Nuestra Posición paradigmática al investigar

All four teachers’ decisions on how to use communication-based textbooks in their classes are likely to have been framed by the availability heuristic. Firstly, as argued in cross-case finding Nr. 6, the participating teachers taught in accordance with the teaching model they were exposed to during their formative years. It is argued in the following paragraphs that teachers’ practices based on their own learning experience have the potential to turn into a cognitive bias.

It was indicated in section 3.3.3 that the majority of Albanian EFL teachers enter their classrooms without adequate academic and teaching preparation. This seems to be the case of the teachers participating in this study too. Indeed, Miss Elona reported that she did not have clear ideas and

criteria for judging “good teaching” [Source: IR] when she first became a teacher. Miss Evis made the

same claim. Without adequate preparation to tackle the profession of teaching, the participating teachers in this research were left with only their own experiences as L2 learners. Therefore, when they first entered their classrooms, they most likely approached the teaching in the same way their L2 teachers did. With the passing of years, as the participants were given limited opportunities to participate in teacher development events that can challenge their teaching models based on their learning experiences, the four teachers are likely to have practised continually in their classes the

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same teaching behaviours rooted in their L2 learning experiences. Therefore, the teaching behaviours the teachers were exposed to as learners, with the passing of years, after being used continually in the classroom, are likely to have become frequently occurring teaching patterns for the four participants.

As seen in section 2.2.2, frequently occurring events are likely to turn into a cognitive bias because decision makers tend to think of situations or occurrences easily brought to mind as more important than instances of less frequent classes. Consequently, the teaching events the participating teachers are familiar with, which are largely based on teachers’ learning experiences, are likely to become automatic decisions made without any formal reasoning.

Nevertheless, since there is no single theory that explains how intuition and reasoning interface with each other, and what determines the dominance of either rational or non-conscious systems, the above interpretation should be treated as a potential description, awaiting replication, of how the complex process of teacher decision making works.

Decisions on how to use communication-based textbooks in their classes seem also to have been framed by the representativeness heuristic. As seen above, Miss Elona maintained that she focused on accuracy rather than on fluency in her classes because:

1) [The students] have never studied the language properly, they (pause) lack the words and

the grammar to keep the conversation going [Source: IR];

2) Students need to memorise some ready-to-use language to be communicative in English. She believes this is an approach that works since this is the way she learned English herself.

Miss Landa followed a teacher-centred approach that sought to help students get the rules stuck in

their heads [Source: IR] because:

Classroom learning should be provided by the one who has the knowledge and understanding of the subject.

Miss Landa stated that she was first exposed to this teaching approach when she attended Mr Dhimiter’s (her secondary school English teacher) classes.

Both teachers seem to be using a teaching approach that helped them to learn English, assuming that the probabilities that this teaching approach will be successful with their students are similar. This is a typical example of the representativeness heuristic (Khaneman and Tversky, 1986). As seen in section 2.2.2, deciding on how likely something is by evaluating the degree to which an

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event or object is similar to its parent population can be misleading because, as Miss Landa explains in the following extract, L2 learners have changed with the passing of years.

Twenty five years ago, we were isolated in Albania, you remember, right? And there was no internet, so there was no real need to practise the spoken English. Nowadays (pause), many students go abroad to study, work, or immigrate. So, we (pause) need to prepare them for the real speaking that takes place out there, in the real world [Source: IR].

Therefore, it can be concluded that the knowledge the two teachers possess about their students is influenced to a great degree by the assumptions the teachers hold about how students learn. As a result, teachers’ decisions on how to use the textbook in their classes are likely to have been framed by the teachers’ tendency to edit the number of choices available to them to accommodate their own understanding and experiences (Khaneman and Tversky, 1986).

Lastly, three teachers (Miss Elona, Miss Evis, and Miss Landa) who avoided or made little use of pair/group work in their classes claimed that they had already tried this approach in their classes, and had found it problematic for different reasons. By contrast, Miss Ada who used pair/group interaction to a great extent in her classes never talked about having had bad experiences with this approach during any stage of her teaching career. One explanation for the avoidance of certain teaching behaviours (in this case the use of pair/group work) might be offered by Kahneman’s (2000; 2011) Intuition in Decision-making Theory. The theory claims that most decisions are based on the impressions, intentions, and feelings of decision makers. If the three teachers associated the use of pair/group work with unpleasant memories from the past, they would be less likely to select this interaction mode as a decision choice to minimise the likelihood of negative outcomes.

In concluding, there is enough empirical evidence to suggest that availability and representativeness, as well as teachers’ impressions, intentions, and feelings, can frame the teacher-decision making process.