Cambodian teachers' responses to child-centered instructional policies: A mismatch between beliefs and practices

•Teachers do not totally shed conventional beliefs to embrace child-centered pedagogy.•Teachers do not fundamentally change their conventional teaching practice.•Classroom realities hinder the adoption of child-centered instruction.•Teachers select and put into practices only some superficial aspects of reform.

Cambodia and her international development partners have been promoting child-centered pedagogy for almost two decades. However, classroom instruction remains predominantly front-oriented and textbook-based. Drawing on questionnaire and interview surveys with primary school teachers in two districts of Cambodia, this study analyzes teachers' beliefs in and classroom implementation of child-centered pedagogy. It has found that teachers fail to adopt this new pedagogy in their classrooms despite their overwhelming support for it. Teachers' failure to act on their beliefs stems from two major reasons: constraining classroom realities and their superficial understanding of the principles underlying child-centered pedagogy.