The relevance of reflective practice in the development of pedagogical practice

Abstract The example of good teachers in the authors’ lives prompted them to study the meaning, the essence of effective teaching practice. This study focuses on the experience of teaching and preparing university students of an English Language Teaching graduation course for the C1 Advanced exam (University of Cambridge) in a synchronous remote learning setting over two years (2020 and 2021). Reflective tools were employed to observe and analyse the phenomena in the virtual classroom by means of reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action (Schön, 1983) on an iterative basis to ensure a continuous process of improvement of our pedagogical practice (Celani, 2008; Freeman, 1998; Kolb, 2015). Reflective practice procedures (Schön, 1983; van Manen, 2016) enabled the identification of a need for adjustments in the first sessions of the tutorial that led to changes required to increase the relevance of the learning experience of the students. After reviewing the main results, this article will conclude by demonstrating the effectiveness of the reflective practice procedures (Schön, 1983; van Manen, 2016) in synchronous remote classes in establishing a safe learning environment and raising the teachers’ awareness of the students’ learning objectives and motivations, resulting in a significant learning experience.