Content uploaded by Fatma Tokoz
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Fatma Tokoz on Oct 05, 2018
Content may be subject to copyright.
Chapter
39
Şehnaz ŞAHİNŞ and Fatma TOKÖZ GÖKTEPE
“My Story n Practcum”: A
project of student-teachers’ acton
research durng practcum
5
Background
is paper presents our journey in which we guided our student-teachers (se-
nior students enrolled in a B.A. English language teaching program) to do
their own action research during their practicum. Student-teachers in gen-
eral go through some challenges in their teaching during the practicum (Far-
rell, 2007) and may suer from a lack of support (Valencia et al, 2009). is
was something we also observed in our students’ teaching experiences during
practicum. No matter what they learned in their educational program, almost
all of them were inclined to use a kind of grammar-translation method in their
teaching and had many classroom management problems. Even more prob-
lematically, they were observed and assessed by only one supervisor from the
university once or twice in a semester.
In short, the problems that were related to the practicum could be grouped
under two main issues. e rst was related to their teaching in the practicum.
Students were left alone with the school mentor at the practicum school most
of the time, so they mainly followed whatever the teacher asked them to do.
Some were lucky enough to have a supportive, helpful, and innovative school
mentor, but some had to work with more traditional and less collaborative
ones. When we observed them, we realized by the end of the semester that
there were some serious teaching problems; however, it was too late to provide
them with instructive feedback. e second issue was the assessment system
for the practicum period, which we believed was unfair. e assessment was
done at the end of the semester by the school mentor and the university su-
pervisor based on the scoring criteria designated by the university in line with
the higher education institution standards. Although all the student-teachers
were going through the same process, they were assessed by dierent school
Çağ University
40
“My Story in Practicum”
mentors and supervisors. We realized that some school mentors focused more
on the student-teachers’ behaviours than on their teaching whereas some did
just the opposite. e same problem was true for the supervisors as well. Bas-
ing their assessment only on one observation (and sometimes for only half of
the class-time because of time limits), some supervisors were more generous
than others. ere were always some students complaining about this unfair
assessment procedure.
Such problems made us look for ways to improve our students’ practicum
experiences. e idea came into our minds in 2015 when we attended the
‘Teachers Research!’ – IATEFL ReSIG Conference where Kenan Dikilitas
and the enthusiasm of lots of other researchers and colleagues encouraged and
inspired us to form an action research team at our institution. ere we decid-
ed to launch the project of My Story in Practicum (MySiP) with our student-
teachers, who would be supported to carry out action research to deal with an
issue related to their practicum classes. e rest of this paper explains what we
could and could not do during these two years in the project.
My story in practicum project (MySiP)
Like the other senior students in ELT departments in Turkey, our students
go to practicum schools for two semesters. e rst semester is devoted to
classroom observation. ey are given weekly tasks to focus on while observ-
ing and are expected to report these observations to us as their supervisors at
the university. As an initial step to our project, we asked the students to be as
reective as possible while observing and writing their reports, and to identify
some issues they might have while teaching. ey shared their experiences and
reections on these issues with us at an allocated time one by one. is was a
preparation stage for the action research they were going to conduct the fol-
lowing semester.
e project formally started in the second semester of the 2015-2016 aca-
demic year, when students had their rst teaching experiences in the practicum
schools. e students were reminded that they were to carry out their action
research on the issue(s) they had identied in the rst semester. Because stu-
dents needed guidance and support, we added an Action Research course into
the program this semester, where they learned the basics of action research and
had the chance to examine some sample action research studies. We devel-
Şehnaz ŞAHİNKARAKAŞ and Fatma TOKÖZ GÖKTEPE
41
oped a collaborative model in which all the parties (action research mentors,
university supervisors, school mentors, and student-teachers,) would work in
collaboration with each other (See Figure 1). Within this model, the role of
the action research mentors (AR mentor) is to train the student-teachers on
how to conduct action research and to guide them within this process through
continuous feedback and discussion sessions. University supervisors have the
role of mentors but also the intermediary between the university and the
practicum school. ey visit the schools every week and observe the student-
teachers while teaching. ere they discuss the student-teachers’ progress with
the school mentors and give constructive feedback to the student-teachers on
the way they teach. ey are also in constant relation with the AR mentor(s).
School mentors are the teachers who are assigned by the practicum school
principals as the mentors of the student-teachers at school. ey guide the
student-teachers in all aspects of a school day, like teaching, developing and
grading assessment tasks, managing the classroom, interacting with the stu-
dents, and so on. e following sections deal with the process we went through
within this model.
