Conference Agenda

The teaching practicum is a psychologically demanding period of professional growth, requiring preservice teachers to meet expectations from students, mentor teachers, school administrators, and university supervisors within a compressed timeframe. Some exit the practicum with higher self-efficacy than when they began, while others experience the opposite outcome. Since self-efficacy beliefs tend to be established early in one's career and remain stable and resistant to change thereafter (Bandura, 1997), it is crucial to view the practicum as a foundation for developing these beliefs. However, in the context of EFL preservice teachers in East Asia, there is a dearth of research examining the impact of the practicum on their self-efficacy and exploring the cognitive processing of their experiences during this period (Hoang & Wyatt, 2021). The present mixed-methods study is an attempt to fill this gap.

Participants were 18 students enrolled in a teacher preparation program at a Japanese university. They all experienced a three-week teaching practicum at the high schools they graduated from. Quantitative data were collected using a 12-item questionnaire before and after the practicum, while qualitative data were gathered through class observations, diaries, and semi-structured interviews. The results of paired samples t-tests indicated that, on average, participants’ levels of self-efficacy increased, particularly in the subscale of classroom management. The findings of qualitative analysis revealed that participants with lower self-efficacy and higher stress experienced pressure from students and mentor teachers to teach “correct” English and speak like “native speakers.” In contrast, individuals with linguistically and culturally diverse backgrounds and experiences demonstrated resilience to such pressure, exhibiting high levels of self-efficacy. It is suggested that preservice teacher preparation programs should be tailored to engage future educators in fostering a multilingual perspective and equipping them with the ability to implement it effectively in actual classrooms, thereby enhancing their overall self-efficacy.

Policy implementation (PI) is a phenomenon plagued with complexity and ambiguity. PI is complex because its success depends on the organization and cooperation between different resources (human and nonhuman). PI is ambiguous because operationalization depends on the policy's interpretation by those charged with putting it into practice. Focusing on the understanding of policy (Yanow, 2000) and those interpreting (Johnson & Johnson, 2015) have been the focus of PI frameworks. Still, these frameworks could be misinterpreted by placing the responsibility on the individual. Though the individual enacts the policy, it is the system in which the individual exists that should be the focus of PI frameworks. This presentation explores this point by demonstrating how Social Systems Theory (Luhmann, 2012) highlights PI complexity and ambiguity through the experiences of those involved (Barkhuizen, 2016). The policy of focus is U.S. state English as a Second Language teaching standards, with the system being an accredited teaching preparatory curriculum. Through the experiences of the curriculum coordinator and instructors, breakdown points are identified that result in a lack of confidence to meet such standards by teacher candidates who have completed their training. These breakdown points are found when there is a misalignment between expected and perceived role and role responsibility, highlighted by the onto-epistemological combination of social systems theory and short story narrative inquiry. This presentation could be helpful for program coordinators, administrators, and those seeking a framework to understand policy implementation.

This study investigates the role of teachers' agency in shaping policies for integrating AI in classroom teaching. With the emergence of generative AI tools like ChatGPT, the use of AI tools in education has become a critical element of language in education policy. In the context of China, both the Ministry of Education and individual schools provide guidelines for AI's involvement in the classroom. Therefore, the agency of individual teachers is of paramount importance in determining the extent to which AI is incorporated into the classroom teaching process. Through semi-structured interviews with eight teachers, each of whom has varying degrees of experience in utilizing AI tools in their classroom instruction, this research employs teachers' agency theory as an analytical framework. The findings reveal that due to the absence of national and organizational-level language policies, language policies regarding the use of AI in education are primarily shaped from the bottom up. In this process, teachers' agency plays a pivotal role in determining the role AI plays in the classroom teaching process. Our study contributes in several ways: First, it establishes four distinct types of teachers' agency that influence the formation of AI classroom policies, exploring how AI can assist teachers in completing instructional tasks, serve as a mediator in multilingual contexts. Second, as generative AI rapidly integrates into classroom teaching, the study underscores the responsibility of teachers to ensure the equitable use of AI, with particular attention to disadvantaged student groups. Third, concerning students' interactions with AI, the study recommends that teachers establish context-specific restrictions to ensure that AI does not supplant essential teaching tasks. Lastly, in assessing the extent of AI's participation in student outcomes and ensuring that students apply AI in alignment with teachers' expectations, the study highlights the heightened demands on teachers' technological proficiency and digital literacy.