Kurdish Novice English Language Teachers’ Perceptions on their Teaching Practices and Needs: A Case Study

The present study aimed to investigate into Kurdish novice English language teachers’ perceptions on their teaching practices and needs. The study also aimed to identify their perceptions on the teacher education programs they had gone through and to what extent they had prepared them for the process of teaching. For this purpose, the teachers’ perceptions regarding their difficulties, challenges and needs in their first year(s) of teaching were identified. This study is a mixed method case study, which applies a descriptive -interpretive method. Sixty – three Kurdish novice English teachers who are teaching in basic and preparatory schools of General Educational Directorate of Erbil participated in this study. Thirty – three teachers were from the basic level while thirty teachers were teaching in preparatory level. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected from two different sources: teacher questionnaire and teacher interviews. The results of the study indicate that in general, Kurdish novice English language teachers found some aspects in their first year(s) of teaching difficult, some neither difficult nor easy and some others easy. The results also show that teaching about target culture, hiring practices and dealing with special needs of students were their main problems. The results at the same time show that the teachers were in need of support from their administrators, interaction with experienced English teachers and a continuous training program. As regards the teacher education program, the results show that teacher education program they completed did not fully satisfy them and they believed that their needs were not met. Based on the results, some implications for improving the teacher education in Kurdistan regional government of Iraq and suggestions for further studies have been recommended. The implications can help teacher education programs to be more effective and help novice teachers more to face less problems and provide them with their needs.