has been a slow
process. For instance, as the study revealed, a teacher who has been teaching since
1976 is still on a DG6 scale. Similarly another retired from the profession at the
age of 55 on DG 6 scale, the lowest on the primary teacher’s salary scale. The
heads of panel, as indicated in the study, were also on DG6.

however, though a positive attempt, is far from adequate to cater for teachers’
development, vis-à-vis career promotion, in the country.

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As such, the ESL teachers’ greatest reward would only be the “psychic rewards”
(Lortie, 1975); that is, their students have learned, and “respect from others,” (that
is, teaching is a noble profession, which is now diminishing, too). Success stories
are a predominant source of pride for teachers. Teaching has been labelled as a
noble profession, but ironically the profession has not been able to recruit the best
brains.

4.4 Workload, Work Stress and Teachers’ Burnout.

Fullan (1991, p.117) argued that educational change depends on what teachers do
and think- “it is as simple and as complex as that”. He maintained that classroom
and school become effective when quality people are recruited to teaching and the
workplace, the school, is organised to reward accomplishments. To him,
professionally rewarding workplace conditions attract and retain good people.
Similarly, it helps to develop teachers as professionals.

ESL primary school teachers encounter excessive workload and work stress in
implementing their daily chores. Wigginton (1986), cited in Fullan (1991),
observed secondary teachers’ routines:
“Teachers routinely have to teach over 140 students daily. On
top of that, we have lunch duty, bus duty, home room duty …
We go to parents’ meetings, teachers’ meetings, in-service
meetings, curriculum meetings, department meetings, county
wide teachers’ meetings, school board meetings, and state
teachers’ conferences. We staff the ticket booths and concessions
stands at football and basketball games. We supervise the
production of school plays, annuals, newspapers, dances, sports
events, debates, chess tournaments, graduation ceremonies. We
go on senior trips .. We go on field trips to capital buildings,
prisons, nature centers, zoos …We supervise fire drills… We
write hall passes, notes to the principals, the assistant principals,
parents and ourselves. We counsel. We wake up every morning
to the realization that the majority of our students would far
rather be some place else. On top of that everybody’s yelling at
us – state legislators, parents, and SAT scores … To add injury
to insult, colleges and universities are getting all huffed up and
grumpy and indignant over the increasingly poor preparation of
the students we’re sending to them. Well, just who do they think
taught us how to teach? How much support and prestige do they
accord their own schools of education?” (Wigginton, 1986,
p.191)
Primary school teachers face the same ‘unattractive’ scenario in their workplace.
Apparently there were “bewildering arrays of social needs and academic
expectations for the classrooms,” (Fullan, 1991, p.119), from achievements in

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tests, and examinations (the league tables, UPSR) and the mastery of basic
language skills as advocated in the syllabus.

On top of that, the National Education Philosophy warrants that the pupils as well
balanced emotionally, intellectually and socially. The state expresses the needs for
intellectual development, citizenship participation, moral and ethical character
development, emotional and physical well being, creativity and aesthetic self-
expression and self-realisation. The inclusion of smart school concepts further
demands all round effort from teachers – thinking skills, innovation and creativity
and technology literacy. As Goodlad (1984) says, “We want it all.”

Fullan (1991) argued that the circumstances of teaching, then, ask a lot of teachers
in terms of daily maintenance and student accountability, and give back little in
the time needed for planning, constructive discussion, thinking and just plain
reward and time for composure. The central tendency of these conditions is
decidedly negative in its consequences.

Lortie (1975) described the dilemmas the teachers faced in the school:

• Initial teacher training of teachers did not equip teachers for the
realities of the classroom.
• Due to the cellular organisation of schools , where teachers spent most
of their time physically apart form their colleagues, forced the
teachers to struggle with their problems and anxieties privately,
• Partly because of the physical isolation and partly because of norms of
not sharing, observing and discussing each other’s work, teachers did
not develop a common technical culture. The teacher’s craft “ is
marked by the absence of concrete models for emulation, unclear lines
of influence, multiple and controversial criteria, ambiguity about
assessment timing, and instability in the product” (ibid, 1975, p.136)

Inevitably, teachers’ burnout seems to be an inherent factor at the workplace. It

determines the will and desire of the ESL teachers to work. “I wished I could
come to school to teach only, and then go back. Nothing else,” as lamented by an
ESL teacher in a school, is a reflection of the inner self of the teacher to his work
and workplace condition. It is a sign of teacher’s burnout. Burnout involves a
change of attitude and behaviour in response to a demanding, frustrating,
unrewarding work experience (Cherniss, 1980). It also refers to negative changes
in work-related attitudes and behaviour in response to job-stress.

