Reflective Writing of Mexican EFL Writers: Levels of Reflection, Difficulties and Perceived Usefulness

Ruth Roux,Axel Tamez,Alberto Mora

doi:10.5539/elt.v5n8p1

Ruth Roux, Axel Tamez + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.5539/elt.v5n8p1

Copy DOI

Abstract

This case study examined the level of reflection in the essays written by 15 Mexican English language teachers taking a Master’s Degree course in English as a foreign language (EFL). The essays were evaluated using the categorization scheme for assessing the level of reflection developed by Kember, et al. (2008). Semi-structured interviews were held with information-rich participants to investigate the difficulties experienced with reflective writing and the usefulness attributed to this academic genre. Findings suggest that the categorization scheme is applicable to reflective writing in EFL, although almost half of the participants continued to write in a non-reflective mode throughout the course. Low level of proficiency in English, lack of familiarity with reflective writing, challenges of deductive reasoning, and the absence of productive feedback were their reported difficulties. Reflective writing was deemed useful because it facilitates participation in class discussion, a more thorough completion of course readings, the adoption of a stance towards SLA theories, and improvement of academic writing ability.

Highlights

This case study examined the level of reflection in the essays written by 15 Mexican English language teachers taking a Master’s Degree course in English as a foreign language (EFL)
As a result of the analysis of the reflective papers in terms of level of reflection, 51% of the 75 pieces of work were classified as “non-reflection”,; 44% were classified as “understanding” a concept or theory; 3% were classified as “reflective”; and none of the papers showed evidence of a change in perspective
This case study investigated the level of reflection in the written work of 15 Mexican English language teachers taking a Masters’ degree course

Summary

Introduction

This case study examined the level of reflection in the essays written by 15 Mexican English language teachers taking a Master’s Degree course in English as a foreign language (EFL). Writing is a vehicle for reflection to learn academic content (Boud, 2001), it is the only means through which teacher educators can analyze student teachers’ thinking related to their learning experiences. Reflective writing is a permanent record of thoughts and experiences (Colton & Sparks-Langer, 1993) considered useful for both, student teachers and teacher educators. On the other hand, may use reflective writing as a window to students’ thinking and learning What they view from that window can help them establish and maintain relationships with students (Spalding & Wilson, 2002), to better facilitate their learning. Superficial reflection tends to merely reproduce knowledge presented by others, while deep reflection produces a change in perspective of a belief or understanding

Methods

Results

Conclusion