Advantages and Disadvantages of Native‐ and Nonnative‐English‐speaking Teachers: Student Perceptions in Hong Kong

Abstract

The Native English Teachers (NETs) Scheme has been in place for over 20 years in secondary schools in Hong Kong and yet how students perceive these teachers is under-researched. This article reports a study which analyses student perceptions of the advantage and disadvantages of learning English from NETs and their non-native counterparts, local English teachers (LETs). Data were collected through semi-structured group interviews with 30 secondary students studying in three different schools in Hong Kong. Content data analysis was conducted, and main themes that emerged from interview transcripts were categorised. Results show that the perceived advantages of LETs include their proficiency in students' L1, their knowledge of students' learning difficulties, the ease students experience in understanding their teaching, and in communication. The perceived advantages of NETs are their good English proficiency and ability to facilitate student learning. The disadvantages of one category of teachers appear to be the reverse of the advantages of another. Data also show that some students experience anxiety when encountering NETs and tend to prefer certain teaching styles. This study has significant implications for classroom teaching practice and teacher professional development.A lthough there is a lack of substantial evidence to support the position that native-English-speaking teachers (NESTs) are better teachers, they enjoy a privileged and dominant position in English language teaching (ELT; ). The native speaker fallacy (Phillipson, 1992)-the belief that native speakers are ideal teachers-has resulted in nonnative-English-speaking teachers (NNESTs) being considered second-class citizens in the field of TESOL (Ellis, 2002;Rajagopalan, 2005). Incidents of students having concerns about being taught by a nonnative speaker are also evident

Decoding the Myths of the Native and Non-Native English Speakers Teachers (NESTs & NNESTs) on Saudi EFL Tertiary Students

“…Saudi EFL university students showed acceptance of the teachers with familiar accents, which are the native accents and the accents of the teachers sharing their L1, and reject any other accents. This finding supports the existing literature which indicates that students are more motivated and open to learning with teachers speaking with native accents (Butler, 2007;Kelch & Santana-Williamson, 2002;Ma & Ping, 2012;Moussu, 2006).…”

“…A study conducted by Beckett and Stiefvater (2009), in which 15 students were observed and interviewed, stated that students enjoyed being taught by NNESTs, especially ones who shared their cultural background and were more aware of their needs. According to a study in Hong Kong by Ma and Ping (2012), the interviews show that NNESTs can be more sensitive to students' learning problems and better anticipate their learning difficulties. Furthermore, survey questionnaires have indicated that NNESTs are good learner models, are more informative about the language, can use effective teaching strategies, and can predict learners' language difficulties (Moussu, 2010).…”

“…Kim (2009) also indicates that NNESTs provide less feedback to the students on specific grammatical areas. Whereas, NESTs sometimes depend on their grammatical intuition in teaching grammar, which cannot be relied on in all cases (Ma & Ping, 2012).…”

“…NESTs usually emphasize language fluency rather than accuracy, which explains their use of interactive activities that develop students' communicative competence (Alseweed & Daif-Allah, 2012). Furthermore, students might lack motivation in speaking English with their NNESTs (Ma & Ping, 2012). Finally, Mahmud and Ching (2012) stated that the more comprehensible the teacher's language, the more preferred the teacher is by students.…”

“…Studies have shown the majority of English language teachers are non-native speakers (Arvizu, 2014;Alseweed, 2012). Moreover, according to Medgyes (1999), the number of non-native English speakers is more than native speakers studying in EFL TESOL programs (cited in Moussu & Llurda, 2008) (Alseweed, 2012;Ma & Ping, 2012;Walkinshaw & Oanh, 2014). In addition, according to Beckett and Stiefvater (2009), students enjoy learning from NNESTs in courses like presentation skills, mathematics, engineering, and business, especially from NNESTs who share their cultural background.…”