The Effects of Microteaching Experience on Student Teachers’ Secondary English Class Observation

영어교육연구 제27권 4호 2015년 겨울 10.17936/pkelt.2015.27.4.01 The Effects of Microteaching Experience on Student Teachers’ Secondary English Class Observation Kyungsuk Chang (Korea Institute for Curriculum & Evaluation) Youngjoo Jeon (Mokwon University) Chang, Kyungsuk, & Jeon, Youngjoo (2015) The effects of microteaching experience on student teachers’ secondary English class observation English Language Teaching, 27(4), 1-21 In the field of pre-service teacher education microteaching has been widely used to help student teachers with instructional experiences with focus on teaching skills Recent attention to microteaching to enhance student teachers’ awareness relates to emphasis on reflection in professional development This study aims to investigate how prospective teachers’ microteaching experience influenced their English class observation The research was conducted with a total of 35 student teachers attending the ELT department at a Teachers College The data was gathered via class observation before and after microteaching experience, where the participants’ teaching was videotaped and reflected The used observation scheme consists of five areas including preparation, presentation, execution/methods, personal characteristics, and teacher-student interaction The analysis of the observation data in each area reveals that there was statistically significant difference before and after microteaching The execution/methods area shows more difference than any other area The oral and written reflection data is analyzed to see how microteaching affected the subjects’ perception on the English language teaching they observed The study concludes with some suggestions for incorporating microteaching into a pre-service teacher education program to help student teachers become reflective practitioner I INTRODUCTION Cruickshank and Metcalf (1993) defined microteaching as a scaled-down teaching encounter in which pre-service teachers demonstrate their ability to perform one of several desirable teacher abilities to a group of 3-5 peers during a short time period Microteaching was developed in the early 1960s at the Stanford Teacher Education Program, representing a significant departure from traditional kinds of teacher training programs (McKnight, 1980) With its original focus on discrete teaching skills, microteaching has been widely used to teach student  1st author: Kyungsuk Chang; Corresponding author: Youngjoo Jeon Kyungsuk Chang, Youngjoo Jeon teachers to master specific teaching skills in the field of pre-service teacher education In microteaching a student prepares and teaches a brief lesson to their peers Feedback is provided once the lesson is completed Microteaching involves teaching simplified in three ways: class size, lesson length and task complexity (Benton-Kupper, 2001; Fernández & Roinson, 2007) As Benton-Kupper (2001) states, while some may have come and gone, incorporating microteaching experience into pre-service teacher education programs is still alive and strong in the 21st century He goes on to note that various components to microteaching have been altered or added but the general philosophy still remains The long-term survival of microteaching in teacher education appears to be attributed to the philosophy and its effectiveness in improving student teachers’ teaching skills Subramanianm (2006) indicates, the use of microteaching within teacher education is seen as an on-campus way of introducing pre-service teachers to the complexities of teaching and a bridge that connects theory to practice As Benton-Kupper (2001) points out, the concept of microteaching appears to be alive and well Microteaching is considered to be a viable approach to meeting the desired goals of preparing pre-service teachers to become effective and reflective teachers (Amobi, 2005) Expanding pre-service teachers’ microteaching experience to reflective practice relates to a paradigm shift from skill or competency-based teacher education In the traditional skill or competency-based prescriptive approach, student teachers practice discrete teaching skills or techniques to master them to be an effective teacher (Burns & Richards, 2009) This approach has been criticized for dilemmas novice teachers face in the real classroom setting Components to microteaching have been changed to meet the need to enhance student teachers’ reflection (Amobi, 2005) Emphasis has moved to pre-service teachers’ active involvement in reflection on their teaching practice beyond mastering discrete teaching skills Compared to the developments of microteaching in the field of general education, little research has been done in second language teacher education Little has been explored about how microteaching affects student teachers’ attitudes, perception, or awareness of teaching This study aims to investigate how prospective English teachers’ microteaching experience influenced the way of doing class observation It examines the impacts of microteaching on student teachers’ development in the pre-service teacher education setting Implications are drawn from the findings for pre-service teacher training program and evaluation, long-term teacher professional development, and field-based practicum II RELEVANT LITERATURE Learning Discrete Teaching Skills Microteaching is often focused on practicing a particular teaching skill, e.g presenting The Effects of Microteaching Experience on Student Teachers’ Secondary English Class Observation learning objectives, providing feedback, using wait-time appropriately etc The Stanford model developed in the early 1960s is considered to be the most commonly practiced form of microteaching in language teacher training (Cripwell & Geddes, 1982) Fundamental skills all teachers needed were established from the observation and analysis of a large number of lessons As McKnight (1980) puts, when it was developed in the 1960s it was seen as a way