TEACHER’S ATTITUDES TOWARD EFL IN GUJARAT, INDIA

Abstract

English as an International language (EIL) has captured attention of many linguistics research topics and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) education for many years. It is a fact that majority of the English language users in the world are non-native speakers known as NNS. Many studies have been conducted on how to teach English as an international or foreign language. EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teachers’ and learners’ attitude towards EIL calls for prime focus in countries such as India, which is divided into rural and urban areas. The English language education in India is dominated by male community. In this developing country, women are acquiring good position in the language education field. However, India has a strong social, caste and creed system; hence women from different strata may not be gaining equal an opportunity at language teaching level. Women are having good opportunity for teaching in metro cities; however, the picture in rural India is different although the situation is gradually changing. The social, caste and creed system has a strong impact in rural India. The society is divided into caste categories like SC, ST, SEBC and Open/General; hence it is very interesting to study the English language education from both social and geographical context. The researcher has endeavored to study the attitude of English language teachers towards the English language education in India. Attempts have been made to focus on the relative importance of attitude towards English language factors in Indian education. It also investigates the impacts of gender, educational qualification, residential area, area of institute and category on the attitude of English language teachers towards the English language education in India. It has been attempted to study the attitude of English language teachers towards the English language education in Gujarat, India from 8 different components: Reading, Writing, Pronunciation, Speaking, Listening, Grammar, Error Correction, and Text Book. The researcher has also tried to study the interactive effect of gender, educational qualification, residential area, area of institute and category on the attitude of English language teachers towards the English language education in Gujarat, India. A questionnaire on attitude towards English language was developed for the study. The questionnaire is based on a three-point scale. The impact of various variables like gender, educational qualification, the residential area, area of institute and category on the attitude of English language teachers towards the English language education in India has been studied with the aid of ANOVA.