High school teachers’ pedagogical beliefs in English as a foreign language writing instruction

Abstract

Writing in a foreign language is deemed to be the most difficult language skill to learners, especially at high school level. Consequently, its teaching has become a challenging task for high school teachers in the Vietnamese context. Teacher beliefs related literature indicates that what teachers do in the classroom is directly governed by what they think and believe. Thereby, the current study adopted features of a survey research design to examine the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) high school teachers’ beliefs about writing and its teaching. A sample of seventy six EFL teachers from the eight selected high schools situated in Ho Chi Minh City was recruited for the current survey. The beliefs of EFL writing instruction of these teachers were elicited through two instruments of eighteen–item questionnaires and semi–structured interviews. Then the questionnaires were quantitatively analyzed and the interviews were qualitatively analyzed. Results of the study showed that most of the participants held different orientations about writing skill, teacher roles and its teaching. The study was closed by a brief conclusion of key findings.