The effective English language teacher from the perspective of Ecuadorian university students

Abstract

Abstract: Studying EFL teacher effectiveness has been a constant issue in the last decade, mainly. Nevertheless, these investigations have focused on teachers and education administrators perceptions. Most of them have been conducted in countries different from Latin America. This research aims to create a profile of university students perceptions concerning the qualities of an effective EFL teacher. For doing so, a quantitative approach was used, and the Effective English Language Teacher (EELT) questionnaire by Zamani and Ahangari (2016) was applied to learners from a public university (N=324). The findings reveal that the participants value Pedagogical Knowledge as the most relevant dimension of an effective EFL university teacher above organization and communication skills, Socio-affective skills, and English Proficiency. Therefore, the three main relevant features of an effective EFL university teacher were be flexible with grading (1.70), have a good sense of humor (1.65) and avoid direct criticism of students when they make errors (1.61). Finally, some recommendations are outlined in this proposal, too.