[Plenary speech] Professional development of novice English language teachers within regional teaching research community: Exploratory practices in Putuo District, Shanghai

This study is about a regional training program for novice primary EFL teachers in Shanghai. The program consists a training mode of compulsory and optional courses which are designed according to the professional development needs of the participants. For the feasibility and benefit of training, diverse methods and contents are applied to increase the teachers’ interest and participation. The program also embodies both in the process and the final assessments to test the effectiveness of the training. This program is proved to be effective since most teachers have acquired a systematic cognition and skills required for daily teaching after training. They become more confident in adapting themselves to the role of teachers. However, the study also finds that the program needs to be optimized because of the increasing gap between the novice teachers from different schools and the declining trend of the teachers’ subject matter knowledge.