The characteristics of
experienced and expert teachers are differing from novice or beginning
teachers. It involved in providing high-quality professional development
for experienced teachers. Research on teacher cognition, a relatively
new field that includes the nature of teacher knowledge and ways to
develop it, is limited. Such studies are rare in the area of teacher
preparation for working with students learning a second language and
rarer still in the area of adult education. Maggioni & Parkinson
(2008) Waters (2006) were undertaken with the goal of strengthening
pre-service teacher training programs, so they focus on how to help
novice teachers.
The definition of what constitutes teacher
experience varies greatly across the scant literature on this topic.
Novice teachers are relatively easily defined as those with little or no
classroom experience. They are often student teachers or teachers who
have less than 2 years of teaching experience (Gatbonton, 2008). The
identification of experienced teachers is more complex. Teachers and
administrators might define experienced teachers as those who have
taught for many years, are able to motivate students and hold their
attention, know how to manage their classroom effectively, and can
change course in the middle of a lesson to take advantage of unforeseen
opportunities to enhance student learning. In the literature, however,
the definition of experienced teachers seems to hinge principally on the
number of years taught; time-related criteria can range from 2 years
or 3 years (Bastick, 2002) to 9 years or more (Atay, 2008; Bivona,
2002). Most commonly, studies identify experienced teachers as those who
have approximately 5 years or more of classroom experience ( Martin,
Yin, &Mayall, 2006; Tsui, 2003, 2005).
Number of years teaching,
however, does not guarantee expertise as a teacher. Some experienced
teachers may be considered expert, while others remain “experienced
non-experts†(Tsui, 2003,). While little research has been done on
expertise in teaching ESL, programs have used a combination of more than
5 years of teaching experience, recognition from administrators, and
high student achievement to identify their own expert ESL teachers
(Tsui, 2003). In practice, the consideration that an experienced teacher
is an expert may be subjective and arbitrary, and not all stakeholders
may share this view. In addition, teachers’ beliefs about expert
instruction do not always match their own instructional practices. For
example, Farrell and Lim (2005) examined the beliefs of two experienced
teachers and discovered some discrepancy between what the teachers said
they did in the classroom and what they actually did. Both teachers were
observed to be using a teacher-centered, traditional approach in the
classroom, although both reported employing student-centered strategies.
Studies have shown that experienced teachers share many attributes
that distinguish them from novice teachers. Bastick (2002) found that
experienced teachers were less extrinsically motivated (e.g., motivated
by salary) and significantly more intrinsically motivated (e.g.,
motivated by the emotional rewards of working with children) than were
novice teacher trainees. Similarly, Bivona’s (2002) studied of K–12
teachers’ attitudes found that teachers with more than 10 years of
experience had more positive attitudes toward teaching than did less
experienced teachers. In addition, Martin, Yin, and Mayall (2006) found
that experienced teachers managed their classrooms more effectively than
less experienced teachers. They took more control than did novice
teachers in establishing classroom routines and monitoring group work
and were less controlling and reactive in dealing with individual
student behavior. Similarly, Gatbonton (2008) found that experienced
teachers were more concerned with ensuring that learning was taking
place and less concerned about students’ negative reactions to class
activities or to the learning process.
