Second Language Learning Experience as a Contributor to the Professional Knowledge and Beliefs of Teachers of ESOL to Adults

Abstract

There is no requirement, in English-speaking countries where English is taught as a second language to adult immigrants, for teachers of ESL to have any proficiency in a second language (Ellis, 2004). Where English is taught as a foreign language (EFL), there is usually no requirement that native-speaker teachers have proficiency in the language(s) of the country or in any other. Although recent research has focused on the benefits that bilingual, nonnative teachers have in their own countries over imported native speakers, the question of whether all ESOL teachers need familiarity with another language has barely entered the fray. I argue here that the L2 experience of ESOL teachers has been insufficiently theorized, and the consequences of such experience, or the lack of it, have not yet entered debates about teacher education. Here I shall use ESOL to include both EFL and ESL teaching, and I shall confine my arguments to the adult sector.