A Case Study Of Pre-service English Teachers’ Professional Development In Teaching Practicum

In recent years, EFL(English as a Foreign Language) teachers’ professional development is beginning to gain a more prominent role in foreign language teacher education. Teacher educators are becoming increasingly interested in exploring this field. But teachers’ professional development is a complicated system which emphasizes the internal and individual improvement of teachers(Ye, 2001). Meanwhile, a large amount of research has been done on the professional development of the in-service EFL teachers. But inadequate research has been done on the pre-service EFL teachers. For the pre-service EFL teachers, teaching practicum is the first time for them to contact with the authentic teaching contexts, as Daresh(1999) pointed out that teaching practicum is the best opportunity for the pre-service EFL teachers to develop their professional ability. Therefore, teaching practicum plays an indispensable part for the development of pre-service EFL teachers. However, after the period of teaching practicum, what progress the pre-service EFL teachers make and what factors affect their development are in need of exploration. In order to have a better understanding of the development of pre-service EFL teachers, the current thesis aimed at addressing the following research questions.(1) What are the pre-service EFL teachers’ understandings about teaching before teaching practicum?(2) What progress do the pre-service English teachers make during teaching practicum?(3) What are the factors that influence the pre-service English teachers’ professional development during teaching practicum?In order to answer the questions, nine English teacher education students who were doing their teaching practice in a junior middle school were chosen as the subjects of the study. Qualitative research methods were employed, including semi-structured interviews and teaching journals for the collection of data.The results showed that: 1) before teaching practicum, the pre-service EFL teachers’ understandings about teaching were still in the ideal stage; Family members, previous teachers and college courses were the major influential factors. But after teaching practicum, they have got their new understandings. 2) The pre-service EFL teachers improved in all the aspects as Richards classified, especially in class management and communication skills. Only subject knowledge was not promoted dramatically. 3) Five influential factors were found in this thesis. The major influential factors were guide teacher, peers, teaching contexts, teaching practice and self-reflection.The major implications from the results are that the EFL scholars should try to provide the pre-service EFL teachers more opportunities to know about the individual differences of different ages and the real situation of teaching before teaching practicum. This can reduce the pressure or confusion when starting their teaching practice. The limitations of the thesis may result from the limited time as well as the size of the samples and so on. The further study could reduce the limitations and explore the complicated development from different points of view.