Iraqi EFL teachers

This study aims to explore the attitudes and practices of Iraqi EFL teachers regarding formative assessment (FA). A total of 102 teachers from primary school to university filled in the Arabic version of Teachers' Conceptions and Practices of Formative Assessment Questionnaire. The questionnaire was translated from English into Arabic first and was validated using confirmatory factor analysis (Hazim Jawad, 2020). Findings showed that a 7-factor model had acceptable fit indices (GFI=0.90, CFI=0.91, RMSEA=0.05). Descriptive statistics were used to explain Iraqi EFL teachers’ attitudes and intentions regarding FA. Findings showed that the majority of Iraqi teachers believe that formative assessment is a useful procedure for measuring students’ learning and is helpful in their education. They also indicated that they have a positive attitude towards FA and are willing to use it. Correlational analysis showed that Affective Attitude, Instrumental Attitude, Subjective Norm, Controllability, and Self-Efficacy were strong predictors of intentions to use formative assessment. However, only Instrumental Attitude had a small significant correlation with the Behavior Scale. In other words, those teachers who believe that FA is useful in improving students learning tend to actually employ FA in their teaching. Findings also showed that female teachers have more positive attitudes towards FA and tend to use it more in their teaching. Implications of the findings for improving English language teaching are discussed.

This article delved into the realm of EFL assessment in Iraq by investigating the beliefs of Iraqi EFL teachers about assessment practices they employed in their classroom and determining whether there was any congruency between their beliefs and actual assessment practices. For this purpose, 140 experienced Iraqi EFL teachers were selected by convenience sampling and the data were collected by the Teachers’ Assessment Practices Belief Questionnaire and the Teachers’ Assessment Practices Questionnaire. The findings of Pearson correlation and descriptive analysis revealed that the cognitive level of assessments (e.g., reasoning and application), types of assessments (e.g., portfolios and concept mapping), and evaluation criteria (e.g., improvement and student effort) were highly valued by the teachers. Regarding assessment practices in the classroom, the participants reported obtaining, elucidating, and responding to learning evidence and assisting students to acquire a positive orientation of learning (making learning explicit). Promoting learning autonomy (an expanded opportunity to assume increased autonomy in defining their learning goals and evaluating both their work and that of their peers) was also found in the teachers’ reports. Besides, an interest in assisting students adhere to performance goals stipulated by the curriculum using careful questioning and assessed by scores and grades (performance orientation). Implications and suggestions of the study are discussed in the article.

In an attempt to explore the status-quo of the teaching styles appealed and adopted by Iraqi EFL teachers, the researchers in the current study selected 120 English language teachers from the context of Iraqi high schools. To gather the data, the researchers made use of Grasha-Riechmann’s (1996) Teaching Styles Questionnaire. The analysis of data mainly through quantitative measures and frequency analysis revealed a clear discrepancy between the teachers’ preferences and practices of teaching styles. More specifically, while the most desired teaching style among the teachers was expert type, and the least preferred one was facilitator type, in real practice of teaching, they made a greater use of personal model style. Furthermore, expert style which was the most favored type was used less frequently than the other styles. However, a go-togetherness was witnessed in the obtained data with regard to facilitator style of teaching which ranked the least based on the teachers’ practices in a manner identical to what was found concerning their preferences. The study findings provide fruitful implications for language teachers in the context of Iraqi high schools, particularly as regards their increased familiarity with the practical teaching styles and their attempts targeted at bridging the gap between their style preferences and practices.