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Abstract

This article reports a multiple case study that explores the potential impact of Japan’s national curriculum for senior high school English as a foreign language (EFL), specifically in relation to the integration of grammar teaching with communicative work, a key component of the curriculum and an area globally underresearched in high schools. The beliefs and practices of four Japanese EFL teachers from different public and private high schools were investigated over a 16-month period. Quantitative data were collected from four classroom observations, while qualitative data were gathered through a preliminary beliefs questionnaire, 10 teacher journals, and postobservation and semistructured interviews. Extending the EFL literature to date, this article draws on the theory of planned behavior as an analytical framework to reveal a complex interrelationship between the various attitudinal, social, and contextual factors that would both obstruct and facilitate teachers’ integration of grammar teaching with communicative work. Importantly, the findings also bring to light a number of concrete ways in which some teachers manage severe social and other contextual pressures to successfully achieve integration, despite the influence of university entrance examinations that emphasize reading.

Keywords

language teaching EFL national curriculum teacher education education theory and practice

Introduction

The research reported in this article focuses on teachers’ integration of grammar teaching with communicative work, a key component in Japan’s national curriculum for English as a foreign language (EFL). With the exception of a small number of studies in Japan (i.e., Nishimuro & Borg, 2013; Underwood, 2012a) and internationally (Pahissa & Tragant, 2009; Sanchez & Borg, 2014), teacher beliefs and practices regarding grammar teaching is an area of communicative language teaching (CLT) that continues to remain underresearched in the senior high school context. As there is a tendency for EFL teachers in Asia to consider grammar teaching and CLT as dichotomous (Littlewood, 2007), more research into the factors that can both facilitate and obstruct attempts to integrate grammar teaching with communicative work would clearly be of benefit to practitioners as well as curriculum planners and teacher trainers. This is especially important in the senior high school context where teachers widely consider grammar teaching as central to preparation for university entrance examinations. A further and significant gap in the research that this study aims to address is the need to work toward a more coherent understanding of how teacher beliefs about the various factors they report operate as an interrelated system (Nishimuro & Borg, 2013). To this end, the current research draws on the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 2005) from the field of social psychology as an analytical framework and represents the first in-depth study of EFL teacher beliefs and practices that has applied this theory to explore a national curriculum’s impact prior to its actual enactment.

The study responds to three main research questions:

Research Question 1: In what ways have Japanese teachers of EFL been able to implement specific communicative components of the previous senior high school curriculum that correspond with those of the new curriculum?

Research Question 2: What attitudinal, social, and context-related factors would influence their integration of grammar teaching with communicative work under the new curriculum that now strongly emphasizes this approach?

Research Question 3: How might teacher beliefs about the various factors they report operate as an integrated system in facilitating or obstructing implementation of the new curriculum?

Background

Factors Impacting CLT and Grammar Teaching in Senior High Schools Globally

The advancement of English as a global lingua franca has had a widespread influence on educational policy for the teaching of EFL in secondary education with national curriculum guidelines in many countries now embodying CLT approaches (e.g., Argentina, Chile, China, Greece, Italy, Iran, Japan, Libya, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, and Zimbabwe). CLT emphasizes learning language first and foremost for the purpose of communicating with others. It emphasizes student-centered learning and face-to-face speaking activities, though as Savignon (2007) noted students may also engage in reading and writing activities that involve “the interpretation, expression, and negotiation of meaning” (p. 213).

In recent years, there has been mounting agreement that students who are learning language for communicative purposes can benefit from explicit teaching in grammatical forms within the context of communicative work. As such, a wide range of methodological options for teaching grammar have been put forward (see Nassaji & Fotos, 2011, for an extensive discussion), such as deductive and inductive approaches, planned and incidental focus on form (Doughty & Williams, 1998), and ways of encouraging noticing, comparing, and integrating target grammar (Ellis, 2002). The role that translation skills may have as a useful resource for both learning a language and using it to communicate has also attracted some attention in recent literature (Masuda, 2017). Yet, despite the diversity that CLT embodies, as Littlewood (2007) observed, a pervasive misconception among Asian EFL teachers is that “CLT means not teaching grammar and that CLT means teaching only speaking” (p. 246). Furthermore, while senior high school teachers in Japan and many parts of the world have reported favorable attitudes toward CLT as a general approach (e.g., J. Huang, 2006; Nishino, 2012; Ozsevik, 2010) and, in the few studies conducted, the integration of grammar teaching with communicative work (i.e., Pahissa & Tragant, 2009; Underwood, 2012a), they also report actual implementation to be a formidable challenge due to various factors operating at the national level and locally within their schools.

A major issue that is often reported concerns the misalignment between national curriculums that advocate communicative approaches and the content of high-stakes examinations, which typically emphasize grammar, vocabulary, and reading questions. Under these circumstances, many teachers report structural, transmission-based approaches to be the most efficient and effective means of preparation (Cook, 2012; Dahmardeh, 2009; Gorsuch, 2000; J. Huang, 2006; Nishimuro & Borg, 2013; Nishino, 2012; Orafi & Borg, 2009; Ozsevik, 2010; Pahissa & Tragant, 2009; Rahman & Karim, 2015; Saito, 2016, 2017; Sakui, 2004; Underwood, 2012a, 2012b). In contrast to CLT, structural, transmission-based approaches (commonly referred to as yakudoku in Japan) are characterized by a focus on the development of reading ability through teacher-led instruction, where grammar is taught deductively (i.e., through explicit explanation) and the translation of written texts from the target language to the first language predominates. A related theme suggested by some studies to reinforce this approach in the Japanese (e.g., Cook, 2009, 2012; Nishimuro & Borg, 2013; Saito, 2017; Underwood, 2012a), Chinese (J. Huang, 2006; L. Huang, 2009), and Libyan contexts (Orafi & Borg, 2009) is the influence of local “cultures of learning” (Cortazzi & Jin, 1996); that is, the established preferences, practices, and conventions that characterize teaching in specific settings, and a resulting social pressure that teachers perceive to be exerted by students, colleagues, and parents. In other studies, there is growing evidence that teachers are willing to experiment with and adapt CLT approaches to their contexts (Hu, 2005; Li & Edwards, 2013; Littlewood, 2007; Pahissa & Tragant, 2009). In a case study of grammar teaching practices in Catalonia, Pahissa and Tragant (2009) reported that one teacher, despite the pressure from a high-stakes examination, may have achieved “some balance in her teaching, where grammar and translation were used along with communicative activities” (p. 57). For this teacher, her experiences as a language learner and an awareness of students’ needs seemed to be an influential factor. Elsewhere, as Li and Edwards’ (2013) study of Chinese teachers recently reported, few senior high school teachers had adopted communicative approaches in contexts where examinations are the focus.