4.5 Professional Autonomy and Locus of Control

The centrally initiated professional development through the external course based
professional development led to a crucial question on professional development of
teachers: Who controls professional development of the ESL teachers? Was it the

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English language panel, as envisaged by the Professional Circular #4/86, or the

school as the organisation or the Ministry, the employer?
It is clearly indicated that the Ministry of Education still basically set the in-
service education agenda around its goals and priorities based on the current
educational reforms it perceived. The ESL teachers still “come a poor third in the
… struggle over the allocation of resources and the determination of priorities and
purposes for their own development” (Ingavarson, 2000, p.160). Fewer
opportunities, in terms of support, allocation and resources, apparently have been
given to the English language panel or the ESL teachers “to define and pursue
their own professional development goals, except those that fall within the goals
of centrally-framed school charters and curriculum.” (ibid, 2000, p.161)

In such a context, Clark (1992) raised an interesting issue on the locus of control
of teachers’ professional development:
“As a teacher, how eager would you feel about co-operating in a
process in which you are presumed to be passive, resistant,
deficient, and one of faceless, homogenous herd? This is hardly
an ideal set of conditions for adult learning, support and
development.” (Clark, 1992, p.75)
Imposed development as indicated by external locus of control has
“an effect, but the results may not be those intended … Without consent,
imposed development will be re-interpreted, and at its best subverted, or
mostly ignored or refused. At the worst, it will have unintended
consequences that both sides agree are detrimental to pupils’ learning”.
(Higgins and Leat , 1997, p.313)

Professional development should be seen as having wider purposes

than “helping teachers to keep up with government or employer initiated
policy changes – should also be about helping teachers keep up with `new
thinking’ on the part of teachers” (Ingavarson, 2000, pp.160-161). ESL
teachers should be made responsible for their own professional
development in schools.

In the school context in Malaysia, the Professional Circular #4/86, and the
Special Committee Report on Teachers Professionalization were government
attempts to recognise the growing importance of professional development of
(ESL) teachers in order to improve the learning of pupils in the schools (primary
and secondary). In particular the Professional Circular #4/86 recognises

• The increasing importance of professional development of teachers in

the 1980s.
• Teachers as an initiating force to in-service education, through the
English language panel.

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• The importance of teachers becoming progressively more sensitive to

what is happening in their classroom and to support their efforts to
improve, assisted by theoretical studies arising from their needs as
they perceive it.

When the Education Vision was introduced, as a response to the nation’s Vision
2020 (Lim, 1997), empowerment was a hit. All schools, inclusive of Delima,
Mahligai and Pengkalan, were plunged into a heated debate about implementing
empowerment at the school level. Everybody talked about empowering the
teachers, the panel heads for school improvement. Empowerment became the tool;
it was a part of the School Development Plan, and it was a part of the school’s
Client’s Charter. It was short-lived, and empowerment is still an unfinished
agenda in Malaysia.

Within the primary schools, the school administrators claimed that empowerment
has been widely practised. Management of English language panels, in particular
the management of pupils’ language activities, has been empowered to the ESL
teachers to a certain extent. They however have no control over their own
professional development and the curriculum.

Blasé and Blasé (2000), for example, advocated six strategies for, how effective
instructional leaders could promote professional development of teachers in the
schools:
• Emphasising the study of teaching and learning
• Supporting collaboration efforts among educators
• Developing coaching relationships among educators
• Encouraging and supporting the redesign of programmes
• Applying the principles of adult learning, growth and development at
all phases of staff development; and
• Implementing action research to inform instructional decision making
(Blasé and Blasé, 2000, p.135)
The headmasters (and headmistresses) are, undoubtedly, middle managers; that is,
in the middle of the relationship between teachers and external ideas and people
(Fullan, 1991, Hussein Mahmood, 1993). Their role is central to promoting or
inhibiting change, especially to the culture of the school ( Fullan, 1991). However,
their roles have becoming more complicated. Fullan (1991) asserted:

“the role of the principal (and headmaster/headmistress)

is not in implementing innovations or even in instructional
leadership for specific classrooms. There is a limitation to how
much time principals can spend in individual classrooms. The
larger goal is in transforming the culture of the school. If
successful, it is likely that some advanced models of the future
will show collaborative groups of teachers organizing and

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conducting learning, perhaps without the presence of the

principals as we now know the role. The principal as the

collaborative leader … is the key to this future.” (Fullan, 1991,
p.161)

While recognising the key role of the headmasters and headmistresses in the
school culture, the “site council”, a networking of educational experts and
community at the school level, undeniably important in developing supportive
collegiality for the development of teacher’s professionalism.

