Teacher intuition and teacher development: An EFL teacher's autoethnography

Xiaomei Sun
China Foreign Affairs University, China

By telling autoethnographic stories, the author reflects upon her 16 years of EFL teaching and four years of MSc TESOL and PhD Education studies. Teacher intuition has played an important role in guiding her to make pedagogical decisions and judgments. Several teaching activities and designs are presented to demonstrate how the author followed her intuition and achieved 'successes' in her professional development. From unconsciously drawing on teacher intuition to consciously using the term to empower peer teachers; from making attempts to theorise her teaching practice to realising the superficiality of the complication, the author experienced transformative changes in her perceptions of teacher intuition. She came to realise that teacher intuition draws on theoretical knowledge but goes beyond it. Considering the potential value and unrecognised status of teacher intuition in language teacher education, it is advocated that teacher intuition be incorporated into teacher education as a contributing factor to teacher development..
[ PDF full text for this article ]

Author: Dr Xiaomei Sun is a lecturer in the Department of English and International Studies, China Foreign Affairs University, Beijing, China. Her research interests include extensive reading in L2, children's literature, and English teacher training and development. Her recent research appears in Language Teaching Research, TESOL Journal, The Language Learning Journal, and Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6806-8170 Email: sunxiaomei@cfau.edu.cn Please cite as: Sun, X. (2024). Teacher intuition and teacher development: An EFL teacher's autoethnography. Issues in Educational Research, 34(2), 743-759. http://www.iier.org.au/iier34/sun.pdf