In addition to the pressure perceived to be exerted by entrance examinations and local cultures of learning—and even in its absence, as Humphries (2014) and Humphries and Burns (2015) have observed in Japanese colleges of technology—the literature draws attention to numerous student-related challenges facing the implementation of CLT in senior high schools globally. Such challenges include large class sizes (Hu, 2005; J. Huang, 2006; Mulvey, 2016; Waters & Vilches, 2008), behavioral problems (Humphries, 2014; Littlewood, 2007), low motivation for learning English (Cahn & Barnard, 2009; Humphries, 2014; Humphries & Burns, 2015; Nishimuro & Borg, 2013), and low English proficiency (J. Huang, 2006; Nishimuro & Borg, 2013; Orafi & Borg, 2009; Ozsevik, 2010; Saito, 2016; Sanchez & Borg, 2014). Regarding beliefs and practices about grammar teaching specifically, in Nishimuro and Borg’s (2013) case study in Japan, teachers reported students’ low proficiency and motivation as two of the factors strongly influencing their adoption of structural, transmission-based approaches. Perceptions of student passivity (Kurihara, 2008; Rahman & Karim, 2015; and King, 2013, in the Japanese university context) have also been reported. In Pakistan, the influence of sociocultural norms regarding gender was reported to discourage students from freely participating in the communicative classroom, in spite of their motivation to do so (Ahmad & Sajjad, 2011). The difficulty teachers face in managing such issues may be further compounded by both a poor understanding of CLT, which can arise from inadequate teacher training (Cook, 2012; Hu, 2005; J. Huang, 2006; Humphries, 2014; Humphries & Burns, 2015; Mareva & Mapako, 2012; Orafi & Borg, 2009; Ozsevik, 2010; Sakui, 2004; Waters & Vilches, 2008), and a lack of proficiency or confidence in their own English ability (Hu, 2005; Littlewood, 2007; Orafi & Borg, 2009; Ozsevik, 2010; Saito, 2017).

A further challenge in Uzbekistan (Hasanova & Shadieva, 2008) and the Philippines (Waters & Vilches, 2008) concerns a lack of textbooks and teaching materials. Yet even where state-approved textbooks are readily available, such as in Singapore and Japan, some studies have called into question their role as an intended bridge between national curriculum guidelines and classroom practice due to design and content that are viewed as incompatible with a communicative approach (Glasgow & Paller, 2014; Goh, Zhang, Ng, Hong, & Hua, 2005; Steele & Zhang, 2016). A related factor concerns the extra workload associated with preparing CLT lessons (compared with structural, transmission-based approaches), especially in senior high schools where significant administrative and extracurricular duties are often required (Goh et al., 2005; J. Huang, 2006; O’Donnell, 2005; Ozsevik, 2010; Sato & Kleinsasser, 2004; Underwood, 2012a; Waters & Vilches, 2008). In a study of EFL teacher’s beliefs in Japan (Underwood, 2012a), teachers stressed the need for textbooks that specifically integrate grammar and CLT, one reflecting that preparing such materials themselves would be “too hard to do and . . . consume too much time” (p. 919).

Japan’s New National Curriculum for Senior High School English

The issues identified in the preceding literature illustrate a variety of obstacles facing the implementation of communicative approaches in senior high schools. The overall prevalence of structural, transmission approaches to grammar teaching broadly indicates the difficulties teachers continue to experience in reconciling grammar teaching with the demands of communicative curriculums.

The research reported in this article explores the influence that various attitudinal, social, and contextual factors may have on teacher intentions to integrate grammar teaching with communicative work under Japan’s new national curriculum for senior high schools, the Course of Study 2009 for Foreign Languages: English (MEXT, 2009), which was fully enacted at the senior high school level in April 2013. As with previous national curriculums in Japan, the Course of Study 2009 could best be described in terms of a situational, notional-functional syllabus (Wilkins, 1976), emphasizing the communicative use of language in specific contexts. To this end, the new curriculum further expands the range of Language Functions, such as praising, summarizing, explaining and reporting, and Language-Use Situations in which these are to be applied, such as exchanging emails, shopping, and talking on the phone. Also in keeping with the previous curriculums, it does not attempt to grade or sequence notions, functions, or grammar in terms of difficulty, advising that the teaching of grammatical items (and core vocabulary) is to be incorporated with language functions and language-use situations. In contrast to the previous curriculum, however, the Course of Study 2009 now positions the integration of grammar teaching with communicative work as a central component in the new curriculum that should guide the treatment of all content, providing a stronger explication of the rationale for this approach throughout (see, for example, MEXT, 2009, pp. 42-44). Yet the new curriculum stops short of providing any specific methodological guidance for integrating grammar teaching with communicative work, and due to the absence of research on this key feature of the curriculum, to date the extent to which teachers have understood the government’s proposals remains unclear.

Theoretical Framework

The theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 2005) was selected as the theoretical framework for this study because, as the preceding review of literature indicates, its belief constructs closely reflect the attitudinal (e.g., pervasive misconceptions regarding CLT and grammar teaching), social (e.g., pressure to conform to local cultures of learning), and contextual factors (e.g., high-stakes examinations, student-related factors, and insufficient teacher training) reported to influence CLT implementation in the Japanese and international research contexts. Meta-analyses have shown the theory to be a robust model for explaining and predicting human behavior across a range of fields (Armitage & Conner, 2001).¹ In mainstream education, numerous studies have used this theory to explore curriculum implementation; however, its application in research on CLT implementation is scarce, namely, Gorsuch (2001); J. Huang (2006); J. Huang and Conti (2009); L. Huang (2009); and Undewood (2012a). While these studies have adopted mixed-methods approaches to data collection and analysis, only L. Huang (2009) adopted a classroom observation method to explore the role of examination washback on curriculum implementation intentions. The research reported in this current article is the first to incorporate classroom observations to study the relationship between teachers’ attitudinal, social, and contextual beliefs about integrating grammar teaching with communicative work and their actual teaching behavior.

A schematic representation of the theory of planned behavior is presented in Figure 1.

Figure 1.

A schematic representation of Ajzen’s (2005, p. 126) theory of planned behavior.

The theory posits that volitional human behavior, barring unforeseen circumstances, is directly preceded by intention to engage in that behavior. In the current study, the behavior explored was the integration of grammar teaching with communicative work. The construct of behavioral intention indicates the likelihood of a person engaging in a specific behavior and the degree of effort they are willing to exert to do so. Intention is influenced by three kinds of belief and their respective attributes, which in turn can be informed by a number of general background factors (e.g., personality traits, life values, emotions, race, age, education, media exposure, and experience). Ajzen (2005) acknowledged that identifying specific background factors can offer further insight into a behavior’s determinants. However, he also stresses that studies usually show general background factors to have only an indirect influence on intentions and behavior; for the most part, their influence being mediated by more specific beliefs about the behavior of interest.

