Abstract
This study aimed to (a) identify necessary elements for promoting English language competence for secondary school English teachers in Japan, and to (b) verify through statistical analysis whether each element is essential for teaching. In the first phase, teachers’ English language competence was defined, and 108 descriptions which satisfied the definition were collected from reference materials. Then, for each description, in-service teachers and students who were taking the teacher training course at universities were asked how much they thought the competence was necessary for teachers, and how well they thought they were equipped with them. The respondents answered these questions using the seven-scale Likert technique. The results showed that both teachers and students thought Grammatical Knowledge, Skills for Spoken Interaction and Spoken Production were important for teaching at schools. However, the respondents also felt that they were not sufficiently equipped with Spoken Interaction Skills.
