Teacher Trainer Talk, Early-career Teachers, and Feedback Sessions 

Teacher Trainer Talk, Early-career Teachers, and Feedback Sessions by Amir Esmaeili

A while ago, I was observing a budding teacher trainer giving feedback to an early-career teacher, which proved to be rather insightful. The session lasted for half an hour, the atmosphere was cordial, and the interaction appeared smooth. Yet, the intended message the trainer hoped to impart was not received due to the problem I call: ‘Teacher Trainer Talk’. Now allow me to elaborate a bit further.

What I mean by teacher trainer talk is not the amount of time a trainer speaks compared to that of a teacher. Let us define it ‘’as the use of certain terminology and feedback types which overlook the stage of development where a teacher finds themself (i.e. early-career teacher vs. seasoned teacher)’’. Effective trainer talk is graded without overly complicated components making it inaccessible to the recipient. 

While such language teaching discourse is essential for all teacher trainers, feedback recipients may not be familiar with it all and hence not benefit from the session as much. Such unnecessary (over)use of jargon could hinder the effectiveness of a feedback session and/or leave the teacher feeling inadequate.

I humbly offer three suggestions for feedback sessions to yield an optimal result:

1. Methodology

Once again, I should underscore the significance of pedagogic knowledge for practitioners and its necessity for trainers. That said, some early-career teachers may be incognizant of a few established methodologies. If a trainer wishes to inquire about or dive into a certain methodology in a feedback session, its premises and purposes should be clarified in unadorned language.  

An early-career teacher, for example, may fail to fully grasp what a trainer means by activating learners’ schema in a warm-up stage. Instead, the trainer may reword this as follows:

‘‘It is often a good idea to learn about learners’ former experience with a topic/lesson and build up on it in the beginning stage.’’ 

2. Terminology

I believe terminology should be reduced to a minimum in feedback sessions. Comments A below would likely have a more significant impact than comments B:

A: It was great to repeat Sarah’s sentence in the correct form. 

B: It was great to recast Sarah’s error.

A: Lovely to see you guide students to discover the grammar point.

B: Lovely to see you teach grammar implicitly.

3. Variety

There must be a healthy balance between the types of feedback trainers provide (Hattie, 2012). If early-career teachers receive a barrage of facilitative feedback: when the trainer asks questions to prompt the teacher to reflect (Gebhard, 1990), they might feel overwhelmed and incompetent. By the same token, seasoned practitioners might feel slighted if directive feedback (instructions on what the teacher should do to improve) dominates the session (Wallace, 1991). 

To exemplify, comment A (directive feedback) would likely produce more favorable results for early-career teachers, whereas comment B (facilitative feedback) may work better for more experienced ones:

A: I think it would be better not to correct students’ errors in the later speaking activity quite frequently and let them experiment with the new grammar. 

B: How do you think you could maintain the flow of the interaction among your students in the free(r) practice speaking activity? 

Conclusion

In conclusion, early-career teachers need not be fully aware of the details of a particular methodology they normally employ to deliver a decent lesson; nor do they have to cling to one! They should not be obliged to know whether they taught the grammar explicitly or implicitly in a feedback session, and trainers ought to strike a balance between the types of feedback they provide. 

Once early-career teachers have amassed some experience under their belt, such use of metalanguage and language teaching discourse may be utilized in feedback sessions to motivate early-career teachers to develop more professionally. If trainers would like to raise early-career teachers’ awareness of such matters, they are best dealt with during in-house training sessions. Teacher trainer talk should be kept simple and pragmatic to bear delicious fruit.

References

Gebhard, J. G. (1990). Interaction in a teaching practicum. In J. C. Richards & D.
Nunan (Eds.), Second language teacher education. New York: Cambridge
University Press.

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible Learning for Teachers: Maximizing Impact on Learning. London: Routledge.

Wallace, M. J. (1991). Training foreign language teachers: A reflective approach.
New York: Cambridge University Press.