of acclimatizing students to teaching over a shorter time period, and early studies indicated a favorable comparison with traditional student teaching, presumably because of the use of nurturant and continuing supervisory feedback, the development of a group of technical skills of teaching and the reduction of the complexity and scope of normal classroom variables (a number of students, length of lessons, etc.) to provide a scaled-down, yet realistic, teaching environment Principal factors studied at early research were the scaled-down format, the technical skills of teaching, and the use of modeling and feedback variables in the technical skills training (Allen & Ryan, 1969; McLeod & McIntyre, 1977) Early studies on microteaching measured teaching skill acquisition by counting frequency of the desired behavior across the various teaching occasions Videotaping was used to provide reliable and valid data on student teachers’ teaching performance (Lee, 1992) McKnight (1980) depicts a typical microteaching as a program where after a technical skill of teaching is described for the trainee through a videotape of a master teacher modeling the skill, the trainee’s subsequent brief teaching performance is videotaped and then reviewed under various supervisory and other feedback contingencies Its original model of microteaching in the 1960s was cyclical in nature since it involved ‘plan, teach, observe, critique’ followed by the repetition of the same steps after the whole process was reviewed (Amobi, 2005; Bell, 2007; Ismail, 2011) Microteaching has gained popularity in the pre-service language teacher training in that it may bridge the gap between theory and practice As Ismail (2011) points out, a microteaching program provides pre-service teacher-trainees with a simulated situation to put the theories that they have learned into practice and to develop confidence and teaching skills while conducting a mini-lesson to their colleagues While some consider microteaching as fake teaching since it does not involve real students in a real teaching situation where a teacher and students interact naturally, it has been argued that it provides students with valuable teaching experiences and made them aware of the benefits and relationships between theory and practice (Bell, 2007; Ismail, 2011) Subramaniam (2006) analyses the benefits that microteaching provide pre-service teachers in various studies (Amobi, 2005; Brent & Thomson, 1996; Farris, 1991; Hawkey, 1995; Wilkinson, 1996) Among them are exposing them to the realities of teaching, introducing to the roles as teachers, and helping them to see the importance of planning, decision making, and implementation of instruction, enabling them to develop and improve teaching skills, and helping them build confidence for teaching Judging from a number of studies on the effects of Kyungsuk Chang, Youngjoo Jeon microteaching, it is convincing that microteaching affects positively However, as Cripwell and Geddes (1982) point out, it is still difficult to see how microteaching can give help with the development of skills that are only observable in a real situation, particularly if trainees are teaching a microclass of other student teachers Student Teachers’ Reflection on Teaching In the developmental paradigm of language teacher education, emphasis is given to the individual teachers’ socio-cultural context (Johnson, 2006; Wright, 2010) While fundamental skills needed by teachers are practiced in microteaching, it is observed that teaching practice in a microclass depends largely on how individual teachers perceive good teaching As Cripwell and Geddes (1982) observe, while a number of checklists and assessment forms have been used to define the characteristics of a good teachers’ performance, it is clear that they differ over what is considered important Studies have been conducted to see how microteaching experience affects pre-service teachers’ perception on teaching It is found that microteaching inculcates the value of reflective practice to student teachers (Amobi, 2005; Benton-Kupper, 2001) Wilkinson (1996) claim that pre-service teachers who engage in microteaching are more receptive to feedback Brent and Thomson (1996) contend that microteaching encourages self-evaluation of self-perceptions and teaching behaviors It is observed that emphasis on trainees’ reflection on teaching has influence on the focus of implementation of microteaching into the pre-service teacher training institutes Brent and Thomson (1996) observe that the implementation enables both pre-service teachers and teacher educators to engage in dialogue and discussion centered on making connections between theories of teaching and microteaching experiences Their observation is different from the clinical supervisory mode where student teachers get the judgemental and prescriptive feedback from trainers to help them master fundamental teaching skills This is related to the recent evolvement of microteaching from the traditional version to modified versions with teacher education programs Subramaniam (2006), in his comparison, identifies differences between the traditional version and modified versions of microteaching One main difference is a shift from a dependence on clinical supervisors as evaluators to a dependence on course instructors and peers as evaluators Studies show that feedback serves as the content for and quality of reflection, enabling preserve teachers to reflect on their microteaching experiences leading to changes in self-perceptions and subsequent teaching behaviors (Amobi, 2005; Benton-Kupper, 2001; Chang & Lee, 2012; Heo & Kim, 2010; Kim, 2009; Kim & Yi, 2013; Paek, 2008; Wilkinson, 1996; Yi & Kim, 2011) There is little research on changes in student teachers’ attitudes, perception, reflection on The Effects of Microteaching Experience on Student Teachers’ Secondary English Class Observation teaching within a simplified context in the pre-service English teacher training programs At the center of