The first kind of belief, behavioral beliefs, is personal in nature and formed by associating the behavior with an attribute (e.g., Integrating grammar teaching with communicative work → hinders preparation for examinations). Attitude toward the behavior represents a person’s evaluation of that attribute and can be instrumental (e.g., useful, worthless, and valuable) or experiential (e.g., pleasant, enjoyable, and fun) in nature. Normative beliefs reflect a social influence and arise mainly from the person’s perception that influential others would approve or disapprove of their adopting the behavior. Subjective norm represents the person’s motivation to comply with this perceived social pressure. While such perceptions may be inaccurate, the person nonetheless believes them to be correct and so they contribute toward the formation of intentions and ultimately behavior. The third belief area, control beliefs, concerns contextual factors, such as the skills, resources, and conditions that could facilitate or obstruct the behavior. Perceived behavioral control represents the person’s sense of control over these factors. When intentions are not mediated by attitude and subjective norm, accurate perceived behavioral control has been shown to influence behavior directly (Ajzen, 2005; the broken arrow in Figure 1 indicates this relation).

Method

Participants

This study adopted an instrumental, multiple case study design. Four case participants (Table 1), each teaching in different senior high schools (Grades 10 to 12), where preparation for entrance to higher education is prioritized, were selected purposively on the basis of certain social and informational background factors, namely, the English courses they were teaching, their educational qualifications, teaching experience and seniority, and the public or private status of their school. All participants are Japanese. Two participants (Nana and Takako) were identified through a preliminary study (Underwood, 2012a) and two (Arisa and Nobu) were introduced through a mutual colleague. Informed consent was established with the participants, and permission for research to be conducted at their schools was granted by a vice-principal or principal in each of the institutions.

Table 1.

Participants.

	Nana (Case 1)	Arisa (Case 2)	Takako (Case 3)	Nobu (Case 4)
Gender	Female	Female	Female	Male
Age	Late 20s	Late 20s	Early 40s	Mid-50s
Teaching experience	3 years	6 years	23 years^a	32 years
School type and rank	Private, average	Private, above average	Public, above average	Public, high
Location	Tokyo, central	Tokyo, central	Rural, north-west	Tokyo, central
Qualifications	MA English Education (2009, Japan)	BA English Literature and Education	BA English	MA English Education (1995, Japan)
Other information	Coordinates closely with native English-speaking teachers; voluntary training outside of school	Highly articulate in English; participates in mandatory training	Highly articulate in English; voluntary training outside of school	Head of the Grade 11 English Department; no recent training

Note. Experience at the time of data collection; ranking of schools in Japan is based on the hensachi system (approximately equivalent to a standardized rank score).

Two years in her current school.

Data Collection

The study adopted a sequential, mixed-methods design (Teddlie & Tashakkori, 2009), emphasizing qualitative methods for generating data on teacher beliefs and, in contrast to most research in the Japanese context to date (cf. Taguchi, 2005), integrating a quantitative method for investigating classroom practices. Prior to the enactment of the new curriculum at the senior high school level, data were collected over a 16-month period (May 2011 to August 2012) in the following sequence: (1) a preliminary questionnaire; (2) a 10-week teacher journal study; (3) four classroom observations and postobservation interviews for each teacher; and (4) a semistructured interview.

The preliminary questionnaire

The questionnaire was administered online in Japanese and English via SurveyMonkey.com. Parts 1 and 2 asked participants about their general background information and current teaching practices. Extracts from the new curriculum that related to the integration of grammar teaching with communicative work were then presented along with a hypothetical teaching scenario illustrating how a teacher might integrate grammar teaching with communicative work in an integrated-skills course. This aimed to mitigate any misconceptions regarding the new curriculum’s communicative approach and enhance the validity of the beliefs subsequently elicited. To gain an initial sense of beliefs about the new approach and to facilitate development of the subsequent journal study, Part 3 of the questionnaire presented nine open-response questions about behavioral, normative, and control beliefs. These questions were based on the standard open-response format of theory of planned behavior “elicitation surveys” (Francis et al., 2004). In essence, the areas of enquiry were (a) What advantages/disadvantages do you associate with the new curriculum’s approach? (b) Are there any people who would be supportive/unsupportive of your teaching grammar in this way? (c) What skills, resources, and conditions could facilitate/obstruct your adoption of this approach? Responses were professionally translated into English and to enhance reliability back-translation checks with bilingual colleagues were conducted. Although the categories of analysis for Part 3 were largely predetermined as each of the questions corresponded with one of the three belief areas, in order to further enhance reliability, the categorization of data was verified with the assistance of a colleague.

Teacher journals

Each journal submission was comprised of two parts: (a) A free-topic section, allowing participants to reflect on any aspect of their work and daily experiences, and (b) an assigned topic section to ensure that certain topics were covered (i.e., entrance exams, student goals, the impact of the national curriculum to date on their current teaching, and their views on grammar teaching). Participants were asked to submit one journal weekly by email (10 in total) and to write approximately 900 Japanese characters (about 500 words when translated into English), although they wrote substantially more.² Journal submissions were sent for professional translation into English, back-translation checks with bilingual colleagues were then carried out, and the final English version was sent to the teacher for verification.

Classroom observations

Data collection took place prior to the enactment of the new curriculum. The courses observed were English II (four skills), Reading, and Writing. As with English II, the objectives for both the Reading and Writing courses specified a clear emphasis on the integration of language skills and communication in concrete, language-use situations. Each participant was observed 4 times during one semester (45 to 55 min for each class). The observed courses for each teacher are outlined in Table 2.

Table 2.

Classroom Observations Under the Previous Curriculum.

	Nana	Arisa	Takako	Nobu
Number/type of courses observed	4 × English II (All Grade 11)	2 × Reading 2 × Writing (All Grade 12)	3 × English II 1 × Writing (All Grade 11)	3 × English II 1 × Writing (All Grade 11)

Note. As with the new curriculum, all courses emphasized the integration of language skills and communication in concrete, language-use situations; Grade 11 and 12 refers to the school year (i.e., 17 and 18 year olds).

