Exploring L2 writing teacher cognition from an experiential perspective: The role learning to write may play in professional beliefs and practices

•This study focuses on teachers' self-perceptions as writers and language learners.•Self-perceptions were elicited through observation- and document-based interviews.•L1 and L2 writing experiences played varying roles in instructional decision-making.

This study investigates English as a second language (ESL) writing teachers' beliefs about themselves as writers in both their first and second languages. It aims to discover what connections ESL writing teachers may see between their beliefs about and practice of teaching second language (L2) writing and their experiences in writing in their first and second languages. One bilingual mother tongue English language speaker (EL) and one English-as-an-additional-language speaker (EAL), both of whom were PhD students teaching ESL writing part-time in very different classroom contexts, took part in the study. During a 15-week semester, their ESL writing classes were periodically observed and each teacher interviewed, after observations, using stimulated recall. Findings indicated that, when salient for the teachers as writers themselves, both L1 and L2 writing and literacy-learning experiences may figure prominently in L2 instructional decision-making.