Covid 19 Contexts Shaping Teaching Practice Discourses: University of Eswatini

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 120-136
Author(s):  
Boyie S. Dlamini

Abstract This study examines how the Covid 19 Teaching practice contexts elicited the intended professional development principles among the PGCEs’ and BEDS’ four 2020 cohorts at the University of Eswatini. The pedagogical knowledge interaction scheme theoretical framework was used to unpack related concepts. The participants, 23 were sampled through purposive stratified sampling. The semi-semi structured questionnaires and classroom observations were used to collect data.  Content analysis was used as a data collecting and analysing tool to analyse and describe the pedagogical discourses within the classroom and institutional contexts. The finding indicated that the mismatch subject arrangement undermined the production of specialised knowledge and alienated some students from their professional engagement and, stifled students’ capabilities to engage into self-reflection. Covid 19 pandemic created complex educational contexts in which incongruent messages related to the fundamental principles of teaching practices were communicated and reinforced. It is concluded that Covid 19 contexts presented a challenge of considerable complexity for the 2020 teaching practice and denied the Trainees the opportunity to learn from experienced teachers or mentors. It is recommended that Coordinators should embrace Covid 19 dynamics in their planning and implementation to protect the teaching practice principles. Key words: Covid 19 contexts, Teaching practice principles

2019 ◽  
Vol 71 (3) ◽  
pp. 236
Author(s):  
Svitlana O. Shekhavtsova

The article provides theoretical background and experimental substantiation of the organization of distance subject-subject interaction in the course of future English philologists training. The actual course of subjectness development in students which is directed to vocational and pedagogical activities applies those informational and communicative technologies which would contribute to the personal development of the students as the subjects of vocational and pedagogical activities. It also deals with the the most rational Internet technologies which provide the didactic resources and the ability to implement subject-subject interaction between the teachers and the students. Hence, distance form of interaction has particular advantages, for example: prompt transmission of different amounts of information to any distance and in any form: sound (Podcast), visual (PowerPoint Presentation), text (a report on teaching practice, exercises, portfolio), graphic, etc.; possibility to effectively change the information via the Internet from the workplace; possibility of interactive communication with the help of purposefully created multimedia information and operative feedback etc. The criteria for the subjectness development in the future English language philologists have been identified. It has been found out that the first criterion concerns value-motivational sphere of the personality of the future philologist; the second criterion is the criterion of subjectness, which characterizes self-knowledge and self-education of the future teachers; the third criterion allows to determine the subjectness of the future teachers concerning self-improvement and self-development at the university; the fourth criterion proves the acquisition of subjectness related to self-reflection by the future philologists. The experimental system of the subjectness development in the future English philologists included four blocks, which define the stages of the subjectness development, and which are united by the common goal and contents. In practice, this system was introduced at the stage of the developing experiment, which provided for the development of methodological recommendations for the university teachers on the organization of subject-subject interaction of the future English philologists within the distance specialized course.


2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 81
Author(s):  
Vilma Páez Pérez ◽  
Salvador Escalante Batista

ABSTRACT The importance of creating opportunities and means for the students to reflect on their own teaching practice is clearly seen in the results obtained by the students majoring in English at the University of Holguin. These students like the language and cherish the idea of becoming translators and interpreters but do not think the same about becoming teachers. It is, therefore, a hard task to motivate them to learn as much as possible from their practical teaching experience and seek for pre-professional development. Making the student- teachers aware of their strengths and weaknesses by a continuous reflection process on the teaching-learning process outcomes has proven its effectiveness. The results of a pilot study applied during the last three years are presented in this paper. KEYWORDS: pre-service teaching practice; self-reflection; teacher development.  


2010 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 64-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Pat McCarthy

This article details the process of self-reflection applied to the use of traditional performance indicator questionnaires. The study followed eight speech-language pathology graduate students enrolled in clinical practicum in the university, school, and healthcare settings over a period of two semesters. Results indicated when reflection was focused on students' own clinical skills, modifications to practice were implemented. Results further concluded self-assessment using performance indicators paired with written reflections can be a viable form of instruction in clinical education.


2020 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bridget Grogan

This article reports on and discusses the experience of a contrapuntal approach to teaching poetry, explored during 2016 and 2017 in a series of introductory poetry lectures in the English 1 course at the University of Johannesburg. Drawing together two poems—Warsan Shire’s “Home” and W.H. Auden’s “Refugee Blues”—in a week of teaching in each year provided an opportunity for a comparison that encouraged students’ observations on poetic voice, racial identity, transhistorical and transcultural human experience, trauma and empathy. It also provided an opportunity to reflect on teaching practice within the context of decoloniality and to acknowledge the need for ongoing change and review in relation to it. In describing the contrapuntal teaching and study of these poems, and the different methods employed in the respective years of teaching them, I tentatively suggest that canonical Western and contemporary postcolonial poems may reflect on each other in unique and transformative ways. I further posit that poets and poems that engage students may open the way into initially “less relevant” yet ultimately rewarding poems, while remaining important objects of study in themselves.


