efl teachers' perceptions and practices of reflective teaching: inhibitors and motivators

Reflective pedagogy has been one of the frameworks helping language teachers foster their professional development. however, teachers seem to be unaware of the concept or unwilling to practice it in their class and little is known about the challenges they face and the existing solutions. this study aims to investigate the status of reflective practice among iranian efl teachers and delve into its inhibitors and motivators. this explanatory mixed-methods study examines the matches and mismatches between the perception and actual practice of reflection among novice, developing, and experienced efl teachers. 190 iranian teachers completed the reflective teaching inventory by akbari et al., (2010) to explore their level of reflective practice. to investigate whether they enact their perception of reflective teaching, the classroom videos of 9 participants out of those with high reflection practice were observed. in the qualitative phase, all of the above participants also answered a structured interview to measure their inhibitors and motivators for practicing reflective teaching in their classrooms. exploratory factor analysis (efa) was used to validate the questionnaire which resulted in four factors. a three-group manova was used to measure the potential effects of teachers’ experience on different extracted constructs of reflective practice. the findings indicated a medium level of reflective practice and showed no significant difference among teachers with different years of experience. the absolute majority of participants revealed positive attitude toward reflective practice. also, they raised several challenges like unfamiliarity with the concept, limited class time, and hectic work schedule. they suggested a number of motivators such as providing cooperative environment, including the concept in the teacher training courses, and increasing the payment. a number of implications have also been suggested at the end of the study.