Facing emergency remote language teaching: The attitudes and competences of future EFL teachers

Abstract

The COVID-19 or Coronavirus health emergency brought about disruptions that highlighted the need to adapt education, especially language education, to secure students’ learning process. In this light, new terms, such as Emergency Remote Language Teaching, arose to differentiate ‘traditional’ online education from what was done in classrooms when schools were closed during the pandemic. Teachers directed their efforts to guarantee the continuity of students’ learning, which has been reflected in the increase in the number of studies examining how they have coped with this situation. In relation to the teaching and learning of English, however, there is limited research, up to the researchers’ knowledge, that explores whether teachers feel prepared to teach in Emergency Remote Language Teaching situations. Therefore, this paper studies the attitudes of Spanish future teachers of English concerning their readiness and abilities for Emergency Remote Language Teaching situations. Findings show that participants have positive attitudes towards adapting content to Emergency Remote Language Teaching, giving appropriate feedback, and selecting proper assessment methods. Moreover, they consider their training at university has been appropriate. Finally, recommendations to include strategies for Emergency Remote Language Teaching in teacher training syllabi are provided.