The study adopted a predominantly structured, deductive approach to observation (Cohen, Manion, & Morrison, 2011), making use of four main categories from the Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching (COLT; Allen, Fröhlich, & Spada, 1984) scheme that corresponded with the communicative orientation of the previous and new national curriculum. These were (a) Content (form- and function-focused teaching, where “form-focused” refers to a structural, transmission-based approach to grammar teaching and “function-focused” to teaching that emphasizes how grammar is used in communicative contexts); (b) Modality (the fours skills and the degree of integration); (c) Student Organization (the use of class, individual, and pair/group-work); and (d) Language Use (teacher and student first, L1, and second, L2, language use). During observations, an event-sampling approach was used to log activities and episodes, and notes were taken on other emergent themes as they occurred (Cohen et al., 2011). Postobservation interviews were conducted to clarify aspects of the observation and broader syllabus and to hear the participants’ interpretation of classroom events.

Semistructured interviews

In the final stage of data collection, semistructured interviews were conducted to provide elaboration, enhancement, and clarification (Greene, Caracelli, & Graham, 1989) of themes that had emerged from the previous methods. As the interviews were carried out in English, each participant was given in advance a personalized list of questions and topics to help them organize their thoughts. However, participants were also informed that they should feel free to raise other topics during the course of the interview. Interviews lasted between approximately 40 and 90 min and were audio recorded and later fully transcribed.

Data Analysis

Qualitative data: Preliminary questionnaire, journals, and semistructured interview

For each of the methods, the analysis of qualitative data was mainly deductive; categorization being largely predetermined by the belief domains of the theory of planned behavior. Analysis was also inductive in that it was responsive to any evidence emerging from the data which was not directly accounted for by the theoretical framework, for example teacher emotion or self-reported practices. Analysis of the questionnaire data involved identifying specific themes under responses to questions about their behavioral, normative, and control beliefs, and a colleague assisted to enhance reliability. For the journals and semistructured interview, there was the additional emphasis on exploring attitude toward the behavior, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control. Prior to analysis, a tentative coding system was developed and, with the same colleague, a sample of journal data was independently analyzed and discussed.

Quantitative data: Classroom observations

The analysis of classroom observation data was comprised of two main stages (a) the kind of activities and episodes observed under the four categories of the adapted COLT scheme (based on field notes) and the duration of these (hours, minutes, and seconds; based on video and audio recordings); and (b) other emergent themes (e.g., episodes of students sleeping and responses to pair work; based on field notes and post hoc analyses of video). Although the adapted COLT scheme comprised of low-inference categories, to confirm the effectiveness of the scheme and reliability in using it, a pilot observation and, with assistance, subsequent analysis of data were conducted. Analysis was predominantly quantitative, standardizing the sum of classroom episodes into percentages (representing proportions of time) to account for the unequal length of lessons across cases. Analysis of other emergent themes was qualitative.

Within-case and cross-case analyses

For each case, a within-case analysis was conducted that involved triangulating data from all four methods (questionnaire, journals, observations, and interviews). A cross-case analysis based on Miles and Huberman’s (1994) “stacking comparable cases” (p. 176) was then carried out to explore any emergent patterns and themes occurring across cases.

Results and Discussion

The first part of this section presents an overview of the main findings across the four cases. Table 3 provides a summary of (a) the quantitative data on teachers’ implementation of the previous curriculum in terms of the COLT categories of analysis (Research Question 1); and (b) the qualitative data on teacher beliefs about the factors that could influence their integration of grammar teaching with communicative work under the new curriculum in terms of the theory of planned behavior belief domains (Research Question 2). The second part of this section describes the major emergent themes and their interrelation, drawing out each teacher’s perspective in more detail. Here, the data on teaching practices and teacher beliefs are triangulated using the theory of planned behavior to illustrate how the factors teachers reported operate as an interrelated system (Research Question 3).

Table 3.

Summary of Teacher Beliefs and Teaching Practices.

	Arisa	Nobu	Nana	Takako
Teacher beliefs about integrating grammar teaching with communicative work^a
Overall attitude toward the approach	−	−	+	+
Overall motivation to comply with social pressure against the approach	+	+	±	−
Overall sense of control over the skills, resources, or circumstances necessary to implement the approach	−	−	−	±
Teaching practices under the previous curriculum
Overall grammar teaching approach (% of form-focused teaching)	STBT(76)	STBT(62)	STBT and student-centered(48)	Student-centered(76)
COLT analysis (%)
1. Language functions	Low (24)	Low (29)	Moderate (43)	Low (24)
2. Skills integration	Moderate (58)	Moderate (51)	Low (28)	High (93)
3. Student-centered work	X (0)	X (4)	Moderate (46)	Moderate (57)
4. Student use of English	X (2)	Low (17)	Low (12)	High (74)
5. Teacher use of English	Low (14)	Low (21)	X (1)	High (72)
Overall implementation of communicative objectives	Low (20)	Low (24)	Low (26)	Moderate (64)

Note. − = unfavorable/absent; + = favorable/present; ± = beliefs vary; STBT = structural, transmission-based teaching; COLT = Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching; (%) = overall percentage of time (as a mean) across four observations; X = not present in observed teaching practice or negligible (i.e., 5% or less); low = mean in the range of 6% to 32%; moderate = mean in the range of 33% to 66%; high = mean in the range of 67-100%; Overall Implementation = the mean of COLT analysis categories (1-5 above); Student use of English and Teacher use of English percentages represent the percentage of overall student or teacher talk time not class time.

Theory of planned behavior belief domains.

Overview of the Cases

While all teachers reported one or more favorable attitudes toward integrating grammar teaching with communicative work, these attitudes were overshadowed to varying degrees by the behavioral belief that such an approach would be inappropriate preparation for the university entrance examinations their students would likely sit. Across cases, this belief was reflected in teaching practices that focused predominantly on reading skills and translation. As Table 3 indicates, the overall implementation of communicative objectives under the previous curriculum was “low” for three of the four teachers and only “moderate” for one. However, despite these apparent commonalities, there was clear divergence in the ways that teachers approached grammar teaching, the extent to which they attended to various dimensions of CLT, and their beliefs about the social and contextual factors influencing these practices.

It can be seen from Table 3 that Arisa’s and Nobu’s teaching practices were for the most part misaligned with the communicative orientation of the previous curriculum, focusing overwhelmingly on the development of grammatical knowledge through teacher-led translation. For Arisa, form-focused teaching (i.e., a structural, transmission-based approach) represented 76% of class time across four lessons and for Nobu 62%. Their teaching provided negligible or minimal opportunities for student interaction (0% and 4%, respectively) or speaking in English (2% and 17%). In a recent national survey by the Japanese government, over 61% of high school teachers reported speaking in English for more than half of their class (MEXT, 2016). The cases of Arisa and Nobu, however, revealed that while they did indeed use English for simple classroom instructions and occasionally questions to students, speaking in English occurred mainly during choral drilling, translation, and reading aloud from the passage; most of their classes being conducted in Japanese. Arisa and Nobu integrated skills to a moderate degree (58% and 51%), but on the whole, this occurred superficially in terms of reading and writing out subsequent translations. As Table 3 indicates, these practices were in line with their overall behavioral beliefs and negative attitude toward the new curriculum, as well as their normative and control beliefs that reflect school environments where students and colleagues are highly unsupportive of communicative work and where there is a significant burden from extracurricular duties, many of which are related to entrance examinations.

