Becoming Reflective ELT Practitioners: Insights and Foresights From the University of Southeastern Philippines

This chapter focuses on reflective teaching and explores how in-service English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) teachers engage pre-service teachers enrolled in the Bachelor of Secondary Education (BSEd) programme, majoring in English, at the University of Southeastern Philippines (USeP) in reflective practice. Reflective practice at USeP is anchored in Kolb and Kolb’s (2017) experiential learning model and occurs when pre-service teachers participate in field study, internship, and mentoring sessions. Using the apprenticeship framework, pre-service teachers work with experienced in-service teachers and observe their classes to professionally learn from them. Mentoring is also provided by supervising professors who guide pre-service teachers’ reflective observations. The reflective teaching journey embedded in the teacher education programme is complex and demanding. Pre-service teachers first gain theoretical knowledge about reflective practice; they then utilize it through active experimentation in the classroom, where they are encouraged to enact and critically reflect upon pedagogical innovations. This prepares the pre-service teachers to experience real-life teaching practices and challenges, reflect on them, and improve. If they follow this process, it will help to ensure that English language teaching (ELT) in schools is more effective. This is because the process helps the pre-service teachers to become reflective ELT practitioners.