Developing a Critical Reflection Stance Towards Language Teaching Practice: European Portfolio for Student Teachers of Languages and Reflective Tasks in Language Education

The European Portfolio for Student Teachers of Languages (EPOSTL) is used with students undergoing an initial teacher education program at the Department of English Language and Literature at the Faculty of Philosophy in Sarajevo. The use of the EPOSTL tool in language teaching pedagogy courses is generally seen as a very positive measure in different European countries and different teaching and learning contexts (Newby, 2012). The tool supports the prospective teachers of foreign language in planning and assessing their own professional development by keeping a record of their teaching experiences provided for them as in-class simulations, in-class observations, or in-class and in-school practice teaching. This paper will discuss the general findings of the teaching reflection cycles implemented in the practice of teacher development. The paper will additionally reflect on some other examples of integrating reflective teaching into language education courses that comprise the teacher education curriculum. The research aims to support students in their future professional development by introducing the EPOSTL, and other reflective tasks for language learning, which did prove to be efficient tools in preparing student teachers to reflect on different aspects of language learning and teaching in a variety of different, challenging, and context-specific teaching situations and by adopting an enquiry stance towards everyday teaching and learning practice.