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Workshop Topic Goals1 What is learnerautonomy?2 Learner autonomy inthe Language Centre3 Implementing learnerautonomy4 Developing a strategyfor promoting learnerautonomy5 Teacher research onlearner autonomyTable 2: Focus of learner autonomy workshopsTo engage teachers in defining LA in wayswhich are contextually feasible.To enable teachers to learn about LApractices used by their colleaguesTo introduce teachers to a framework fordescribing LA; to engage them in using itto analyse activities for promoting LA.To discuss obstacles to LA in the LC andways of responding to them productively;to identify strategies for sustaining thework started through these workshops.To introduce teacher research as astrategy through which teachers canexplore learner autonomy in their ownclassrooms.These workshops followed the principles listed above by giving teachersopportunities to explore their understandings of learner autonomy and, equallyimportantly, of how the concept might be defined in a way that was of practical useto the institution (Workshop 1). The workshops also gave teachers the chance toshare ideas about how they promoted learner autonomy (Workshops 2 & 3) as wellas to focus on the challenges involved and responses to them (Workshop 4). Thefocus of the final workshop was on how teachers might, individually or in groups,explore learner autonomy in their own classrooms through teacher research. Whilenot devoid of theoretical input, the workshops had a primary focus on teachers’practices and beliefs in relation to learner autonomy.The handouts used in all five workshops are enclosed in Appendix 4. One keyfeature of these is that data from the prior research phase of the project were usedas a stimulus for the workshop activities. In this manner, a strong link was madebetween this prior research and professional development and we believe thatthis is a productive model for designing contextually-relevant in-service teachereducation. Clearly, the research dimension in this model needs to be rigorousand to generate data which are credible and trustworthy, while the professionaldevelopment phase is likely to be most effective when it reflects the principles weoutlined above (as opposed, for example, to input sessions in which teachers arepresented with the research results).Another feature of the workshops was that ideas generated by teachers early inthe sequence were incorporated into later sessions, thus creating a clear senseof direction, coherence and momentum in the work we were doing. For example,in Workshop 1 the teachers drafted definitions of learner autonomy that they feltwould be workable within their centre; in Workshop 4 we fed these back to theteachers for further analysis and discussion.Teacher Beliefs Autonomy | 239