2015-2016 Academic year
In this project, we followed Kemmis and McTaggart’s (1988) cyclical process
steps: planning, action, observation, and reection. Planning step had actually
started in the rst semester when the student-teachers were asked to reect
on possible issues they might encounter while teaching or on some areas they
wanted to explore. In the Action Research course in the second semester, the
student-teachers were required to watch one of the video-recorded classes
they had taught in their practicum class in their own time (at least two or three
times) with their peer(s). ey were asked to focus on their teaching practice
and describe an issue and/or a problem they had experienced in their class-
room. is led them to determine the area(s) of their teaching practice they
would like to change or improve and prepare their action research plan. ey
presented this plan in the classroom to other peers and the AR mentor to get
some feedback and suggestions for the research. Later on, the student-teacher,
the AR mentor, and the supervisor had some meetings to ne-tune the action
research cycles. Only then did the student-teachers start implementing their
plans and collecting the data.
42
“My Story in Practicum”
Figure 1. Collaborative Practicum Model
Within the process of data collection, the students received feedback from
AR mentors. ey were also expected to contact their supervisors at least once
every two weeks in order to discuss the process they underwent. During these
meetings, they shared retrospective experiences on their teaching practices and
reected back across this experience related to the issue they would like to
change in their classroom. As AR mentors and supervisors, our role was to
help them examine what the collected data told them from a critical point of
view and nd their own solutions to handling the issue they experienced in
their practice teaching. We were like critical friends (Burns, 2010), as we pro-
vided them with an auxiliary perspective in a supportive way.
e students were required to write their action research reports by the end
of the semester as an assignment for the Action Research course. We also organ-
ised a poster-presentation conference named ‘My Story in Practicum (MySiP)’
at the university to publicise their studies. All the students and instructors in
the department, the parents of the student-teachers, and the school mentors
were invited to the conference. us, they were able to present their expe-
riences and reections throughout the process, which motivated them and
the other students in the department. We had also encouraged them to share
their experiences in the ‘2016 Teachers Research Conference’ that took place in
Istanbul. Because it would be highly dicult for most students to pay the
conference fee, we got in touch with the conference organizers to consider this
issue, and they were kind enough to oer a lower fee for our students. us,
Şehnaz ŞAHİNKARAKAŞ and Fatma TOKÖZ GÖKTEPE
43
ten of our students participated and presented their research in that confer-
ence. At the next conference in 2017, a lower fee was announced to all students
by IATEFL, which showed that IATEFL is supportive not only to teacher-
researchers but also student-researchers.
2016-2017 Academic year
We continued the same project the following year but with some modication
based on our experiences in the previous year. e rst modication was to in-
crease the number of supervisors, because in the rst year of the project we had
found that dealing with the whole process as only two supervisors was quite
exhausting. Each of us, as supervisors, had about 15 students to work with
regularly, observe their teaching, and give feedback on it. ere were times we
needed to observe some students more often, but we were hampered by the
limited time. Four other instructors voluntarily accepted to join the team: Two
of them were experienced teachers working at our department for many years.
ey expressed their positive feelings about the MySiP project and stated that
they would willingly join the team. e other two were the new research as-
sistants at the department who had gone through a similar experience in the
previous year when they were practicum students.
e second modication was the organisation of the student observations
in the practicum schools. We had 32 students in total and three practicum
schools. We organized the observations in such a way that every week two
dierent supervisors visited the practicum school. us, each of the six super-
visors had the chance to observe almost all the students, and each student was
observed at least by four of the supervisors. is helped the students to receive
feedback from dierent perspectives and led to more fair assessment.
Another modication was related to the poster-presentation conference
at the end of the semester. We decided to invite a well-known scholar in the
eld to give a talk to the students before the poster presentations. Prof. Dr.
Özden Ekmekçi kindly accepted our invitation and gave a valuable talk on
the qualities of a good teacher. is obviously was another motivating factor
for the students; not only the student-teachers but the other students in the
department were also all very excited to have the chance to make conversation
with and ask their questions to a well-known scholar. As in the previous year,
we invited the school mentors in the practicum schools as well as parents and
we ended up with a fruitful experience.
44
“My Story in Practicum”
On the whole, it is possible to state that our project was successful and
provided an example for other universities that want to improve the practicum
process and enhance professional development of teacher candidates. Among
many positive outcomes, which are discussed in the following section, this
project led our students to broaden their horizons. We again encouraged them
to present their research in the Teachers Research-2017 conference in Istanbul
and 12 student-teachers attended the conference. ey had the chance to lis-
ten to many worldwide scholars there and even received feedback from some
of them.
