Standards of Foreign Language Teachers’ Professional Training: Prospects and Foreign Experience

Abstract

Abstract The article deals with an urgent issue of necessity to enhance professional training of future foreign language teachers. It has been substantiated that the only way to assess its quality is to use a set of professional standards. Theoretical substantiation of the standards elaborated by TESOL, as well as their step-by-step process of elaboration, have been studied. These standards served as a model for developing standards of foreign language teachers’ professional training in other countries. On their basis the standards of foreign language teachers’ professional training, as well as indicators of teachers’ performance for each of them, have been formulated as a role model for other countries which pay special attention to foreign language teachers’ training. The main difficulties of the standards implementation have been defined, as well as their possible solutions. One of the most urgent issues raised in the article is the necessity to elaborate a detailed system for assessing teachers’ correspondence to the standards and to adjust the existing training programs to them. Conclusions about productivity and efficiency of the conducted research can only be made after the standards approbation throughout the complete foreign language teachers’ training program that is 4-6 years (depending on the degree - Bachelor or Master). Still, at this stage of our research it is quite clear that one of the possible solutions to the problem of the necessity to elaborate a detailed system for assessing teachers’ correspondence to the standards and to adjust the existing training programs to them is involvement of stakeholders of different levels to elaboration of the standards (from future teachers to educational authorities). The practical value of the presented material is that it can be used by other countries for elaborating their own national standards.