Innovation in Language Learning

The Due to the growing universal interest in teaching quality and methods of evaluating teaching efficiency, teacher self-assessment can enhance teachers’ sense of agency and contribute formatively to their personal and professional development. This study aimed to apply and re-evaluate Borg’s Self-Assessment Tool for English Language Teachers (SAT) (2018) in the Iranian context. To collect the required data, the original questionnaire, consisting of 48 Likert scale questions in nine thematic areas along with eight additional open-ended questions developed by the researchers was administered to 102 professors at Islamic Azad University (North, Central, and South branches) teaching TEFL and English Translation courses at different academic levels. The qualitative and quantitative analyses of the responses to the Likert scale questions revealed relative but not complete conformity with those of Borg (2018). Some major differences were observed between the frequencies of the options chosen by the participants in both studies, with Iranian professors having provided a more positive self-assessment of their abilities in different areas. There were also differences between the ways in which the participants assessed themselves in terms of the nine categories of the questionnaire. Moreover, in response to the open-ended questions of the present study, some of the participants stated that the questionnaire is biased both educationally and culturally in favor of ESL teachers in developed countries. Therefore, the researchers find the questionnaire still far from global use and, in line with Borg (2018), believe that further studies in terms of its content and combining the SAT questionnaire with classroom observations are required to provide a more revealing picture of what teachers are really capable of doing. Moreover, they suggest the inclusion of the participants’ demographic features in interpreting the results of the questionnaire in case the ultimate purpose is to introduce it as a globally reliable and valid teacher assessment tool.