A STUDY TO ASSESS THE EXISTING STATUS IN THE TEACHER EDUCATION COLLEGES REGARDING THE USE OF REFLECTIVE PRACTICES BY THE TEACHER EDUCATORS IN PUNE CITY FOR EXCELLENCE IN TEACHER EDUCATION.

“The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.”
“Sydney J. Harris”
The current study set out to find the existing status of use of reflective practices by teacher educators in order to bring excellence in teacher education. With regard to the above mentioned aim, 33 teacher educators participated in the research. Further, in this study, the researchers made use of the following measuring instrument researchers made Self reflection questionnaire to know usage and awareness of reflective practices by teacher educators. Survey method was used and data was collected from 7 teacher education colleges in Pune City. Questionnaire included open and closed ended questions. Closed end questions were analyzed using percentage. Grounded theory was used for interpretation of responses for open end questions. Major findings of the study were that teacher educators always plan their lesson before teaching and mentioned use of reflective practices, but could not list the reflective strategies. However are willing to learn more about reflective practices. They were able to list their qualities as a teacher and did SWOT analysis, but of personal qualities then as a teacher. Theory obtained after performing grounded theory was: Teacher educators are unaware of the new approaches to reflective practices as they mentioned only traditional reflective practices. The teacher educators are aware of their qualities, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats as a teacher, but lack knowledge of reflective strategies.