Teaching Practicum

Teaching practicum has been defined as the application of pedagogy in a meaningful context: the classroom (^{Roland & Beckford, 2010}). ^{Freeman and Johnson (1998)} argue that a real context is a must for pre-service teachers to bring their own interpretation of the teaching itself. The teaching practicum then constitutes an opportunity for pre-service teachers to be in contact with real context and to enrich it with social and cultural aspects they might incorporate into their teaching process.

According to ^{Halverson (2004)}, during the teaching practicum pre-service teachers need to develop Phronesis or practical wisdom, an Aristotelian term which describes the ability to adjust some knowledge according to the context where it will be used. In order to understand Phronesis or practical wisdom, the author explains two key concepts: episteme¹ and techne.² The episteme is the kind of knowledge needed depending on the context and the techne refers to the knowledge to create something; the joining of both helps the pre-service teacher to perform in an effective way in any context.

To a great extent, pre-service teacher preparation programs have followed Shulman’s (¹⁹⁸⁶, ¹⁹⁸⁷) seminal ideas on teachers’ knowledge base. He categorizes what teachers should know as follows: content knowledge, general pedagogical knowledge, curriculum knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, knowledge of learners, knowledge of educational context, and knowledge of educational ends. In a study conducted by ^{Castañeda-Trujillo (2017)} in which he examined the study plans of 22 English teaching programs from public and private Colombian universities, he showed there is a heavy weight on content knowledge and general pedagogical knowledge but very little weight on research and on teaching practicum (less than 10% each of the study plans). This allows us to conclude that pre-service teacher preparation programs are still located within the passive technician and reflexive practitioner models (^{Kumaravadivelu, 2003}). In the former, content knowledge is the most important and teachers are supposed to follow the prescriptions given by experts. The latter includes other sources of knowledge that come form experience and research. Yet, pre-service teacher preparation programs should move forward towards the transformative intellectual, the third model proposed by ^{Kumaravadivelu (2003)} where teachers (pre-service in this case) are considered as intellectuals who are able to think and act critically upon their context.

We have not got that far, and in terms of the teaching practicum there are three main models (^{Day, n.d.}): (a) the apprentice-expert model where the pre-service teacher works closely under the guidance of an expert and learning happens through “observation, instruction, and practice” (^{Day, n.d.}, p. 5); (b) the rationalist model where students acquire theoretical knowledge and at the moment of the practicum they have to apply it; and (c) the case studies model which implies the analysis and discussions of real teaching cases-this model has not been widely used. ^{Loughran and Hamilton (2016)} add the laboratory model in which the pre-service teacher needs to observe and analyze classes alone in order to develop her/his own understanding on how to teach a class. This model has been mainly implemented during the teaching practicum because the pre-service teacher is not yet in “action” and it permits the discussion and reflection on many issues that emerge in the classroom.

The undergraduate program where one of the researchers is enrolled, follows the laboratory model, and offers the teaching practicum starting in the fifth semester and ending in the eighth semester (in fifth and sixth semesters pre-service teachers do their teaching practicum in elementary school; seventh and eighth in secondary school in public schools).

Innovation in English Language Teaching

^{Rogers (1995)} defines innovation in education as an idea or object that is seen as new for a person or for a group of people. When the new idea or object is presented, people determine if they adopt it or not. In order to adopt it, they must take into account five characteristic: relative advantage (how is it better), compatibility (how coherent it is with the values and experiences), complexity (how people understand it), trialability (the possibility to try in a shorter span), and observability (how the results are visible). If the innovative idea or object achieves those characteristics its adoption will be easier by the population and it will be developed.

Additionally, ^{Rimari (n.d.)} defines innovation as an external or internal force which aims to change, transform, or enhance the reality in the classroom. On the other hand, ^{Huberman (1973)} defines innovation as the creative selection, organization, and use of different materials in a new way in order to carry out a better way to achieve clearer goals. He sets some characteristics of innovation:

^{Rimari (n.d.)} establishes the components that cause an innovation to occur. The first component is that the innovations appear because of the implementation of small changes inside the classroom; for instance, the implementation of a new text in the classroom. A second component is the popular impulse; it means that innovation is produced due to the change of ideas into the new ones based on people’s beliefs. Finally, he explains that changes are mediated by an authority; it means that the changes could be implemented only if the authority in charge allows them.

