Meeting agenda matters: promoting reflective dialogue in teacher communities

Reflective dialogue as a job-embedded teacher professional learning activity has still been an unexplored area. Little is known about what factors affect its emergence. This study addresses this gap by examining the effect of the frequency of occurrence of particular meeting agendas on the emergence of reflective dialogue in teacher communities as well as what conditions are conducive to promote reflective dialogue. Using a mixed methods research design, first, we created a single-level multiple-indicators multiple-causes model. Through a focus group interview we delved deep into reflective dialogue. In the quantitative part, we found that the conversations on the goals of the school, curriculum, and student learning contributed to the evolution of reflective dialogue among teachers as these topics are more important. As teachers focus more on discussing these three topics, they begin reflecting on their practice through a collaborative dialogue. The follow-up qualitative study revealed that there are more topics that might promote reflective dialogue. Personal and institutional conditions have been revealed as being necessary for creating culture of reflective dialogue. For school leaders, practical solutions to promote reflective dialogue were provided. For researchers, future research directions were suggested to obtain a fuller picture of reflective dialogue across schools.