Table Of ContentCAMBRIDGE TEACHER TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT
Series Editors: Marion Williams and Tony Wright
This series is designed for all those involved in language teacher training
and development: teachers in training, trainers, directors of studies,
advisers, teachers of in-service courses and seminars. Its aim is to provide a
comprehensive, organised and authoritative resource for language teacher
training and development.
Teach English - A training course for teachers
by Adrian Doff
Trainer's Handbook
Teacher's Workbook
Models and Metaphors in Language Teacher Training
Loop input and other strategies*
by Tessa Woodward
Training Foreigra Language Teachers - A reflective approach
by Michael,. Wallace
Literature and Language Teaching - A guide for teachers
and trainers·
by Gillian Lazar
Classroom Observation Tasks - A resource book for language
teachers and trainers·
by Ruth Wa;nryb
Tasks for Language Teachers - A resource book for training and
development·
by Martin Parrott
English for the Teacher - A language development course·
by Mary Spratt
Teaching Children English - A training course for teachers of,
English to children·
.;
by David Vale with Anne Feunteun
A Course in Language Teaching' - Practice and theory
by Penny Ur
Looking at Language Classrooms
A teacher development video package
About Language - Tasks for teachers of English
by Scott Thornbury
Action Research for Language Teachers
by Michael J. Wallace
* Original Series Editors: Ruth Gairns and Marion Williams
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Action Research for Language
Teachers
Michael]. Wallace
,',' CAMBRIDGE
UNIVERSITY PRESS
PUBLISHED BY THE PRESS SYNDICATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE
The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge, United Kingdom
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 2RU, UK http://www.cup.cam.ac.uk
40 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011-4211, USA http://www.cup.org
10 Stamford Road, Oakleigh, Melbourne 3166, Australia
© Cambridge University Press 1998
This book is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
aDd to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreemenrs,
no reproduction of any parr may take place withom
the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
Reprinted 1999
Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge
Typeset in Sabon 10V12 pt [eEl
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress cataloguing in publication data
Wallace. Michael J.
Action research for language teachers I Michael J. Wallace.
p. em. - (Cambridge teacher training and development)
Indudes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0 521 554950 (hb). - ISBN 0521 55535 3 (pb)
1. English language Study and teaching Foreign speakers
Research. 2. Language and languages - Study and teaching - Research.
1. Title Il. Series.
PEl128.A2\V228 1997
428' 007'2 - DC21 97-33569
CIP
ISBN 0 521 554950 hardback
ISBN 0 521 55535 3 paperback
For Eileen
Contents
Acknowledgements
X
Thanks xu
Introduction 1
1 Why action research? 4
2 Selecting and developing a topic 20
3 Collecting the data 35
4' Field-notes, logs? i,?uplals, diari,es and personal accounts 54
5 Verbal reports , 76
6 Observation tech,niques: recording and analysing classroom
skills
104
7 Questionnaires and interviews
124 "
8 The case study approach
160
9 Evaluation an'd trialling: teaching materials
181
10 No teacher is an island: some approaches to sharing ideas 207
Concluding remarks 253
Glossary of research terms 255
Suggestions for further reading 262
Bibliography 266
Subject index 270
Author index 272
IX
Acknowledgements
The author and publishers are grateful to the authors, publishers and
others who have given permission for the use of copyright material
identified in the text. While every endeavour has been made, it has not
been possible to identify the sources of all the material used and in such
cases the publishers would welcome information from copyright
owners.
City Polytechnic of Hong Kong for the extract on p. 63 from
'Journaling together: collaborative diary-keeping and teacher develop
ment' by M. N. Brock, B. Yu and M. Wong (1992), in J. Flowerdew,
M. Brock and S. Hsia (Eds) Perspectives on Second Language Teacher
Education; Oxford University Press for the following: the article on
pp. 68-75 'An experiment in role-reversaf: teachers as language lear
ners' by T. Lowe, ELT Journal 41 (2), © 1987; the article on
pp. 92-103 'Six writers in searchof texts: A protocol-based study of Ll
and L2 writing' by V. Arndt, ELT Journal 41 (4); © 1987; the extracts
on pp. 139-141 and pp. 143-145 from 'Language development pro-·
vision in teacher training curricula' by C. Murdoch, ELT Journal 48
(3), © 1994; the article on pp. 153-159 'Learner strategies and learner
interviews' by E. Pearson, ELT]ournal42 (3), © 1988; the article on
pp. 172-180 'Developing a course strategy for learner autonomy' by
S. Cotterall, ELT Journal 49 (3), 1995; the article on pp. 195-206
'Survey review: two series of Business English materials' by B. Reed and
S. Nolan, ELT Journal 48 (1), © 1994, all by permission of Oxford
University Press; Cambridge University Press for· the extract on
pp. 121-123 from Teaching Talk: Strategies for Production and Assess
ment by G. Brown, A. Anderson, R. Shilkock and G. Yule (1984) and
the extract on pp. 220~221 from Language Teaching; The international
abstracting journal for language teachers ana applied linguists, 28 (4)',
1995; British Education Index for extract (a) and ERIC Document
Reproduction Service for extract (b) on p. 219; Multilingual Matters
Ltd. for the extracts on pp. 224-225 from Introspection in Second
Language Research edited by C. Faerch and G. Kasper (1987); the
artide on pp. 243-250 'Research Update on Teaching L2 Listening' by
R. L Oxford, System 21 (2), 1993, is reprinted by permission of
x