5.0 Professional Development of ESL Teachers: What is it all about?

5.1 Defining Professional development of Teachers

Professional development is therefore about teacher development (Eraut, 1994;
Fullan and Hargreaves, 1992; Elliot, 1987). It is about career development to
improve teaching performance. It is to improve the craft of teaching. It is, as
Elliott (1987, p.11) noted, “an enhancement of teacher’s potential and it involves
the acquisition of a set of capabilities necessary for the successful completion of
professional task.” These new sets of capabilities are “skills and abilities which
are implied by performance tasks, beliefs and attitudes and reflexive powers ”
(ibid, 1998, p.12), resulting in teachers’ professional actions, on one hand, and
changes in their thinking about their jobs, on the other. (Keltchermans, 1998)
It is also the ability to want to change oneself. It is “about being comfortable with
going forward, enabling people to take on things without them causing problems.”
(Sisslings, 1991). Keltchermans (1998) described professional development of
teachers as a life-long process in the context of schools and classroom. It is career
long, “starting with initial education and continuing until retirement. It is an active
process. The teacher must actually work to develop. Development does not
happen merely as a result of years of teaching.” (Dean, 1991, p.7)
Professional development of teachers, therefore, suggests a process whereby
teachers become professional by having a “substantial background knowledge
and skills, acquired during initial training and thereafter” (Dean, 1991, p.5). It
implies “a process whereby teachers may be helped to become more professional”
(Hoyle, 1980, p.42), a process by which teachers acquire the knowledge and skills
essential to good professional practice at each stage of the teaching career. It is the
improvement of teaching, which involves the continuous improvement of
knowledge and skills of the teachers.

5.2 ESL Teachers as Reflective Practitioners

Elliott (1993) argued that wise professional judgements and decisions rest on the
quality of the situational understandings they manifest. Situational understanding
involved discriminating and then synthesising the practical significant elements to

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a situation into a unified and coherent picture of the whole. To him, there was no
value-free understanding of the concrete and complex situations, which confronted
professional practitioners.

Systematic inquiry, hence, becomes an integral feature of professional practice. It

assumes a central role in improving judgements and decisions. Following Schon
(1983), Elliott (1993, p.67) maintained that experienced professionals did not
recall and apply sets of abstract or theoretical propositions when confronted with a
decision about how to respond in a practical situation. Rather they intuitively or
reflectively compared and contrasted the present situation with cases experienced
in the past, and in doing so they developed a picture of its significant features.

Day (1997) argued that teachers have not generally taken an active part in the
production of knowledge about their own teaching. They have been
disenfranchised and they have been perceived as basing their practice on their
professional practical knowledge and experience. Day (1993) also raised
important issues on how teachers could reflect on their practice and by what
means the teachers might be supported over time to developing reflective teaching
practice at different levels.
“It is equally important to recognise that, to date, much learning through
reflection has been private. Conditions of service, and the organisational
cultures in many schools do not allow for regular professional dialogue
about teaching which goes much beyond anecdotal exchange and the
trading of techniques.”

Elliott (1993) described reflection as a means for situational understanding of

particular, complex and fluid practical situations. A practitioner would view him
or herself as part of the situation she wanted to understand.

“In reflecting about the situation (s)he does not dissociate his or he own
agency and influence. The form of reflection involved is reflexive.
Secondly, there is a problematic dimension opened up by this reflexive
stance. The practitioner calls into question his/her own actions and
responses within the situation, in the light of evidence which suggests they
are more inconsistent with professional values than (s)he originally
assumed. This in turn opens up a third critical dimension in which the
practitioner reflects about the taken-for-granted beliefs and assumptions
which underpin his/her practical interpretations of professional values and
their origins in his/her life experiences and history. S(he) begins to
reconstruct his/her constructs of value and discovers that this opens up new
understandings of the situation and new possibilities for intelligent action
within it.” (Elliott,1993, p.68-69)

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Hence, I strongly believe that professional development of teachers

involves teachers reflecting on their practice and experiences in the school
context. Their highly personalised day to day contact and interaction with
their pupils within their self-contained classroom, serve as the situations
they have to understand in order to sustain their pedagogical development
and maturity. Reflection and experiential learning are essential components
of teachers’ professional development in the schools. Stenhouse (1975)
described:

“The improvement of teaching is a process of development … It is not to

be achieved by a change of heart but by the thoughtful refinement of
professional skill … achieved by the gradual elimination of failings through
the systematic study of one’s own teaching. Both curriculum development
and research into teaching should provide a base for this professionalism.”
(Stenhouse, 1975, p.39)

6.0 Conclusion

In this article I have discussed some issues on teacher professional development

in the workplace. The role of workplace, the school, in teacher professional
development has been highlighted. Indeed, as Hargreaves and Fullan (1992)
stated, teacher development cannot be cast on stony ground. Neither would they
strive in an organisational culture which is fairly hierarchical, departmental and
discipline based. Certain organisational preconditions to curriculum change
should be present (Fullan, 1991), and `if it is attempting to implement an
innovatory curriculum without changing the organisational context, it would
understandably run into problems” (Ratnavadivel, 1999, p.207).

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