This study investigated the strategies Iranian English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers perceived to use to promote EFL learners’ engagement in online gamification. It adopted an integrative framework accommodating the four aspects of engagement, including behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and agentic, while concomitantly incorporating the four layers of ecological systems theory (EST) consisting of microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, and macrosystem. Participants included 23 EFL teachers within the age range of 22 to 42. They were teaching adults at three language institutes in different cities across Iran. The data were collected via semi-structured interviews. The findings showed that the teachers used various strategies to foster student engagement. The thematic analysis of the data revealed that the strategies embraced behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and affective aspects of engagement, and at the same time, they were aligned with four layers of EST at a conceptual level. This study recommends EFL educators and teachers to adopt a holistic ecological perspective in using strategies to maximize student engagement in online gamification.
