Language input can be comprehensible and memorable when the language is presented and taught contextualized by using relevant topics, authentic materials, and tasks for learners. Such contextualized language instruction is beneficial because learners can transform their language knowledge from known to unknown, from local to global, from simple to complex, and from concrete to abstract (Bourke, 2006; Korkmaz & Korkmaz, 2013).

The Ministry of Education in Taiwan stipulates that English curriculum must be competency-based for the elementary, junior, and senior high schools, starting from fall semester in 2019. Under the new 12-year basic education curriculum, materials for English instruction must be contextualized. This study will focus on fostering elementary school English teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge on contextualized language instruction, through textbook analysis, instructional leadership, co-planning, and reflection.

Snowball sampling was employed in this study. A total of 41 participants who were interested in being fostered their pedagogical content knowledge in contextualized language instruction were recruited from different cities in Taiwan. Data collected in this study were textbook evaluations, the survey, observations, lesson plans, and teaching materials, documents on professional development, interview, and participating teachers’ reflections.

Overall, participants were aware of the basic concepts of contextualized language instruction, but with limited competence in word knowledge. They considered that relevant and authentic contexts and tasks in textbooks were lacking. Through textbook analysis and collaborative lesson planning, relevant and authentic contexts and tasks were included in their lesson plans. Teachers still need to be equipped with greater pedagogical content knowledge to explain tasks, teach more function language to their learners, and design follow-up checklists.