In contrast, despite similar pressures from duties and examinations, Table 3 shows that Nana and Takako, who had mostly positive attitudes toward the new curriculum and minimal motivation to comply with social pressure against it, had adopted practices that were in some respects aligned with the previous curriculum’s communicative approach. For instance, while on the whole Nana’s teaching reflected a structural, transmission-based approach (48% of class time across four lessons), she also incorporated some highly effectively student-centered group work for summary writing and answering open-response type reading comprehension questions (46%). Yet student interaction was almost exclusively in Japanese; students speaking English for only 12% of her four lessons, with much of this time representing responses to display questions. Furthermore, while Nana attended to language functions (43%), the primary emphasis was invariably reading, in spite of English II being a four-skill course.

For Takako, however, while the content of her classes was also based on reading passages, in contrast to the other teachers, when translation work did occur in class most of this was from Japanese to English and took place during integrated-skills activities (93% across four lessons), many of which were student-centered (57%) and emphasized speaking. As Table 3 shows, a high degree of English use was evident by both Takako (72%) and her students (74%). Takako’s use of English represented 72% of teacher talk, with the majority occurring in classroom instructions, questions to students, telling stories or anecdotes, and praising or giving feedback. Her minimal use of Japanese was mostly for explaining grammar, as the Course of Study 2009 recommends. Moreover, she meaningfully integrated grammar teaching with language functions (i.e., paraphrasing, summarizing, and praising) during an interactive oral summarizing activity. What was lacking in Takako’s classes, however, was the integration of grammar teaching with a wider range of language functions (e.g., agreeing/disagreeing and advising) and in a variety of language-use situations (e.g., talking on the phone and activities in the workplace), especially those focused on speaking, as the previous curriculum mentioned and new curriculum strongly emphasizes. Takako indicated that she wanted “to move beyond this teaching” but had not yet arrived at any solutions (Postobservation Interview 3).

Emergent Themes and Their Interrelation

In this subsection, the data on teaching practices (Research Question 1) and teacher beliefs (Research Question 2) are triangulated using the theory of planned behavior to illustrate how the factors teachers reported operate as an interrelated system (Research Question 3). Five main themes emerged from analysis across the data set. In Figure 2, these themes are mapped onto the main belief domains of the theoretical framework.

Figure 2.

Interpretation of the findings through the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 2005).

Theme 1: The Role of Attitudes Toward the Curriculum

Theme 2: Managing Social Pressure Against the Curriculum

Theme 3: The Influence of University Entrance Examinations

Theme 4: The Burden of Administrative and Extracurricular Duties

Theme 5: The Importance of Context-Relevant Teacher Education and Development

The interrelation between components is denoted by arrows; a bold arrow indicating a strong influence and its path the direction of influence. A solid arrow indicates an influence occurs irrespective of whether the beliefs work for or against implementation of the curriculum. A broken arrow indicates that an influence varies according to whether the beliefs work for or against implementation. Figure 2 does not incorporate the four background factors that guided participant selection as there was no evidence to suggest a consistent influence on the behavioral, normative, and control beliefs domains. While the emergent theme of context-relevant teacher education and development (discussed below) could be considered as an informational background factor, in the current study its influence was directly evident through control beliefs about the skills required to implement the new curriculum and perceptions of control over these. As such, its influence is considered under the control belief domain.

Behavioral beliefs and attitude toward the behavior

The behavioral beliefs that were most influential on implementation intentions were associated with strong, instrumental evaluations (favorable and unfavorable) regarding the efficacy of the approach in preparing for entrance examinations. In Figure 2, this relationship is indicated by the broken arrow that connects the behavioral belief domain to intentions, and concerns Theme 1: The Role of Attitudes Toward the Curriculum. The Japanese students in Masuda’s (2017) study perceived translation work as useful preparation for entrance examinations. However, a key finding in the current study that has not been emphasized in the literature to date emerged from the cases of Nana and Takako, who stressed that rather than learning grammar through translation alone, integrating grammar with communicative work is especially beneficial to the development of grammatical knowledge necessary for entrance examinations. As Nana commented,

Learning within context is the most important thing, and I think if we teach grammar within a communicative context, students will be able to improve to the level that they can even tackle university exams. (Journal 2, Lines 188-190)

In both cases, this belief was reflected to a certain extent in classroom practices. For example, while Nana’s grammar teaching was mostly deductive, during one summary writing activity, rather than drawing explicit attention to useful grammar and vocabulary, she encouraged an inductive process of discovery in which students worked collaboratively to complete the summary and she responded only when language needs arose. Upon completion, Nana provided explicit grammatical instruction and advice for summary writing. She then had groups compare each other’s work and identify any errors and areas that could be improved. Similarly, Takako provided opportunities for students to work out not only grammatical rules but also pragmatic functions. In her Writing class, for instance, she had students discuss the function of shite kureta, a Japanese verb conjugation used to show appreciation, and then work with numerous partners to orally construct English sentences which express gratitude. Working individually, students wrote their sentences out and then exchanged with different partners for peer checking and feedback.

In contrast, when unfavorable instrumental evaluations of integrating grammar teaching with communicative work (i.e., the approach is misaligned with university entrance examinations) outweighed favorable evaluations (either instrumental or experiential), there was no influence on positive intentions to implement the approach. While Nobu briefly mentioned that integrating grammar teaching with CLT might increase student motivation for studying grammar (the only advantage he expressed), the case of Arisa illustrates more fully how her favorable instrumental evaluation in terms of increased communicative ability and an experiential evaluation regarding improved student motivation were outweighed by an unfavorable, instrumental evaluation associated with entrance examinations. She reflected

Certainly, the new curriculum would improve communication [sic] ability and motivation for study, but I am still very skeptical. Students need much reading and translation to tackle these examinations and without that can they really pass? (Postobservation Interview 4)

As Table 3 indicates, Arisa’s classroom practices focused predominantly on language forms through a structural, transmission-based approach (76% across four lessons), allowing no opportunity for students to interact with each other in English.

