Abstract
The purpose of the study was to present what Malaysian student teachers undergoing their teaching practice said about the concerns and processes of learning to teach. This was done through their own self-assessment of their experiences and everyday interactions of their social realities. The data were obtained through student teachers’ reflective writing which was kept as a journal for a period of 14 weeks. The data was analysed to identify the different concerns affecting student teachers. Eighteen different concerns were identified and placed into four main themes: (a) institutional and personal adjustments, (b) classroom management and discipline, (c) methods and strategies, and (d) student achievement. Specific comments were sought to provide citations that represented their concerns. A direct implication of this study was for teacher educators to incorporate these concerns into their curricular and course content. If teacher educators could recognize the issues of practicum students and have them addressed, the anxiety felt by student teachers could be lessened as they go out to learn the ‘how’ and ‘what’ to teach. The value of the study was in the pursuit of using student teachers’ capacity to self-assess and appraise their circumstances as a research area in teaching to reveal a higher complexity of learning in their specific professional domain. Further, it showed how the understanding of learning to teach could be enriched through their own awareness of the surrounding circumstances.
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Acknowledgements
This study was supported by a grant from Sultan Idris Education University (Malaysia) given to the first author. Both authors gratefully acknowledged each of the 14 student teachers involved in this study and who have kindly contributed with integrity and honesty.
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Goh, P.S.C., Matthews, B. (2012). Concerns of Student Teachers: Identifying Emerging Themes Through Self-Assessment. In: Mok, M. (eds) Self-directed Learning Oriented Assessments in the Asia-Pacific. Education in the Asia-Pacific Region: Issues, Concerns and Prospects, vol 18. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4507-0_16
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