SLA Research and EFL Pedagogy: Iranian EFL Teachers’ ‎Perspectives in Terms of Their Majors

This study investigated the Iranian EFL teachers’ familiarity, involvement with, accessibility to, and their judgments about usefulness of SLA research. The sources the teachers consult about teaching and SLA research were also explored. Moreover, the main aim of the study was exploring the mentioned issues in terms of the teachers’ majors in order to find any significant associations between the teachers’ majors and the raised issues or any significant differences between the two participating groups of teachers’ perspectives in the above-mentioned subjects. Quantitative data were collected through a questionnaire. 142 participating Iranian EFL teachers were divided into two groups of TEFL and Non-TEFL majors based on their university degrees and their opinions were compared. Using Chi-square test for independence, significant associations were found between the teachers’ majors and their familiarity with and their access to SLA research and materials. Moreover, via independent-samples t-test for the found parametric statistics and Mann-Whitney U Test for the non-parametric statistics, significant differences were found between the opinions of two groups of teachers about the relevance and usefulness of SLA research for classroom teaching as well as two of the items under the topic of teacher-researcher relationship. However, both groups of the Iranian EFL teachers seemed to be willing to cooperate with the SLA researchers and no significant difference was revealed between them. To improve the condition, creating a culture of collaboration as well as the amending of the language teacher education programs and supervision system are vital steps to be taken in Iran.