Decoding Teaching Styles of Language Lecturers

Teaching styles refer to approaches an educator uses to impart knowledge to students. There are various teaching styles educators can use either as a single style or a combination of more than one. Different styles are used to ensure different students’ needs can be catered. This depends on the nature of subject matter, the goals of the lesson and the needs of the students. Even though teaching styles have been discussed for many years, little attention has been given to teaching styles among language lecturers at higher learning. This research aims to identify the different teaching styles among language lecturers, and which of the teaching styles is the most dominant for each lecturer. The instrument was adapted from the Grasha – Riechmann Teaching Styles Questionnaire (1996), which measures five teaching styles such as Personal Model Teaching Style, Expert Teaching Style, Formal Authority Teaching Style, Delegator Teaching Style, and Facilitator Teaching Style. Findings showed that there is a significant difference between genders only for formal teaching style and the most dominant teaching style is facilitator. These findings have brought up a better understanding of teaching styles among language lecturers.


Introduction
Changes have inevitably appeared in educational environments very rampantly these days. Educators need to address this issue to ensure they can keep up with the changes. Many scholars agree that the quality of teaching and training has a great impact on enhancing the motivation, vitality, innovation, and efficiency of a teacher (Mahmoodabad et al., 2010). It is understood that there is no single perfect teaching style. However, those who are aware of their practical style can take full advantage of what it offers while at the same time taking precautions on its disadvantages. Therefore, transitioning from standardized learning environments to environments that consider the different learning needs of students has become a significant issue in today's educational establishments.
The teaching style is the way a teacher teaches with distinctive mannerisms, complemented by choices of teaching behaviours and strategies. This can change, intentionally or unintentionally, as a result of the change that occurs to the teacher in different areas (Kellough & Roberts, 1994). Some of the changes are due to teachers trying to adapt to new demands in the teaching profession.
The Japanese have followed the motto of "Adopt, Adapt and Adept" to localize and improve certain aspects of life. The history goes back to the idea that they send their people to other developed countries, have them learn the best practices and bring back the knowledge to their country. This is how they contribute to the efficiency of their nation. This concept is similar when it comes to education, especially in the teaching styles. Teachers must be ready to understand the new needs of the education and later decide whether to adopt, adapt, adept or even a mix of these concepts into their teaching so that they will not be left behind and students' needs can be catered.
This research adapted the Grasha (1994Grasha ( , 2002 teaching style which describes different ways teachers approach their roles in the classroom and interact with students. There are five different styles suggested by Grasha which are expert, formal authority, personal model, facilitator, and delegator. Each of these has its own characteristics which shape how a lecturer delivers his or her teaching.

Problem Statement
In educational institutions, emphasis is laid on training teachers for many reasons, for example, effective classroom management as well as effective content delivery. Despite frequent personal development training of teachers, teachers are unaware of what teaching styles they have been using in class. When teachers are aware of their own teaching style (or styles), it can help them improve their teaching methods, by designing the course to increase student engagement and, ultimately, enhance student outcomes. This can be done once the teachers understand the advantages and disadvantages of the teaching style they uphold. Later on, they can also explore other teaching styles of their preference to broaden their teaching delivery.
This research is conducted as very few studies have addressed language educators' individual teaching styles. Past literature showed research on teaching styles involves educators from other faculties, not language. Moreover, previous literature indicates that teaching styles can make an important difference to students' learning performance (Centra & Potter, 1980;McDaniel, 1981;Wentzel, 2002). Thus, it is apparent that this research is significant to be conducted.

Objectives of the Study
1) To identify the different teaching styles among language lecturers 2) To identify the dominant teaching styles among language lecturers

Research Questions
1. What are the teaching styles applied by language lecturers? 2. Which of the following teaching styles is the dominant style of teaching?

