Reflective Practices in Teaching: A Study on Faculties of Royal University of Bhutan Colleges

Abstract

Aims: Reflective practice refers to teachers' conscious efforts to question their daily activities in the classroom to help them learn and develop professionally. The purpose of this study was to determine the level of reflective practices among Royal University of Bhutan (RUB) faculty members, as well as if these activities differed according to demographic characteristics of the respondents. The study's theoretical framework is the four reflective lenses of Brookfield, namely: student's eye, colleague's eye, Research and theory, and personal experiences/ autobiographies. Study Design: A descriptive research design with a quantitative approach was used in this study. Place and Duration of Study: The study was conducted in Bhutan for a period of one year (2020-2021) Methodology: A total of 186 faculty members from the colleges of the Royal University of Bhutan participated in the study using an online structured questionnaire through Google Form. Descriptive statistics, a one-sample t-test, One-way ANOVA, and an independent sample t-test were used to evaluate and present the findings. Results: The findings revealed that Royal University of Bhutan colleges' faculty members engage in reflective practices, with student feedback being the most widely utilized strategy for reflection among the four lenses, and peer feedback being the least used technique. The results also showed that there were no differences in educators' reflective practices depending on gender, the number of years of teaching experience, or training attended during in-service years. Conclusion: The study's main recommendations are to promote peer help in enabling classroom reflection and to provide faculty members with training and development opportunities in various teaching pedagogies.