Student Views of a Caring Teacher in an Undergraduate English Language Classroom in Russia

Abstract

The study has sought to find out how undergraduate students in a Russian university perceive caring attributes of their English teachers. Thirty-four students, all enrolled in the first and second year of university studies participated in this research. Open-ended surveys were used to collect the data. Analysis of the responses revealed that on one hand, students see themselves as largely responsible for success in learning English, emphasizing such qualities as study habits and desire to achieve. On the other hand, the results point out to the fact that students clearly understand that having pedagogical and content knowledge is not enough for the teacher to be effective. Students want and need to see a teacher as a caring professional, not simply a vessel of knowledge. However, as the results indicate, there is a disconnect between what students want to see in a teacher in terms of caring characteristics and what they actually see in the classroom, as many of the students surveyed could not illustrate how caring traits they identified as desirable in a university teacher are actually played out in their classrooms.