Reections on the project
By the end of the academic year, we asked the students to ll in an open-ended
exit survey so that we could get to know about and appreciate their feelings
and experiences about doing action research in the practicum. According to
the data we collected, we can state that they had started to raise more aware-
ness about their selves as future teachers:
is project helped me to step back and see the bigger picture and realized how the
practice is dierent from the theory.
It helped me explore who I am and what I want for my future students.
Consulting my mentors/supervisors and learning from their experiences made me see
‘I am not alone’ experiencing these conicts and diculties.
e students-teachers realized that what they learned at school did not always
t in the real classroom environment, and they had to develop their own way
of considering the actual context. Such an awareness may help the student-
teachers to realise that it is not always possible to directly transfer their knowl-
edge, but that it is important to build initial foundations of a teacher identity
through social practice (Gebhard, 2009).
e project also helped them understand the importance of being a teacher
researcher:
At the very beginning when I learned we need to do action research in practicum, I
said, ‘Ugh, oh God, what’s that? We do not need to do a research to teach something!
is just gives extra burden in the last year!’ But, now I understand how I was
wrong.
Şehnaz ŞAHİNKARAKAŞ and Fatma TOKÖZ GÖKTEPE
45
Action research was really helpful to my teaching because it improved my own prac-
tices. We were not only a teacher but also a researcher.
By doing action research, I could see the changes in my teaching.
Action research helped me discover the potential problems that rose in a classroom and
the ways to deal with them by following some steps.
Hopefully such an understanding will lead these student-teachers to keep
doing their own research in the future and continuously develop themselves
through collaboration with colleagues and their students.
Looking to the future
is study revealed that doing action research in the practicum gave an op-
portunity to student-teachers and mentors/supervisors to develop a sense of
community and to understand each other by nurturing professional develop-
ment in a supportive environment. By doing so, we could explore ways of
addressing student-teachers’ needs before and during the practicum. In the
feedback sessions and informal conversations about their practicum, most of
them explained that the ideal views they had before teaching were replaced by
the reality of the actual classroom setting and carrying out an action research
helped to bridge this gap. As one stated, teaching in the practicum was ‘like
travelling to a new country where they did not know how to survive’; however,
action research and the mentor/supervisor support were like ‘a caring mother
who would give the required equipment to survive’. is metaphor reects
how they saw their practicum experience.
Mentoring involves providing emotional support and exchanging opin-
ions (Stanulis & Russell, 2000). us, as university instructors and mentors, we
should build mutual rapport with our student-teachers so that they can become
more self-condent and facilitate critical reection on their practices. During
our project, we came across some concerned student-teachers who had diculty
understanding the reasons for doing action research and questioned the benet
of this process. However, at the end of the project, most of them came to express
their gratitude and intention to keep it up in their classroom. In our view, ELT
departments that wish to mentor their students should consider including ac-
tion research or similar courses to support practicum experiences.
46
“My Story in Practicum”
Having successfully completed the second year of the project, at least in our
context, we would suggest that the mentor/supervisor and student-teachers
need to have regular contact, enthusiasm and energy, and a sense of autonomy
and belonging to assist each other constantly to improve this practicum pro-
cess. As a result of this study, we now both view ourselves as teacher-research-
ers who are in search of new ways to make student-teachers’ stories more re-
markable and meaningful by strengthening the relationship between the two
parties.
References
Burns, A. (2010). Doing action research in English language teaching: A guide for
practitioners. New York: Routledge.
Farrell, T. S. C. (2007). Failing the practicum: Narrowing the gap between
expectations and reality with reective practice. TESOL Quarterly, 41(1),
193-201. doi: 10.2307/40264340
Gebhard, J. G. (2009). e practicum. In A. Burns & J. C. Richards (Eds.), e
Cambridge Guide to Second Language Teacher Education (pp. 250-258). New
York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
Kemmis, S., & McTaggart, R. (1988). e action research planner (3rd ed.). Vic-
toria, Canada: Deakin University.
Stanulis, R. N., & Russell, D. (2000). “Jumping in”: trust and communication
in mentoring student teachers. Teaching and Teacher Education, 16, 65-80.
Valencia, S. W., Martin, S. D., Place, N. A., & Grossman, P. (2009). Complex
interactions in student teaching: Lost opportunities for learning. Journal of
Teacher Education, 60(3), 304-322. doi: 10.1177/0022487109336543