Normative beliefs and subjective norm

In Figure 2, the broken arrow connecting the normative belief domain and intentions indicates that subjective norm can work both for and against intentions to integrate grammar with communicative work, and this relates to Theme 2: Managing Social Pressure Against the Approach. As the background to this article described, a number of studies in Asia to date have indicated that preparation for entrance examinations and local cultures of learning can exert a strong pressure against the implementation of communicative curriculums (e.g., Cook, 2012; J. Huang, 2006; L. Huang, 2009; Saito, 2016, 2017; Underwood, 2012a). A key finding in the current study, however, further reveals that teachers’ motivation to comply with social pressure can be impacted not only by control issues related to examinations, but also by other control factors, and, importantly, this in turn influences the behavioral belief domain. In Figure 2, this relationship is indicated by the two arrows pointed toward the normative belief domain. The arrow connecting the behavioral belief domain denotes the influence of both negative and positive attitudes toward the curriculum.

The findings discussed under Theme 1 above describe how Nana and Takako view integrating grammar teaching with communicative work as beneficial to preparation for examinations and, as Table 3 indicates, these positive attitudes correspond with their overall low motivation to comply with social pressure against this component of the new curriculum. For instance, while Nana perceived that many colleagues would exert pressure against the approach, when asked whether she would be motivated to comply their expectations, she laughed and responded emphatically, “No!” (Semistructured Interview, Lines 158-162). For Nana, her students’ expectations were of primary concern, and this represents her partial motivation to comply with the pressure she perceives them to exert against integrating grammar with communicative work (Table 3, Teacher Beliefs). In contrast, Arisa and Nobu expressed mostly negative attitudes toward the new curriculum’s approach, which, as Table 3 indicates, corresponds with their notably stronger motivation to comply with social pressure against integration. Indeed, Arisa and Nobu both aligned themselves with social referents who they perceive would be against the approach, as Nobu reflected:

I said before, me and many teachers know [sic] if our students don’t enter good universities, fewer students would want to come to our school. There would be pressure against this way [integrating grammar with communicative work] everywhere. From students, senior teachers and the principal especially. (Nobu, Postobservation Interview 3)

In terms of the control belief domain, the bold arrow represents the strong influence of perceived behavioral control (discussed in detail under Themes 3, 4, and 5 below). As Table 3 shows, the cases of Arisa and Nobu, and to some extent Nana, indicate that a low perceived behavioral control over extracurricular duties, teaching abilities, and having to prepare for entrance examinations corresponds with a higher motivation to comply with social pressure against integrating grammar teaching with communicative work.

In the Japanese senior high school context, Saito (2017) observed how support from colleagues and students can have a strong influence on a teacher’s ultimate implementation of curriculum. In the current study, Takako reported that while such support for her teaching approach would have certainly been welcomed, it was not essential for her implementation. For Takako, increased levels of perceived behavioral control over the control factors that constrained Arisa, Nobu, and to some extent Nana, in turn positively influenced her behavioral belief domain, and this led to a lower motivation to comply with negative social pressure and increased curricular implementation. Takako described how colleagues had expressed strong disapproval of her inclusion of oral activities and student-centered work in her four-skill English II course:

There were many criticisms from other teachers that “this kind of lesson is pointless,” and “The most important thing in university entrance exams is the ability to translate difficult sentences, and if any more time is wasted on these lessons, the students will end up failing.” (Journal 1, Lines 95-98)

Yet, despite feeling considerable isolation from her colleagues and initially experiencing “hostility” from students when requiring them to use grammar in speaking and writing activities (Journal 9, Line 812), Takako had persevered with her approach and later reported her students having achieved the highest scores in their grade level on mock entrance examinations for prestigious universities. While students may well perceive translation work to be effective, as Masuda (2017) reported, the case of Takako in the current study underscores an important point; that is, success on entrance examinations that emphasis reading can also be achievable through integrating grammar teaching with communicative work. In the semistructured interview, Takako explained how her students’ high achievement alleviated a substantial degree of pressure from both colleagues and the students themselves to adopt a structural, transmission-based approach. Takako’s teaching approach is discussed further under Themes 4 and 5.

Control beliefs and perceived behavioral control

In the current study, the beliefs most influential on implementation intentions are associated with context-related factors, and these were found to work for and against the integration of grammar teaching with communicative work, reflecting Themes 3, 4, and 5. In Figure 2, this relationship is denoted by the bold broken arrow that connects the control belief domain to intentions. Control beliefs also had a strong influence on the formation of behavioral and normative belief domains, as indicated by the bold arrows (Themes 1 and 2).

Theme 3: The Influence of University Entrance Examinations

One dimension of the findings reflects much research in Japan and a range of international contexts that suggests misalignment between the communicative goals of national curriculum and the content of high-stakes examinations is a significant obstacle to the implementation of CLT (e.g., Dahmardeh, 2009; J. Huang, 2006; Ozsevik, 2010; Pahissa & Tragant, 2009; Rahman & Karim, 2015; Underwood, 2012a). However, the findings from the current study go beyond existing research by offering deeper insights into the interconnected nature of examination-related beliefs and, despite the pressure examinations exert, the divergent ways in which teachers approach the integration of grammar teaching in their classes.

As discussed under Theme 2, the cases of Arisa and Nobu illustrate how control beliefs regarding the importance of preparing for entrance examinations can contribute to the formation of unfavorable attitudes toward integrating grammar teaching with communicative work and motivation to comply, or in their cases align, with social pressure against it, as Nobu put it, “The students’ motivation is just like us teachers, to pass the exam” (Semistructured Interview, Lines 161-184). In line with these beliefs, Table 3 indicates their grammar teaching as predominantly structural-transmission based and occurring mostly during form-focused work (76% and 62% for Arisa and Nobu, respectively, across four classes).

In contrast, while Takako and Nana shared the same behavioral belief regarding the importance of entrance examinations, as noted earlier, their behavioral beliefs differed from Arisa and Nobu in terms of what they considered to be an effective approach in preparing for examinations, as did their overall motivation to comply with social pressure against CLT approaches. Table 3 indicates that Takako’s and Nana’s grammar teaching practices incorporated much student-centered work and, as the COLT analysis shows, many other components of the curriculum’s communicative approach. A key difference between Takako, especially, and Arisa and Nobu was that any negative washback from examinations on her behavioral and normative belief domains (and subsequently classroom practices) was moderated to some degree by her perceived behavioral control over extracurricular duties and teaching abilities (these points are discussed in detail under Themes 4 and 5 below). Yet lacking in both Takako and Nana’s classes was the integration of grammar teaching with a much broader range of language functions and language-use situations, especially those focused on speaking. This was partly explained by their acknowledgment that communicative ability is not widely tested on entrance examinations, as Nana’s comment reflects:

