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Exploring Prospective EFL Teachers’ Beliefs

METHODOLOGY

The study is designed as a descriptive case study in that it aims to report on a naturally occurring repre-
sentation of professional learning beliefs throughout the practice teaching course. In that sense, the study
aims to provide an in-depth understanding of PTs’ reflections on their professional learning throughout
their field experience. As Yin (2011) suggests, case study approach is suitable when contextual conditions
are met and highly relevant. The study can also be considered as an opportunistic case study (Creswell,
2007) as the case was accessible because the researchers were the instructors of the course and one group
of the triad members of practice teaching as university supervisors. Although a case study aims to focus
on a particular aspect of a case (Creswell, 2007; Yin, 2011), the findings of the study can be compared
to other contexts and experiences presented here by practitioners and researchers to make naturalistic
generalizations (Stake, 2005).

The Research Context

The two field-experience courses, School Experience and Practice Teaching, provide the context of the
current study. In order to complete the requirements of these courses, all PTs are appointed to selected
state-run schools of Ministry of National Education (MoNE) in the city where they pursue their under-
graduate studies. Therefore, the courses are twofold, one part takes place the MoNE schools for six hours
a week, focusing on observation and teaching practices of the PTs; the other is a two-hour seminar once
a week and offered by the university supervisors. The seminars aim to gather PTs together and share
their professional experiences in the cooperating schools throughout their practice teaching.
Throughout the observations and teaching practices PTs attend the English language classes at the
cooperating schools. They are assigned to prepare lesson plans, materials and incorporating necessary
assessment tools to their teaching practices. During the processes of observations and teaching practices,
PTs work with CTs at the cooperating schools. Therefore, they have a certain professional contact with
the CTs at their last year of initial teacher education program.
Although the curriculum is provided by CHE (2007), only the responsibilities and task descriptions
are provided. Thus, the content of the School Experience and Practice Teaching courses are designed by
the university supervisors offering the course without a certain course outline proposed for the aforemen-
tioned courses in the initial teacher education programs (Rakıcıoğlu-Söylemez, 2012). The university
supervisors’ applications and theories to evaluate PT practices throughout these courses depend on the
supervisors’ priorities. In the current research context, the university supervisors organized the course
according to CHE regulations, thus there was no intervention to design the study to collect the data.

Participants

A total of 110 PTs (female N=81, male N=29, age range 20-22 years) voluntarily participated in the
study. They were all in their senior year of studies the English Language Teaching (ELT) program of a
state-run university located in the Mid-Western Black Sea region of Turkey, and enrolled on the practice
teaching course. Most of the participants in the study were graduates of teacher training high schools
in Turkey. Therefore, the participants formed a homogeneous group in terms of their educational back-
ground and pre-service instructional experience.

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