Teaching Practice from the ELT Student Teachers' Perspectives: A Case Study of Semnan Farhangian University

Teaching practice is considered as an important component of becoming a teacher. It provides the student teachers experience in the actual teaching and learning environment. During teaching practice, a student teacher has the opportunity to try the art of teaching before actually getting into the real world of the teaching profession. As Marais and Meier (۲۰۰۴) argue, the term teaching practice displays the range of experiences to which student teachers are exposed when they work in classrooms and schools. They believe that teaching practice is a challenging but important part of teacher training, especially in developing countries, where the effectiveness of the teaching practice can be diminished or eroded by a range of challenges. As scholars argue, geographical distance, low and uneven levels of teacher expertise, a wide-ranging lack of resources are some of the challenges. The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate the dimensions of Farhangian University internship system. To this end, ۱۰ female ELT student teachers from Semnan Farhangian University were conveniently sampled and interviewed. The participants refereed to the problems caused by the university and the schools as the possible sources of teaching practice weaknesses. The strengths and opportunities of the teaching practice program were also referred to by the participants. This study has some implications for teachers, teacher educators and policy makers.

Keywords:

Teacher education , Teaching practice , Student teachers