English teachers’ research engagement: Level of engagement and motivation

The gap between research and practice has been an endemic feature of the Iranian English languageteaching profession. This concern has recently received major attention by the call for empiricalinvestigations to be conducted in order to improve the relationship between research and practice. Thepurpose of the present study was to investigate the extent to which Iranian English teachers engage indoing and reading research. The study also aimed at exploring the motivations that can promoteteachers’ research engagement. Data were collected through conducting qualitative interviews with 24teachers with various teaching backgrounds. Analysis of the data revealed moderate level of researchengagement. The results also showed a wide range of motivations, including teachers’ professionaldevelopment, instrumental incentives, institutional expectations and pedagogical concerns that canpromote teachers’ research engagement. Further analyses demonstrated that teachers’ professionaldevelopment and pedagogical concerns remain their main motivations for research engagement.Instrumental incentives and organizational expectations comprise other potential motivations that canbe profitably used to encourage teachers’ research engagement. However, this is not likely to happenunless working conditions in Iranian schools and policy conditions in national education system arealtered.

کلیدواژه ها:

educational research ، professional development ، research engagement ، research-practicegap ، teachers’ motivations