From practice to practice: reflective practice in language teacher education as a stepping stone to professional practice and CPD

There has been a growing demand among student teachers for an increase in the practical components of teacher education programmes, particularly in academic settings. This includes a desire for more practice-based activities, such as observations and micro-teaching, as well as more authentic teaching experiences as part of a teaching placement in school settings. As a profession of teacher educators, it behoves us to investigate such activities to better understand how to effectively integrate them, as they represent a significant resource investment for the institutions involved. One dimension of this understanding comes in the form of uncovering student teachers’ perceptions of the practice-oriented undertakings they experience during their teacher education. To that end, the research reported in this paper aims to examine the opinions of student teachers in relation to these practice elements using a pedagogies of practice framework (Grossman et al. 2009) as well as uncovering their perceived predicted levels of engagement in CPD after graduation. A survey of student teachers undertaking English language teaching programmes in Ireland and Norway provides the data for this study, which shows very high preferences for the more authentic practice experiences as well as a widespread commitment to specific CPD activities post-qualification.