Browsing by Subject "language proficiency"

Objectives. During the past ten years, there has been some studies about the Finns’ language proficiency and how they perceive English language (EF EPI, 2019; Eurobarometer, 2012; Grasz & Schlabach, 2011; Leppänen ym., 2009; Niemi & Ruuskanen, 2018; Virtanen, 2019). However, these studies have not studied these topics from one occupation’s point of view. The research aims to describe, analyse and interpret the class teachers’ perceptions of their language proficiency and of English language. In addition, the results of the study were compared to the previous studies (Leppänen ym., 2009; Niemi & Ruuskanen, 2018; Virtanen, 2019), and the answers of the less experienced class teachers and the more experienced teachers were compared to each other. Methods. The study was carried out as a qualitative survey research. The data was collected from the questionnaire, in which 32 class teachers answered. Other studies’ indicators were adapted in the questionnaire, and it had both open-ended and close-ended questions. A classification was used as the method of the data analysis. The data was sorted adequately depending on the question type, and in a way that it was comparable to the results of the previous studies. Results. The class teachers told that they know many foreign languages. The class teachers’ most proficient language was English, as almost everyone rated their proficiency as good or excellent. The less experienced class teachers rated their level of English and Spanish higher than the more experienced teachers, whereas the more experienced teachers rated their level of Swedish and German higher than the less experienced teachers. According to the answers, the class teachers perceived English language mainly positively and thought that the knowledge of English is an important skill to have. There were some differences found between the less experienced class teachers and the more experienced ones. It seemed that the more experienced teachers perceived English a little bit more negatively than the less experienced ones. The class teachers’ expectations of their own competence, in this case of their language proficiency, was at the high level. In addition, they thought that the knowledge of English and other foreign languages was an important skill to have. According to the expectancy-value theory (Eccles, 1983, as cited in Viljaranta, 2017, it can be said that the class teachers are committed to the ongoing or future task of early language teaching.