Adding to these definitions, ^{Barraza (2005)} establishes that there is only one way to know the concept of innovation and that is by the knowledge of its domains; in innovation in education those domains are new and improvement. The new domain is understood as the things that have never been created; in this sense, innovations are unusual. The improvement domain has a relation to the last domain, when something new needs changes, it can be improved, which means that innovations in education are made to improve different educational factors such as methods or activities.

ICT innovation in English language teaching in Colombia. Teachers of English in Colombia have been innovating their teaching practices through the use of technology. In a general overview, through examining research reports published in the major journals in the country, we found that teachers engage in this type of innovation and while they acknowledge the advantages in language learning-teaching, they also point at the major constraints that have to do with infrastructure, connectivity, technological skills, and institutional support, to mention some. As examples, we can mention a study conducted by ^{Galvis (2011)} in which he explored the integration of computer technology in two English classes in a language center in Bogotá. He found that implementing ICTs in the classroom is complex due to four main aspects: feasibility, time, user-friendly interface, and students’ likes and dislikes. ^{Arias, Buitrago, and Pineda (2011)} explored the implementation of virtual environments and its implications for teaching. ^{Herrera (2017)} conducted a research project in a public university in Colombia where a virtual learning environment (VLE) was implemented as a main tool in an English as a foreign language class. The results showed that students felt motivated but found that a lack of infrastructure and Internet connectivity posed a main barrier for VLE implementation. Other studies like the one conducted by ^{Fandiño (2012)} and ^{Herrero, Marín, and González (2016)} show that teachers need institutional support in order to acquire the necessary skills to innovate in their classrooms using ICTs. In their research study, ^{Clavijo Olarte and Quintero (2012)} show how the implementation of ICTs in pre-service teachers’ education might serve a dual purpose: On the one hand, it could improve their English language development and on the other hand, serve as a pedagogical tool for their future professional life.

Mobile Learning (M-learning)

As a concept in development, mobile learning or m-learning, does not have a unified definition. For ^{Guy (2010)}, different alternatives have attempted to pin it down.

Firstly, it is a descendant of electronic learning or e-learning. ^{Pinkwart, Hoppe, Milrad, and Perez (2003)} and ^{Georgiev, Georgieva, and Smrikarov (2004)} describe it as a space that exists in the e-learning approach. On the other hand, there are some who support m-learning as an individual discipline. ^{Caudill (2007)} cites different supporters of this new discipline such as ^{Traxler (2005)}, who defines it as an educational outline where the use of technologies is the requirement or ^{Trifonova and Ronchetti (2003)}, who define m-learning as the educational process that involves activities mediated by mobile tools.

Going deeper into m-learning, ^{Ozdamli and Cavus (2011)} establish some elements and characteristics we need to consider when talking about m-learning without depending on what we aim to do. The elements are: learner, who determines the needs, interest, and background in the educational process; teacher as an expert of the information presented; content which is decided with the comunity in order to make it interactive; environment as the place where the information is shared-the environment could be online or face to face-and finally, assesment as a tool to help the learner to know his/her process and clarify his or her doubts about the content.

In m-learning teachers have to pay special attention to how contents respond to the needs of the individuals and to their contexts. ^{Alonso de Castro (2014)} highlights the communicational features of m-learning, mainly “useful in the development of collaborative activities which help establish group work and help develop creativity and communicational skills among students” (p. 12).

Setting and Participants

One student-teacher and her advisor conducted this research over a period of one year and a half. The student-teacher had a dual role: on the one hand, she had to implement an innovation as a requirement for her teaching practicum. On the other hand, she had to systematize the results for her research seminar. She carried out her innovation in a public school in Bogotá, with students of eleventh grade over an academic year.

The advisor’s role was to guide the student-teacher in the systematization of the innovation for her research seminar. While doing this and being aware of the many struggles the student-teacher was facing, both decided to conduct a small-scale project to document those struggles. To fulfill this purpose, the following instruments were used to collect data: An introspective narrative in which the student-teacher recalled her experience conducting the innovation. Both had many conversations previous to the writing of the narrative, and the advisor gave her some prompts to generate a rich written piece. After analyzing the narrative, the advisor conducted an introspective interview with the student-teacher to explore her tensions, concerns, dichotomies, opinions, and so on, while carrying out the innovation. As secondary data sources we used the lesson plans the student-teacher produced as part of the implementation of the innovation.

