Findings Most of the answers above seem to indicate that tutors perceive a need for collaborative work combined with a need to be led or guided. This combination may be an indicator of the importance of a mentor in the professional development process. In general, we can say that most tutors would like to work together in a more collaborative way. One of the reasons may be the fact that they have experienced it in the Tocantins English Project. However, most of them seem not to know how to start such collaboration and expect to be guided by a leader or mentor. These answers, in principle, confirm the assumption that what we need in our TEFL Department at ULBRA is a project to develop teachers collaboratively, through which they can share their doubts and fears, as well as their positive and less positive teaching experiences. The right moment for change Teacher development in Brazil used to be associated with in-service training or further education programmes offered by governmental or private institutions. The effectiveness of such programmes can be considered high, if they are seen from the point of view of methodological or technical training. However, they do not normally go very far beyond the usual updating on new teaching trends, techniques or aids or even on making teachers acquainted with a new syllabus adopted by the institution they work for. Nevertheless, it seems the time has come for the adoption of a wider concept of development, which does not necessarily exclude the aspects mentioned above, but which moves the focus from top-down decisions on training to a wider perception of development as a process of becoming increasingly aware of the quality of the learning atmosphere one creates Widdowson, 1978 35. One of the reasons for this is that the country has slowly woken up from more than twenty years of dictatorship. The latent democratic forces, which enable critical reflection, have been released, opening up the doors for the construction of an emancipating pedagogy and for the improvement of critical educational practices. The nature of such practices can be easily justified by Habermas 1974 theory of a critical social science in which he states that critique understands that its claims to validity can be verified only in the successful process of 26 enlightenment and in what it means in the practical discourse of those concerned. Teacher development programmes in the new century cannot fail to include an element of critical reflection as the full task of a critical educational science requires participants to collaborate with the organisation of their own enlightenment. It includes participation in the decision-making process by which they will transform their situations and some continuing critical analysis in the light of consequences of those transformations which can sustain the engagement in scientific discourse, the processes of enlightenment and practical action Carr and Kemmis, 1986. If teachers are to be participants in the construction of a new educational science, i.e. with a critical view they should be regarded as the main subjects of that structure. Yet how can they act as such if constraints of all sorts often prevent them from even following adequate training programmes A close examination of such constraints Angus, 1995 reveals that in Brazil most courses are costly, timetabling arrangements allow for little time off, travelling time to training sites is long, there are no adequate professional development plans to account for motivation, working conditions often cause feelings of frustration, there is little or no negotiation as to the contents of training courses, follow up procedures carried out by trainers are often inadequate for several reasons, teachers are not involved in the general planning and administration of courses. An attempt to change , The Tocantins State English Project The British Council, in partnership with the Tocantins State Government implemented a project to improve English teachers proficiency and enhance their teaching skills. The Tocantins State English Project TEP officially started in April 2002 under the coordination of Sara Walker, who has been working in English projects in Brazil since 1967. The tutors trainers involved in the project were the same University tutors mentioned above, including myself and other English teachers from language schools from four larger cities nearby. The aim of the project was to benefit serving secondary English schoolteachers in local public schools. There were two hundred and twenty five teachers involved in the project, and by the end of the project, they hoped to have a vast pool of English talent across the country.
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