English teachers' beliefs and practices in teaching vocabulary: The case of teaching experience

Evidently, vocabulary learning has a vital role in learning a foreign language. Accordingly, the way teachers approach teaching vocabulary is also of tremendous importance. Moreover, the role of experience in teaching vocabulary is of significance when it comes to novice and experienced teachers. Thus, the present study set out to investigate the differences between second language (L2) vocabulary teaching beliefs and practices of novice and experienced English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers. Initially, 100 male and female teachers of Modiran Institute in Tehran were selected via convenience sampling. Then, they were briefed about the purposes of the study and data collection. Next, they were asked to fill out the novice and experienced teacher questionnaire and the questionnaire of teachers' belief about L2 vocabulary learning and teaching. Then three classroom sessions of 20 of the participants were observed using 15 items of the questionnaire of teachers' belief about L2 vocabulary learning and teaching as an observation checklist. The results of statistical analysis indicated that there was no significant difference between the beliefs and practices of teachers in terms of L2 vocabulary teaching. However, there were significant differences among the externally observed practice (EOP), self-perceived practices (SPP) and self-perceived beliefs (SPB) total scores. Moreover, on the whole, teachers' EOP was significantly different from and lower than their SPP and SPB. The results also revealed that novice and experienced teachers differed significantly in terms of their SPB total scores and experienced teachers had a significantly higher SPB than novice teachers.