In this article we are reporting, in order to give context, the pedagogical intervention carried out by the student-teacher, and the research part, which was conducted by both the student-teacher and the advisor.

Negotiating Between Epistemologies

The student-teacher has to negotiate between the epistemology given during her undergraduate courses and her personal epistemology (^{Hofer, 2004}). As stated by ^{Cárdenas and Suárez-Osorio (2009)}, the teaching practicum should give student-teachers opportunities to develop their teaching abilities while understanding how teaching and learning take place. In grounding for her teaching practicum, one of the researchers (the student-teacher) took several courses on English teaching. These teaching methodologies, which present a Western view of teaching and learning, have been produced in the inner circle countries (^{Canagaragah, 2009}) or in the epistemological North (^{De Soussa Santos, 2011}) and have been consumed by the South. As shown in a recent study conducted by ^{Castañeda-Trujillo (2016)}, teacher preparation programs in Colombia are still dominated (colonized) by the way English teaching is conceived by the North. As a consequence, there is a mismatch between what the methodology books say and what student-teachers encounter in their classrooms.

When reaching the point where our participant had to propose and carry out an innovation in a real school setting where she had to conduct her teaching practicum she faced an authentic context and realized that something goes between expectations and reality. Her epistemological negotiation took her in two directions: One has to do with the teaching of English; the other with the technology literacy of her students.

In terms of the teaching of English, she had to produce a lesson plan a week ahead of her class and had to follow the PPP model. After her lesson, she would have to fill in a reflective form (designed to deal with instrumental aspects only); in the one dated September 14th (see Appendix 3), she states that she managed to carry out only half of her class. Her plan was to teach students the use of an application to create cartoons. In her imaginary world-product probably of the teaching methodology books where settings are homogenized-her students would be well-behaved, engaged, middle class (to afford smartphones), and have technology literacy skills. But she found a totally different setting, so her first epistemological negotiation takes places within the class. She realizes that the PPP model would not work; that there should be other ways of learning and that she would have to put her lesson upside down and follow her instincts towards what she thought would work and listen to her students’ needs. Here she privileges her personal epistemology-defined by ^{Hofer (2004)} as “theories and beliefs that individuals hold about knowledge and knowing, and the way in which such epistemological perspectives are related to academic learning” (p. 129)-over the given epistemology. In her lesson plans her main interest is grammatical; her concern is about the language per se, it is about “correcting mistakes” (Sept_7_16), “correcting pronunciation” (Sept_14_16), “phrasal verbs” (Oct_5_17), and the like. But in the actual classroom she switches her “grammar oriented” lesson to a truly meaningful one in which she makes on-the-spot decisions to serve her students’ learning needs which go beyond the mere formal aspects of English. Here in her own words:

As they use the cellphone every day, I thought they could open the comic and read it easily but the next class I had a surprise, nobody were able to open the comic and read it. What I decided to do was to use half an hour of a class and taught them how to open the .cbr file because I thought I was not clear with the instruction, so I asked them to download the file and bring to the next class as some of them did not had Gmail account to access to the folder I decided to send the file again and I wrote some instructions about how to open the file. [sic] (Narrative Introspection)

In terms of technology literacy, she expected her students to become “digital natives” (^{Prensky, 2001}) but she found that beyond using social media, the students in her course were not very proficient at using technology. She is aware that this lack of technology literacy will interfere with the development of her class and decides to stop, change gears, and teach them how to deal with the technological task.

Through the data collected (lesson plans, narrative introspection, and introspective interview) we can trace the struggles the student-teacher goes through. She complies with the design of a lesson plan that fulfills the requirement of the undergraduate program, as can be seen in Table 1, but once in the classroom facing the constraints of the context, instead of trying to carry out her lesson no matter what, she is proactive, sensitive to the needs of her students and adapts the lesson to reality, as shown in the excerpt above. This is consistent with ^{Aguirre’s (2014)} finding on how pre-service teachers really care about their students and make the necessary things to help them both at the emotional and cognitive level.

