Professional development through CALL lesson study: L2 writing teachers’ perception and practice

Abstract

Despite a surge of interest in teachers’ purposeful integration of technology into classrooms, research on L2 writing teachers’ digitallymediated writing instruction through lesson study (LS) is essentially lacking. To address this void, we investigated how L2 writing teachers perceived and practices professional development (PD) through technology-assisted writing pedagogy within the three LS phases, i.e., collaborative LS design and implementation, peer observation and feedback, and peer revision. The data sources included the participant teachers’ screencasts, peer reflective comments/responses, and semi-structured interviews. The findings demonstrated that the experience of LS-oriented, digitallymediated writing instruction facilitated the writing teachers’ firsthand exploration of digital spaces and promoted their digitallymediated teaching competence through peer reflection, team coaching, and project-based practices. Additionally, the experience enhanced their pedagogical flexibility, confidence, and autonomy for adapting writing instruction to virtual platforms, assisted them in developing technology-mediated writing lesson plan, task design, and assessment rubric, engaged them in a small community of L2 writing teachers as digital materials co-producers, and helped them use digital tools to meet learners’ context-specific writing needs. The study promises implications for CALL teachers and CALL teacher education programs.