the disillusionment of the most repeated elt terminologies: “teacher, teaching, and learning”

The present contribution aims at investigating the metaphors used by english teachers in order to portray their conceptions regarding the word’s teacher, teaching and learning. the study attempts to unravel the underlying relationship between teachers’ conceptions and metaphors the participants used. sixty-three participants answered a two-staged interview developed by the researchers. after interview results were transcribed into text, followed by coding, managing and categorizing data, researchers selected two different frameworks to analyze data including alger, c. l. (2009) organizing principles of studies on teaching metaphors, and conceptual categories of teacher by saban et al. (2007). the two frameworks specifically addressed the unique social and cultural context of iranian school. the analysis of the data revealed that the english teachers who participated in this study showed a general tendency towards student-centered metaphors. the first three subcategories with the highest percentages belonged to teacher as a ‘guide’, teacher as a ‘nurturer’, and teacher as a ‘model’, correspondingly. the implication for the research finding is that universities and teacher education centers focus on preparing syllabi to have an explicit discussion concerning efl teachers’ conceptions during courses that present student-centered teaching methodology. also, the findings of the present study help evaluating efl teachers’ practice so that classroom management could meet the requisites for student-centered methodologies.