reflection in teacher professional development is class observation Learning to teach through class observation is closely related to changes in trainees’ awareness, attitudes or perceptions (Bailey, Curtis, & Nunan, 2001; Wallace, 1991) The present study aims to investigate how student teachers’ microteaching experience with focus on reflection brings about changes in their English class observation III METHODOLOGY Participants and Context of the Study The subjects of this study were 35 prospective teachers who registered at the department of English education, Teachers’ College, K University in S City They enrolled on the English Language Teaching Theory and Practice Course taught by the researcher The syllabus of the course is shown in Table TABLE The Course Syllabus Week Component Activity -Getting Started -A Methodical History of Language Teaching -The postmethod era: Toward informed approaches -Teaching by principles -Intrinsic motivation in the classroom -Teaching across age levels -Teaching across proficiency levels -Sociocultural, political, and institutional contexts -Curriculum design -Lesson planning Curriculum analysis -Teaching and materials -Technology in the classroom -Initiating interaction in the classroom Material evaluation -Sustaining interaction through group work -Classroom management -Strategies-based instruction -Integrating the ‘four skills’ Interaction analysis -Mid-term Exam Kyungsuk Chang, Youngjoo Jeon -Teaching listening -Teaching speaking -Teaching reading -Teaching writing -Form-focused instruction -Language assessment: principles and issues -Classroom-based assessment -Teacher development -Teachers for social responsibility Pre-Class Observation -Microteaching Post-Class Observation 10~ 14 15 -Final Exam The course lasted 15 weeks for the second semester of an academic year The main textbook for the course was Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy From Week to Week 10, the student teachers learned theories of English language teaching and learning following 26 chapters in the textbook A series of lectures on each theme were given, followed by the participants’ reflection on their own understanding and experiences Microteaching lasted five weeks from Week 10 to Week 14 Seven student teachers took part in microteaching in each week The overall weight of the microteaching components made up about 30% of the course Data Collection and Analysis Thirty-five prospective English teachers were required to prepare a twenty-minute lesson using one of the authorized English textbooks used at the secondary schools They were asked to teach the lesson their peers After teaching the mini-lesson, each student teacher was required to reflect orally and in writing about their experience in conducting the lesson To compare how microteaching experience affected the participants’ classroom observation, the student teachers observed the same class before and after microteaching On Week they were required to observe an English class done by an experienced teacher, and they observed the same class on Week 14, when every participant finished microteaching The tool used for the pre- and post-class observation was the scheme proposed by Brown (2007) in the main textbook for the course The observation scheme used to gather the data consists of areas (see Appendix):  Preparation  Presentation  Execution/Methods The Effects of Microteaching Experience on Student Teachers’ Secondary English Class Observation  Personal Characteristics  Teacher-Student Interaction There are 41 statements in the observation scheme Presentation area has 3; presentation 10; execution/methods 13; personal characteristics 5; and Teacher/student interaction 10 The scheme has a 5-point Likert scale ranging from (unsatisfactory), (average), (above average) to (excellent), and not applicable (N/A) The student teachers’ responses to each question in the pre- and post-classroom observation were analyzed using SPSS 12.0 version for descriptive statistics, frequency analysis, and paired t-test to see difference between the pre- and post-classroom observation The qualitative data analysis was also done in order to better understand the effects of the student teachers’ microteaching experience on observation The data from the participants’ oral and written reflection about their microteaching experience was analyzed using Ross’ (1989) Content Analysis Method The data was categorized into themes consistent with the areas to be examined through the current research (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994) The details and specifics of the data were looked at to discover important themes and interrelationships IV FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION The results of the analysis of the class observation and the reflection data reveal how the student teachers’ microteaching experience had influence The changes in each area of class observation are discussed with the quantitative and qualitative data Most Significantly Changed Areas The observation results of five areas were changed after experiencing microteaching The comparison of the pre- and post-observation results shows the evaluation of each area changed after microteaching The execution/methods area had the most difference in the mean value, and teacher-student interaction area had the second most difference after microteaching experience The personal characteristics area revealed the least change after the experience As shown in Table 1, the difference between the pre- and post-observation is statistically significant at the p-value of 05 and 01 TABLE Comparison of Observation Areas (N=35) Area Pre M Post SD M MD SD t p Kyungsuk Chang, Youngjoo Jeon Preparation 3.16 0.602 3.38 0.667 0.219 2.163 0.038* Presentation 2.72 0.613 2.93 2.176 0.201 2.176 0.037* Execution/Methods 2.66 0.573 2.89 0.468 0.236 2.849 0.007** Personal Characteristics 2.70 0.539 2.88 0.496 0.181 2.176 0.037* Teacher-Student Interaction 2.55 0.524 2.78 0.579 0.234 2.661 0.012* * p