I know some exams are changing but if [they] continue to produce grammar-based content, then students will probably ask for more grammar-centered lessons and that means reading and translation. (Preliminary Questionnaire, Control Beliefs, Question 3)

Theme 4: The Burden of Administrative and Extracurricular Duties

Only a small number of studies in Japan (O’Donnell, 2005; Sato & Kleinsasser, 2004) and internationally (Goh et al., 2005; Ozsevik, 2010; Waters & Vilches, 2008) have reported substantially on the difficulties senior high school teachers face in implementing communicative curriculums due to their heavy workload. In the current study, each of the cases revealed detailed insights into the significant burden of nonteaching duties common in private and public schools. Arisa and Nana both drew attention to the “power-coercive” (Markee, 1997) style of decision making in their private schools. Nana, for instance, reported how decisions are always top-down and made “behind the scenes” (Journal 9, Line 553), resulting in additional, time-consuming responsibilities such as printing promotional materials, receiving external telephone enquiries, and even odd jobs like cleaning and dusting. The following extract from her semistructured interview reveals the burden of such duties:

I’m too tired to think about myself and my teaching and these duties deprive me of my time . . . I thought teaching is my priority, but teaching is way back. I don’t have time to prepare, so I sometimes just do what I did last year. I want to change . . . I want to improve my teaching. (Lines 532-543)

In schools where institutional goals focus on entrance to higher education, it was unsurprising that many other duties were associated in some way with preparation for entrance examinations. Across cases, these included organizing and attending seminars, university fairs and open-campus; attending weekend English proficiency examinations; running off-campus study camps and summer courses; teaching intensive Saturday classes; checking applications and providing individual guidance; conducting mock interviews, and due to the centrality of English in entrance examinations, additional homeroom duties for English subject teachers. When Nobu was asked whether such duties would influence his implementation of the new curriculum’s emphasis on integrating grammar teaching, he responded,

I definitely think so. If we had more time to focus on English teaching. That’s another thing . . . Most high schools have so many problems. So actually, I don’t take a lot of time for teaching. That’s a fact. (Semistructured Interview, Lines 338-344)

Yet, as Table 3 indicates, only Takako believed herself as having some degree of control over such duties. In one sense, this was accounted for in terms of her considerable efforts, as she stated “Preparing and marking are done in between club activities on Saturdays and Sundays. And I intentionally commute by train rather than by a car just so that I can work” (Journal 1, Lines 78-80). In addition, in her Writing and English II (four skills) classes she tested grammar and translation orally in groups and allotted a small amount of time for students to check each other’s written translation work. In her postobservation interview, she explained how this approach reinforces learning, provides immediate feedback, and significantly reduces her marking, thereby freeing up substantial time for lesson planning, making materials, and other administrative work (similar advantages were noted by Li & Edwards, 2013, for Chinese teachers). Yet providing students with opportunities for more extended creative writing in paragraphs or short essays, which would certainly require teacher marking, was not part of Takako’s curriculum. As Mulvey (2016) observed, given that 61% of Japanese public school classes have between 31 and 40 students, finding the time to mark such writing regularly is beyond the scope of most high school teachers—Takako’s writing class had 39 students. Nevertheless, Takako had adopted a problem-solving approach to teaching, and these classroom strategies largely reflect her professional development.

Theme 5: The Importance of Context-Relevant Teacher Education and Development

One aspect of the findings in the current study highlights how teacher education and development can fall short of supporting implementation of CLT. In the case of Arisa, for instance, despite having recently participated in six, 50-min mandatory training workshops at her private school, she still perceived herself as lacking the teaching abilities “to make students learn grammar in a communicative way” (Semistructured Interview, Lines 178-179). It later emerged that rather than specific training in CLT methodology, the workshops focused mainly on communicative competence theory and secondary curriculum generally (Workshop Coordinator, personal communication, April 25, 2013). Similarly, in spite of the potential benefits of a postgraduate degree in English education, throughout the study neither Nobu nor Nana expressed a clear idea of how to integrate grammar teaching with communicative work. For instance, Nana, who had recently completed her MA in English Education, in Japan, stressed in her Preliminary Questionnaire “I have absolutely no idea as to how to go about this approach” (Question 8, Control Beliefs). Fourteen months later, she was still uncertain, “still maybe I don’t understand. I don’t have a clear answer for myself” (Semistructured Interview, Lines 570-571).

In contrast, an important aspect of the findings highlights the value of context-specific training. Nana reported having learnt about Kagan’s (1992) structural approach to cooperative learning informally from the native English-speaking teachers in her school. This training was reflected in both her positive attitudes regarding the efficacy of the new curriculum’s approach and her classroom practices, which demonstrated efficient and effective use of pair and group work during several function-focused reading activities (46% across four lessons, Table 3). In addition, Takako reported having read widely on grammar teaching and CLT and considering how she could apply this knowledge to her examination-oriented context. The benefits of this learning and reflection were evident in her positive attitude toward the approach and her sense of control over the teaching abilities that she believes are necessary to implement it.

Central to Takako’s approach was the presentation of grammatical explanations and translations in home-study booklets, which she creates with junior teachers. She reported these as providing “far more class time for students to actually use the grammar” (Postobservation Interview 1). Classroom observations indicated that when there was translation work in class rather than the teacher-led English to Japanese translation widespread in many schools, most occurred in pair and group activities that comprised of Japanese to English translations, requiring students to reconstruct cloze sections of the passage orally, one to three sentences at a time and under time pressure, thereby demanding an element of fluency. The difficulty of cloze sections ranged from one or two content and function words to conjugating verbs into the appropriate tense as part of a more extended cloze (details are provided in the Appendix). In a meaning-focused oral activity, Takako successfully integrated grammar teaching with paraphrasing and summarizing language functions, in which students drew on grammar, vocabulary, and mind maps from home-study booklets to retell a reading passage orally (refer to Appendix). At this time, partners made use of language functions (i.e., asking for repetition and clarification, and praising) as well as metalinguistic devices for showing attention and indicating comprehension (i.e., nodding, smiling, and making eye contact) and offered feedback to the speaker. Furthermore, issues with student passivity that have been noted in some studies (e.g., Kurihara, 2008; Rahman & Karim, 2015) were not apparent in Takako’s classes. As noted earlier, Table 3 indicates that 74% of Takako’s overall classes consisted of student opportunities for speaking in English, with minimal time spent on teacher-fronted, grammar explanations. Takako’s case findings extend those of Li and Edwards’ (2013) recent study in China by showing that while preparation for entrance examinations does indeed constrain CLT implementation in senior high schools, many aspects of a communicative approach can still be achieved.

