Abstract :
This study replicated another research project to find out what factors underlie the
Characteristics of Effective English Language Teachers (CEELT) when a large and
more representative and homogeneous sample is selected. The CEELT
questionnaire compiled by Moafian and Pishghadam (2008) was administered to
1469 Iranian learners of English as a foreign language at various private and public
schools in Mashhad, Iran to test three hypotheses addressing the strength of
relationship among the characteristics, the number of extracted factors and their
cross loadings. The 47 characteristics revealed high correlations among themselves
and loaded as well as cross loaded on only five rotated factors when the Principal
Axis Factoring was applied to the participants’ responses, i.e., rapport, fairness,
qualification, facilitation and examination. The results have several research
implications. First, reporting correlation coefficients and the KMO statistic of
sampling adequacy is necessary. Secondly, samples consisting of at least 1000
participants should be selected, preferably with a ratio of 30 cases for each item.
And finally, cross loading variable must be reported because these cross loadings
necessitate adopting a holistic view towards teaching languages and establishing
significant relationships between teacher characteristics and learner abilities such
as language achievement and proficiency.
