5 Within Vygotskian sociocultural theory, mediation is a central concept Lantolf
Thorne, 2006 explaining how humans utilise cultural tools in order to undertake activities. The self-evaluation process endorsed in this study requires teachers to use
particular mediational tools for self-reflection including journals or diaries, self-
reporting inventories or checklists, and audio or video recordings of a lesson Richards Lockhart, 1996. Teacher self-evaluation tools proposed by Airasian and Gullickson
1997 include teacher self-reflection questions, media recording and analysis, student feedback tools, teacher portfolios, student performance data, external or peer
observations, journaling, and collegial dialogue involving sharing experience and joint problem solving.
Teachers are thus encouraged to use tools applicable to their teaching context in accordance with their affordances and constraints.
In this study, ten Indonesian English language teachers engaged in assisted teacher self-evaluation as a mediational activity. D
uring the process of data collection, one teacher withdrew his consent. Therefore, the research participants in this study
involved nine English language teachers, whose pseudonyms were Hani, Sandi, Ira, Andi, Selia, Arifin, Maya, Joko, and Nuri.
The teachers used four self-evaluation tools: lesson video recording, teacher self-reflection questions, student feedback, and collegial
dialogue. The four mediational tools were chosen for the following reasons. First,
teacher self-reflection questions provided participants with the opportunity to reflect on
the effectiveness of the lesson and what aspects may need to be improved. Second, video recording the lesson provided participants with a “mirror” to see and assess their
instructional practices. Third, student feedback provided the opportunity for students, as
knowledge receivers, to be positioned as significant contributors to the evaluation of teacher performance and allowed teachers to hear from an “other” perspective.
According to Richardson 2005, student feedback provides important evidence for assessing teaching quality and can be used to support efforts at improving teaching
quality. Fourth, collegial dialogue provided an opportunity for teachers to share
teaching experiences and problems for the purpose of learning from each other.
1.1.3 Teacher self-evaluation and teachers’ habitus
In order to better understand how the teachers’ thinking and reflection processes were linked to their sociocultural contexts during self-evaluation activity, it is necessary
to consider Bourdieu’s sociological theory of habitus, capital, field, and practice since it bridges the gap between what seems to be individual learning and sociocultural context
6 Kang, 2002. Bourdieu’s sociological theory functions as a lens to view the interplay
between structural conditions and identity, and to evaluate the impacts of this interplay on activities within education programmes in particular teacher professional
development Braun, 2012; Ecclestone, 2004; Makewa, Role, Genga, 2011; Mayer, 1999. Bourdieu 1977, p. 10 defined habitus as “a system of lasting, transposable
dispositions which …functions at every moment as a matrix of perceptions, appreciations, and actions” italics in original. These perceptions, appreciations, and
actions are shaped from past experiences and mostly gained through early childhood in the family. These perceptions organise educational experiences and affect and modify
teachers’ habitus, which in turn organises further experiences such as additional learning or employment Wesner, 2007. Therefore, habitus may be used as a concept
to explain teachers’ instructional practice, especially how a teacher’s experience as a learner in social activities influences the way he or she acts in relation to their teaching
practice, given that teachers tend to imitate their personal educational experiences when they teach Lortie, 1975.
Habitus requires two interrelated aspects, capital and field, to shape the individual’s practices or actions. Capital is defined as an objectified or embodied
resource that can potentially produce different types of profits Bourdieu, 1986. Field is defined as structured systems of social positions in which actors compete for access to
and control over specific resources. Furthermore, Bourdieu 1984 formulated: habitus x capital + field = practice to explain that an individual’s practices or actions are the
outcome of the interplay of hisher habitus and capital within a given field. Accordingly, to identify a teacher’s pedagogic habitus, it was necessary to identify the teacher’s
capital economic, cultural, and social and the fields or social sites that have their own
particular structure and policies. Unfortunately, little research exists to indicate how teacher habitus can be
changed. Bourdieu’s notion of habitus has been criticised for being somewhat static and deterministic. However, he argued “habitus is not the fate that some people read into it.
It is an open system of dispositions that is constantly subjected to experiences, and therefore constantly affected by them in a way that either reinforces or modifies its
structures. It is durable but not eternal”Bourdieu Wacquant, 1992, p. 133. Further, Appadurai 1996 argued that global processes are to make the case as to why habitus
should be static rather than dynamic. Specifically, he stated:
7 There has been a general change in the global conditions of life worlds; put
simply, where once improvisation was snatched out of the glacial undertow of habitus, habitus now has to be painstakingly reinforced in the face of life-worlds
that are frequently in flux Appadurai, 1996, p. 56.
Indeed, Roth 2002, p. 50 stated that habitus can be changed “through an awakening of certain forms of self-consciousness and self-work that enables practitioners to get a
handle on their dispositions”. That is, there is the possibility that a certain activity can alter someone’s habitus if heshe is aware of the potential for improvement and has the
motivation to change. From a sociocultural theoretical perspective, the transformation from inter-psychological to intra-psychological processes is mediated by culturally
constructed and organised instrumental means. In this context, teachers’ self-awareness is influenced by situational affordances and constraints as well as by attention to the
quality of the mediation itself.
1.2 Research questions