Table 1 Lesson Plan, October 19^th 

Making Up for the Logistics/Technological Flaws

Student-teachers are required to carry out an innovation during their teaching practicum. For some, the obvious innovations involve the use of technology, as was the case of our participant who decided to incorporate m-learning into the English class. As reported by ^{Viáfara (2011)}, many teachers and student-teachers that use or have used technology for the development of their lessons, have taught themselves. Our participant, as reported by her in the introspection, initially learned from her brother and from there she learned autonomously. The data analysis allowed us to conclude that the student-teacher had to make up for the logistics of her innovation. As stated above, in her imaginary, the participant anticipated a picture-perfect classroom where she would be able to implement her innovation without a problem. Reality showed her otherwise and caused her to make decisions to compensate for this flaw. The first obstacle she found was that the school had wi-fi but students were not allowed to use it (^{Viáfara, 2011}). She wanted to go on with her plan (instead of giving up) so she resorted to her technological skills and found applications students could use without an Internet connection.

At the moment of implementing the lesson, she had to sort out all the technological and logistics difficulties she did not anticipate. This required from her tremendous ability to keep the control of the group,³ to keep her students engaged, and to keep on teaching her class. As reported by her in the following excerpt, she gives away her power and invites her students to come up with possible solutions, that is, she truly involved them and gave them voice:

In that moment I did not have the projector. I had to explain step by step. They kept saying “no teacher, I can’t open it” or “it didn’t work”. I had my cellphone and my tablet, so I said “let’s make four groups; one group can use my tablet”. Since I had not a vertical relationship with them, it was more horizontal, I said “well, what are we going to do? there is no way to do the activity, are we going to do it?” One of them said: “yes, teacher, sounds cool but how do we do it?” Then I told him: “But how do we get the file? I tried to do it through bluetooth and I couldn’t, I tried to link my cell and but didn’t work, the Tablet didn’t work either”, then he said: “teacher, I’m going out, I know where to get the wi-fi signal, I download the file and come back”. He steped out and came back 10 minutes later with the file and we could open it. (Introspective Interview)⁴

One additional element here that is worth mentioning, considering the context of public schools in Bogotá, is the mutual trust built between the student-teacher and the student who requests to step out. This is particularly striking because they were both so engaged in achieving the task that there was no room for distrust; the student-teacher is not worried about her student fleeing the class and, in fact, he comes back with the technological problem solved.

Mending the Self: Between Frustration and Achievement

As stated by ^{Castellanos (2013)}: “Pre-service teachers come into the English teaching profession with beliefs about teaching; sometimes they are aware of them, other times they are not” (p. 196). As stated by the student-teacher in the semi-structured interview, she had some beliefs about how her teaching practicum would be and had great expectations about the things she would do (see excerpt below). But when she gets into the actual practicum her beliefs do not match the reality. This mismatch leads her to the third way to deal with using technology as an innovation in her English language teaching (ELT) practicum, which is to mend the self, trying to make a bridge between her expectations and her achievements:

As a teacher having had the experience, at first it was with that spirit, the one we all had when we started the teaching practicum…with such a desire to amaze our students, to do a thousand things because one is fresh, just out of college and has that raws sensibility…but when one meets the reality is different. After the experience I realized that it was not going to be so so wow. (Introspective Interview)

The student-teacher had to adjust her plans to the reality she found, and conform to what was possible. It was very striking for her that students were not allowed to use the wi-fi connection. Anecdotal data (collected as the role of one of the authors as teacher educator) have shown that this is a very common situation in Colombian schools. Many teachers who want to use technology cannot do it because school administrators neither allow them to use the equipment provided by the government (computers, tablets, smart boards, and the like) nor give them access to the wi-fi connection, which is consistent with ^{Viáfara’s (2011)} findings. Once confronted with this fact, the student-teacher plans ahead and explores other possibilities that allow her to carry out her innovation.

Her students’ digital illiteracy was another aspect in which she had to mend her beliefs. As stated above she wrongly assumed that her students were digital natives but found out that she had overgeneralized and had to walk them through very “basic skills” as she calls it.

The lack of accompaniment by a university mentor and by the cooperating teacher also played a role in her need to mend the self. In the semi-structured interview, she expresses her frustration but despite this, she carries out her innovation the best she can: “This was not a very rigourous innovation and I did not have any advisor” (Introspective Interview).

Given the circumstances and the context she faces, the student-teacher becomes an independent decision-maker (^{Díaz Benavides, 2013}). She weighs her limitations and possibilities and decides to keep on in order to bring her students a different and entertaining way of learning English. At the end of her experience she acknowledges her frustrations but also her achievements and the possibilities for the future.