World Language Teachers' Perceptions of Efficacy in the Modern, Communicative Classroom

Approaches to second language pedagogy have evolved from their earlier iterations. Methods that once focused purely on the translation of a document from its original language into the student’s own have been replaced by communicative approaches that require students to produce the language (ACTFL, 2014b). To that end, world language teachers must create an environment in which the second language is used as much as possible (ACTFL, 2014b). Creating the environments necessary for the acquisition of language (Aljohani, 2017) depends on teachers’ beliefs about themselves (Cooke & Faez, 2019) and the pedagogical approaches they find valuable (Brown, 2009).

Through the lens of social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1991) and with a particular focus on self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977), this qualitative, phenomenological inquiry (Moustakas, 1994b) investigated world language teachers’ unique perceptions of efficacy. The study sought to elucidate the life world of five in-service world language teachers of varying backgrounds and experiences through surveys and one-to-one interviews, toward a better understanding of their perceptions of efficacy in communicative classroom spaces.

The findings revealed four themes and nine sub-themes across the shared phenomenon of world language teacher efficacy. Data revealed that second language teachers see themselves as effective because of their content knowledge, pedagogical approaches, and their ability to create student-centered and intentionally communicative spaces. However, teachers also experienced negative influences on their perceptions of efficacy due to professional limitations or because of the anxiety that they experienced when they compared themselves to their professional peers.