Online EFL Classrooms: How Teacher Power Affects Attitudes Toward Learning?

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, teachers and students worldwide have embarked on vigorous knowledge discovering adventures as conventional teaching approaches have been challenged and reimagined. The drastic shift from traditional classrooms to virtual methods to avoid learning disruption has paved ways for new educational research needs. This research delves into the impact of teacher power on learning within online EFL classrooms, hoping to provide an insight to help teachers and students better understand their power relation in the digital era. Specifically, it inspects how EFL teachers use teacher power to impact learning in virtual environments. Data collected from a survey and focus group interviews with 465 participants reveal that expert, reward, and reference powers are used at high frequencies, while legitimate and coercive powers are found to be seldom or never utilized. Students respond positively to teachers’ contingent exhibition of expertise, dedication, and genuine interest in their development. However, they express reservations about inconsistent communications of rules and expectations, which are likely to induce stress and negative attitudes towards learning. This information highlights a rather complex power dynamics within the studied context. Teachers are encouraged to critically reflect on their power practices to create more conducive learning environments for students in the modern era