EFL Teachers' Reflective Journal Writing: Barriers and Boosters

Urmia University Press. Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Urmia, 165, Iran; Tel: +98-44-32752741; Fax: +98-44-32752746; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://ijltr.urmia.ac.ir/

Y

20

English (Second Language); Second Language Learning; Second Language Instruction; Language Teachers; Teacher Attitudes; Foreign Countries; Consciousness Raising; Reflection; Journal Writing; Barriers; Teacher Workshops; Guides; Grounded Theory; Content Analysis; Familiarity; Teaching Methods

2322-1291

The study examined the extent to which Iranian EFL teachers were familiar with reflective journal writing (RJW), the possible contribution of a consciousness-raising interactive workshop to the participants' individual and collective journal writing, and their perception of the barriers to RJW. The study enjoyed a qualitative design employing interviews and journal writings for data collection. Thirty Iranian EFL teachers sat a face-to-face interview. They were also asked to write two reflective journals, (one individually and one collectively), before, and two others after attending a consciousness-raising interactive workshop on reflection which adopted Richards' (1995) framework on teacher reflection and Soodmand Afshar's (in press) journal content guide. The grounded-theory-based content analysis was employed to analyze the data collected. The results indicated an improvement in participants' familiarity with RJW after the event. Furthermore, the barriers to RJW were identified as 'institutional issues', 'teacher issues' and 'educational system issues'.

As Provided

2019

EJ1230316