Pre-service EFL teacher learning during the practicum : a multiple case study in a context of systemic dissonance

This study examines the contribution of the practicum to student teacher learning and investigates the factors hindering or facilitating such learning in a pre-service English language teacher education context in Turkey. For the purposes of the study, student teacher learning is defined as a change in student teachers’ stated cognitions and teaching practices. Adopting a sociocultural perspective to learning, it is assumed that any learning that takes place would be mediated by the socialisation of the student teachers into the practicum context. Qualitative longitudinal research was conducted into five cases of student teachers situated within their supervision triads through classroom observations, semi-structured and video stimulated interviews. Drawn from narrative and thematic analysis of the data, the findings show that during the practicum, the student teachers gained basic instructional skills, recognised tensions between the ideals promoted by the teacher education programme and the realities of the classrooms, strove mainly to survive the assessed practicum and to develop a perception of themselves as teachers. While the student teachers benefited from practising teaching in real language classrooms, the main factors impeding their learning were limited access to teaching, the absence of constructive feedback and the lack of communication among the partners who were involved in the organisation and implementation of the practicum. The opportunities created for student teacher learning were influenced not only by the local institutional factors but also wider social, cultural contextual factors. Further analysis of the data has led to the generation of a model of student teacher learning during the practicum. The major contribution of this study is to uncover the pivotal role of practicum context in affording opportunities for student teacher learning and to explicitly demonstrate the collective impact of the multidimensional factors on such learning. The findings of the study have direct implications for the design of English language teacher education practices, and also offer suggestions for further research into pre-service student teacher learning.