This applied research identified facilitators and barriers to the implementation of teaching designed to induce critical reflective thinking in learners in programs of Christian higher education in Africa, by teachers in such programs who had received training in such teaching, in order to improve the design of future teacher-training programs. The methodology used was a qualitative case study approach. Analysis of data collected concerning such teachers who were trained in teaching for critical reflective thought constituted the study's basis. The training was grounded in the transformative learning theory of Jack Mezirow and the critical pedagogy of Paulo Freire. The design was informed by academics and practitioners in the fields of adult learning, Christian higher education, faculty development, and missiology. The sample was those teachers in Christian higher education who attended training courses for such teachers either in Nairobi, Kenya or northern Uganda. The data consisted of observations, and interviews. Data were collected at the participants' places of ministry.
The data analyzed in this research was used to develop a rich picture of the contexts in which the subjects taught, and the changes that took place in their teaching. The framework used, primarily from Rogers's diffusion of innovation model, analyzed data in four areas; the characteristics of the innovation, the characteristics of the change agent, the characteristics of the social systems of the subjects, and the characteristics of the participants.
The most significant of the barriers identified were; low level of critical consciousness of teachers, teachers' understanding transformative teaching as a set of methods, lack of learning resources for student use, missadoption of transformative teaching due to a perceived compatibility with previous ways of teaching, and the use of a language of instruction with which both students and teachers were inexpert. The most important facilitators were; teachers who had adopted a basic educational paradigm of critical pedagogy, teachers with passion for teaching, collegial student teacher relationships, mature students, highly committed students, and sufficient learning resources for student use.
Recommendations were made for future teacher training programs, for systemic changes in Christian higher education, and for further research.