Implications and Conclusions

The final section of this article concludes by considering the main practical and theoretical implications that can be drawn from the findings.

In Japan, and other international contexts, despite a national curriculum that emphasizes communication, the focus of many university entrance examinations continues to be vocabulary, grammar, and reading skills. All of the teachers in the current study were affected by this predicament, their classes based predominantly on reading passages and translation. Nevertheless, the findings from this study suggest a number of concrete ways in which teachers working in such challenging conditions can attempt to integrate grammar teaching with communicative work. Integration was most evident in the case of Takako and was facilitated mainly by her creative approach to grammar explanation and translation. Rather than relying on a teacher-led, structural, transmission-based approach, Takako made extensive use of home-study booklets, which she created with other teachers, for providing grammatical explanations and translations. This freed up substantial class time for collaborative, form-focused oral cloze activities as well as more meaning-focused interactional tasks in which students retold reading passages orally to partners, drawing on mind maps, and integrating language functions and metalinguistic strategies for peer feedback (described in Theme 5 and the Appendix). Considering the potential time saved by having students study grammar and translation out of class, although not evident in the classes observed in this study, such an approach could enable teachers to move beyond reading passages as their source material and adopt a broader range of meaning-focused, communicative activities for incorporating language functions with language-use situations in class. These might include problem-solving tasks and discussions, information-exchange activities, or what Nassaji and Fotos (2011) described as collaborative output tasks, such as dictogloss, text-editing, reconstruction cloze, and jigsaw tasks. As discussed at the start of this article, a variety of methodological options for integrating a focus on grammar could then be incorporated at various points during the activities to push students further along the interlanguage continuum (Ellis, 2002). In the current study, while the extent of grammar teaching within meaning-focused communicative work was limited, the positive attitudes toward integration that Takako and Nana reported in terms of both the instrumental and experiential advantages and the teaching practices that reflected these beliefs represent the teachers’ initial efforts to reconcile dimensions of language curriculum that are normally considered separate (Littlewood, 2007).

A further practical implication can be drawn from Theme 5 and this concerns teacher education and development. With the exception of Takako, teachers lacked a clear understanding of the methodological options for integrating grammar teaching with communicative work, in spite of the potential advantages of in-service training and, in two cases, postgraduate qualifications. Without the kind of specific, context-relevant professional development that Takako, and to some extent Nana, pursued, it seems likely that high school teachers will continue to struggle with reconciling grammar teaching and communicative work—if they attempt it at all. This issue is interconnected with Themes 3 and 4. In the present study, extracurricular duties related to entrance examinations were reported to be especially onerous for English teachers, who had a significantly higher workload due to the centrality of English. With the main priority for many schools being success on examinations that currently emphasize vocabulary, grammar, and reading, it is likely schools will continue to invest resources toward preparation in these areas. Thus, a critical level of cooperation must first occur among teachers, department leaders, and school management in order to negotiate the allocation of time necessary for teacher development. Although recommendations for accomplishing this would be highly context-specific, one strategy emerged from the case of Takako, whose students’ achievement on mock entrance examinations alleviated a substantial amount of social pressure to adopt structural, transmission-based teaching. In the absence of broader changes to the entrance examination system, proving the efficacy of a communicative curriculum in terms of improved standardized test scores would clearly facilitate the establishment of collaborative, school-based professional development aimed at implementing a new approach.

In terms of the theoretical dimension of the study, this article represents the first in-depth research in an English Language Teaching context to apply the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 2005) to explore the potential implementation of a new national curriculum. The main implication concerns the interrelation between the normative belief domain and the control and behavioral belief domains. The data from this study revealed that in addition to the pressure of examinations themselves, teachers’ motivation to comply with social pressure for or against integration of grammar teaching (i.e., their subjective norm) was influenced by perceived behavioral control over the teaching abilities required to reconcile preparation for entrance examinations with communicative work. In turn, an increased sense of control appeared to impact the formation of positive behavioral beliefs and favorable, instrumental attitudes toward the new curriculum. This important interrelationship has not been noted in the research to date. Related to this point, rather than formal preservice education (one of the general background factors considered in this study), in-service, context-specific teacher development emerged as a strong influence on beliefs and practices. Future research could further explore the impact of this kind of informational background factor on the normative belief domain.

Thus, the theory of planned behavior brought to light a complex interrelationship between grammar teaching practices and teacher beliefs about the new curriculum, the social environments in which teachers are required to implement it, and the centrality of context-related factors. The findings, therefore, go some way toward addressing questions arising from recent research in the Japanese context (Nishimuro & Borg, 2013), namely, how different aspects of senior high school teachers’ belief systems interact in influencing classroom practices and why structural, transmission-based practices remain resilient despite national policy mandates to the contrary. In Japan, more empirical research is now required to examine the extent to which senior high school teachers have actually implemented the national curriculum since its enactment in 2013. Globally, as numerous geographical settings in which English is taught as a foreign language in high schools share many of the characteristics of English teaching in Japan (e.g., preparation for high-stakes examinations that emphasize reading, inadequate teacher training, and various class-related obstacles), the practical and theoretical insights emerging from this study may well have broader implications.

Footnotes

Appendix

Acknowledgements

I am sincerely grateful to the teachers, students, and schools who made this study possible; to Dr. Luke Harding of Lancaster University, UK, and Dr. Dianne Wall for their invaluable guidance; and to the anonymous reviewers on earlier versions of this article.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biography

Paul R. Underwood, PhD is an associate professor of English teacher education in the Faculty of Social Sciences, Toyo Eiwa University, Japan. His research interest is language in education policy, especially the application of the theory of planned behavior in educational innovations.

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Challenges and Change: Integrating Grammar Teaching With Communicative Work in Senior High School EFL Classes

Abstract

Keywords

Introduction

Background

Factors Impacting CLT and Grammar Teaching in Senior High Schools Globally

Japan’s New National Curriculum for Senior High School English

Theoretical Framework

Method

Participants

Data Collection

The preliminary questionnaire

Teacher journals

Classroom observations

Semistructured interviews

Data Analysis

Qualitative data: Preliminary questionnaire, journals, and semistructured interview

Quantitative data: Classroom observations

Within-case and cross-case analyses

Results and Discussion

Overview of the Cases

Emergent Themes and Their Interrelation

Behavioral beliefs and attitude toward the behavior

Normative beliefs and subjective norm

Control beliefs and perceived behavioral control

Theme 3: The Influence of University Entrance Examinations

Theme 4: The Burden of Administrative and Extracurricular Duties

Theme 5: The Importance of Context-Relevant Teacher Education and Development

Implications and Conclusions

Footnotes

Appendix

Acknowledgements

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

Funding

Notes

Author Biography

References