Literature Review
There are many teaching styles that can be used in language teaching, depending on the needs of the instructors and learners, as well as the context and demand of the learning environment. The teaching styles are the pattern of belief, knowledge, performance and behavior of teachers when they are teaching. Hurriyetoglu and Kilicoglu (2020) referred teaching styles to the attitudes and behaviors that teachers exhibit in the teaching process constitute the style of the teacher.
According to the Oxford Dictionary, teaching refers to how a person imparts knowledge to or instructs (someone) as to how to do something. Style on the other hand refers to a particular procedure by which something is done, a manner or way. Teaching styles, also sometimes referred to teaching approaches, are described as the general principles, educational, and management strategies for classroom instruction (Tharanky, 2015). Teaching style is a phrase sometimes used to describe different things. Although some authors use it as if it is synonymous with teaching method or technique, most researchers who have defined teaching style refer to style as a predilection toward teaching behavior and the congruence between an educator's teaching behaviors and teaching beliefs (Heimlich & Norland, 1994. Therefore, teaching style can be defined as how a person imparts knowledge in a particular manner or way. Blazar (2016) believes that any style used by teachers in presenting their lessons is vital as it can result in the students liking the lessons or not.
There are many previous studies discussing different teaching styles among educators from different fields. One study by Shaari et al (2014) at University of Malaya showed that teachers often use personal model and expert styles, and delegator style was the least used. Another study by Razeghinejad et al (2010) demonstrated a different finding that the teaching style of the faculty of Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences mostly employed expert and delegator styles and followed by personal model and facilitator styles. A study by Azizi et al (2014) at Urmia Medical University showed that teaching styles are related to the social adjustment of students. This is in line with Zhou (2011) who believes how much a student can learn is determined by not only their learning styles but also the teacher's teaching style. Even though many studies have been conducted on teaching styles, not that many focus on language teachers or instructors. It is then crucial to delve into this matter as it has been discovered that the success of a lesson can be determined by these two factors. Grasha and Hicks (2000) believe that to guarantee the effectiveness of teaching and learning, teaching styles need to be considered as an important element in a lesson. Tharanky (2015) agrees with this idea as she sums up previous research (Felder, 1996;Hsueh-Yu Cheng & Banya, 1998;Reid, 1987) that found evidence of a mismatch between teaching styles of teacher and students' learning preferences may lead to detrimental effects on students' learning interest. It is generally understood that a positive teaching environment will result in better knowledge acquisition by the students (Soloman & Felder, 2005). Therefore, due to the importance of teaching style, it is necessary to conduct research to raise awareness of the individuality of the teaching styles posed by language lecturers to ensure they understand the advantages and disadvantages of each style when used in the classroom.
Grasha teaching style survey is a self-assessment tool designed to help teachers identify their teaching styles employed in class. There are five dimensions of teaching styles which are the expert style, formal authority style, personal model style, delegator style and facilitator style. Each teaching style offers advantages and disadvantages, highlighting the importance of considering the context and students' needs when choosing an appropriate approach. The diagram below summarizes the five teaching styles with their advantages and disadvantages.

Methodology
The quantitative research approach includes the collection and analysis of numerical data to describe and generalize conditions, investigate relationships, and study the cause-effect of phenomena. Demographic information of the participants such as age and years of service were obtained through self-developed demographics questions. The population of this research is 40 language lecturers from Academy of Language Studies, UiTM Cawangan Terengganu. These lecturers teach different language courses from English, Arabic, French and Mandarin. The sample for this study was 39 out of 40 lecturers under Academy of Language Studies using convenience sampling where each participant voluntarily wanted to be part of the research. To investigate the teaching styles of these language lecturers, Grasha-Riechmann Teaching Style Survey culturally adapted and distributed to the lecturers via Google Forms. The questionnaire items were revised and modified to investigate the teaching styles when conducting a language class. None of the 40 questionnaire items was rejected and the items of the are broken into five sections that include the questions of Expert method, Formal authority (8 items), Personal model (8 items), Facilitator (8 items) and Delegator (8 items). Likert scales statements are used to range lecturers' preferences of an item in the questionnaire in that the scales range from completely agree to completely disagree. The questions are ranked from 1 (extremely disagree) to 5 (extremely agree). The total score of each segment was partitioned to 8 as per the questionnaire index in each teaching method.  Table 1 illustrates the demography of the respondents for this research. From a total of 39 language lecturers teaching different language courses identified, 26 of them are females while the rest are males. Majority of the respondents (11) have less than 5 years of teaching experience. The highest academic degree the respondents pose is master's degree.

RO 1: To identify the different teaching styles among language lecturers according to genders
Gender difference T-Test was used to identify if there is any significant difference between the genders of the respondents in regards to their teaching styles. There is a significant difference in formal teaching style among gender. The Sig. (2-Tailed) value in the table is 0.015 and this value is less than .05. Because of this, it can be concluded that there is a statistically significant difference between the mean number of formal teaching styles for male lecturers and female lecturers. Since the statistics table revealed that the mean for males was greater (4.1250) than the mean for females (3.6792), this finding can conclude that participants from most male lecturers significantly employed a formal teaching style than female lecturers. This finding is similar to Faruji (2012) where it was found that more males teaching English employed a similar teaching style. RO 2: To identify the dominant teaching styles among language lecturers  Means applies more to the teaching style. Nonetheless, both genders showed no significant differences for the other four teaching styles and a study done by Norzila et al. (2007) showed that students preferred Formal Authority Style the least among ESP lecturers. Even though the study was done to investigate the students' preferences on ESP lecturers, the finding of this current study should be taken into consideration because some of the male respondents are teaching English courses, and this could affect the students' attention and interest as well as their motivation in the language class. However, the dominant lecturers' practised teaching style is Facilitator followed by Expert and Personal. This finding is similar to the study by Norzila et al (2007) whereby the students' most preferred teaching style is Facilitator. This shows that the current practice by the language lecturers in the Academy of Language Studies of UiTMCT suits the students' preferences.

Group Statistics
Regardless of the findings, the study acknowledges the lecturers in identifying areas for improvement and provides insights into how they can adjust their teaching style to better meet the needs of their students. Inayat and Ali (2020) also highlight the importance of realizing and being aware that teaching style is crucial in ensuring student engagement in a lesson. "If a child can't learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn".
As sensible as this statement by Ignacio Estrada sounds, it is infrequently put into action. Therefore, it is suggested that for future study to focus on the relationship between the teaching style and students' preferences. This could offer more understanding in improvising the teaching method and leveraging the teaching and learning engagement between lecturers and students.