Teacher Cognition Essay

Chapter 1: Introduction

1.1 Overview

For three decades, significant contributions to uncovering the effects of teachers’ cognitions to teaching practices have been widely made which represents an attempt to holistically and systematically look at intellectual changes while learning to teach (Borg, 2003, 2006, 2009). For instance, it has been already acknowledged that novice teachers come to the teaching situation with ideas, perceptions, thoughts, and beliefs, previously constructed by learning experiences, pre-service training, and contextual factors which influence their behaviors, decision making, and classroom practices (Burns, 1996; Hung, 2011; Johnson, 1994; Nishino, 2012; Pajares, 1992; Phipps & Borg, 2007; Woods, 1996). Furthermore,

Accordingly, the effect of teachers’ beliefs and perceptions on their teaching and practices have been extensively investigated and studied from different perspectives under a bigger umbrella term “teacher cognition” (Borg, 2003; p. 81). To consider some related works, Phipps and Borg (2007) concluded that the cognition developed by the novice teachers may be resistant to change and exert a persistent long-term influence on teachers’ instructional practices which is in line with Pajares’ assertion (1992), that "beliefs are formed early and tend to self-perpetuate" (p. 324). In addition, the influence of previous experience on teachers’ behavior (Richardson, 1996); teachers’ beliefs about teaching on their pedagogical decisions (Johnson, 1994), and practice on beliefs (Richardson, 1996) have been studied which indicate a direct connection between their cognition and action that is conducive to likewise performance. This connection implies the necessity of congruency between beliefs, experience and action which are in constant interaction with each other (Freeman & Richardson, 1996). However, if this connection is distorted by any means, it may give rise to frustration and negative feelings in teacher education courses (Galman, 2009), and even tensions in classroom practices

Despite some of the beneficial effects of the methods on language teaching and teachers which Rodgers and Emeritus (2001) considered it as the powerful concept, there are also numerous attacks on this concept and it has been under criticism for a long time for ignoring the complex realities of teaching (Baily, 1980; Davis, 1999; Feyerabend, 1988; Stern, 1983). In these contexts, teachers are like robots who simply implement curricula designed by others, in an unthinking manner, and ignore their decisions and cognition during teaching which created a new focus (teachers’ cognition and mental lives) for educational researchers that viewed teachers “not as mechanical implementers of external prescriptions, but as active, thinking decision-makers” (Borg, 2009, p. 2). When students enter teacher education programs, they already have definite ideas about teaching and learning (Zeichner & Liston, 1987) and methodological prescription put these preformed conceptions at risk of rejection. A number of reasons have been advanced for the formation of this inconsistency between beliefs and practice. For instance, lack of knowledge and skills to implement ideal teaching models or teaching methods could the