Exploring Myanmar EFL Teachers’ Reflective Practice Experiences through Reflecting on Critical Incidents as their Professional Development

Abstract

Reflection is an essential practice in English language teaching, and it is necessary for teachers to reflect on their teaching practices for professional development. However, very few studies have explored EFL teachers’ reflection on critical incidents as professional development through two rounds of self-reflection and online group reflection. This study aimed to investigate three EFL teachers’ reflective practice experiences through reflecting on critical incidents as their professional development in Myanmar. The narrative inquiry method was used, and snowball sampling was applied to recruit three EFL teachers from the politically affected rural areas. The participant teachers were required to engage in self-reflections via narrative frames and group reflections virtually for two weeks. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data about their learning experiences by reflecting on critical incidents. Thematic analysis was applied to analyse the data. The findings indicated six critical incidents that were identified from teachers’ teaching lows and teaching highs. Although EFL teachers in this study were in an educational system, it was found that they reported different critical incidents. They felt both positive and negative emotions at the time of critical incidents. The six sub-themes related to their learning experiences in professional development emerged. This study also highlighted the importance of reflecting on critical incidents for EFL teachers’ professional development. Further research should recruit more EFL teachers in investigating their reflection on critical incidents, and use mixed-method study by applying a simple random sampling method to get more in-depth data. Moreover, future research should be done by using critical incident analysis or other reflective tools with more frequent reflection to understand EFL teachers’ reflective practice experiences in depth.