Mousaion ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Olefhile Mosweu

Most curriculum components of archival graduate programmes consist of contextual knowledge, archival knowledge, complementary knowledge, practicum, and scholarly research. The practicum, now commonly known as experiential learning in the global hub, is now widely accepted in library and information studies (LIS) education as necessary and important. It is through experiential learning that, over and above the theoretical aspects of a profession, students are provided with the opportunity to learn by doing in a workplace environment. The University of Botswana’s Master’s in Archives and Records Management (MARM) programme has a six weeks experiential learning programme whose purpose is to expose prospective archivists and/or records managers to the real archival world in terms of practice as informed by archival theory. The main objective of the study was to determine the extent to which the University of Botswana’s experiential learning component exposes students to real-life archival work to put into practice theoretical aspects learnt in the classroom as intended by the university guidelines. This study adopted a qualitative research design and collected data through interviews from participants selected through purposive and snowball sampling strategies. Documentary review supplemented the interviews. The data collected were analysed thematically in line with research objectives. The study determined that experiential learning does indeed expose students to the real world of work. It thus helps to bridge the gap between archival theory and practice for students without archives and records management work experience. For those with prior archival experience, experiential learning does not add value. This study recommends that students with prior archives and records management experience should rather, as an alternative to experiential learning, undertake supervised research, and write a research essay in a chosen thematic area in archives and records management.


Diagnosis ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sumner Abraham ◽  
Andrew Parsons ◽  
Brian Uthlaut ◽  
Peggy Plews-Ogan

AbstractDespite the breadth of patient safety initiatives, physicians talking about their mistakes to other physicians is a difficult thing to do. This difficulty may be exacerbated by a limited exposure to how to analyze and discuss mistakes and respond in a productive way. At the University of Virginia, we recognized the importance of understanding cognitive biases for residents in both their clinical and personal professional development. We re-designed our resident led morbidity and mortality (M&M) conference using a model that integrates dual-process theory and metacognition to promote informed reflection and analysis of cognitive diagnostic errors. We believe that structuring M&M in this way builds a culture that encourages reflection together to learn our most difficult diagnostic errors and to engage in where our thought processes went wrong. In slowly building this culture, we hope to inoculate residents with the habits of mind that can best protect them from harmful biases in their clinical reasoning while instilling a culture of self-reflection.


2021 ◽  
pp. 102831532199849
Author(s):  
Nafsika Alexiadou ◽  
Zoi Kefala ◽  
Linda Rönnberg

This article focuses on “internationalization at home” (IaH) for education students in Swedish Universities and its significance for their professional formation and future practice. We draw on research in two large institutions and explore the perceptions and experiences of internationalization of home students in education. We find that while the “intercultural” understanding of students is well developed, the international and intercultural dimensions of experiencing IaH are limited, due to several institutional and learning environment contexts. This has consequences for the social dimensions of future teaching practice. In addition, the perception of the discipline as “national” is significant in shaping the outlook of students toward international questions and their own future personal and professional mobility. We contextualize these findings using documentary analysis and staff interviews, and argue that to achieve intercultural and international learning environments of quality, social relevance, and long-term social benefit, we need to rethink how internationalization perspectives are integrated in teacher education courses.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
James Calleja ◽  
Patrick Camilleri

PurposeThe research reported in this paper brings forth the experiences of three teachers working in different schools. These teachers learned about lesson study through a course offered at the University of Malta while, at the same time, leading a lesson study with colleagues at their school. With the COVID-19 outbreak, these teachers had, out of necessity, to adopt and accommodate for their lesson study to an exclusive online approach. This paper, hence, focuses on teachers' learning as they shifted their lesson study online.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents a case study that delves into the experiences and perceptual insights that these teachers manifested in shifting to an exclusive online lesson study situation. Data collection is derived from a focus group discussion, teacher reflective entries and detailed reports documenting the lesson study process and experiences. Employing technological frames as the theoretical lens, a description-analysis-interpretation approach was employed to analyse and interpret reflections and grounded experiential perceptions that the respondents disclosed during their lesson study journey.FindingsNotwithstanding their initial discerned sense of loss and unpreparedness of being constrained to migrate lesson study to exclusive online means, teachers eventually recognised that digitally mediated collaborative practices enhanced self-reflection about the lesson study process. Therefore, the extraordinary situation that the teachers in this study experienced not only disrupted their modus operandi but also allowed them to discern new opportunities for learning about digital technology use in lesson study.Practical implicationsDisruption, brought about by unforeseen circumstances, takes teachers and professional development facilitators out of their comfort zones, invariably helping them grow out of their limitations and rethink lesson study practices.Originality/valueIntentionally driven disruptions prompt teachers to resolve their dissatisfactory situations by thinking out of the box, eventually helping them to improve their professional practices.


2015 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Terry Locke

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to offer a personalised overview of the content of English Teaching: Practice and Critique for the years it was hosted at the Wilf Malcolm Institute for Educational Research (WMIER) at the University of Waikato (2002-2014). Design/methodology/approach – It notes trends in relationship to the context of origin of 335 articles published in this period (excluding editorials), including significant increases in articles originating in the USA and Pacific Rim Asian nations, particularly South Korea and Taiwan. It comments on articles that relate to the original vision of the editors’ founders, especially their emphasis on practice, criticality and social justice. Findings – Prevailing themes across 13 years are mapped and in some cases discussed. Originality/value – A number of reflections are shared in relation to the future of the journal and some challenges currently facing subject English.


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