Early Field Experiences of PTEs in ELT Programme of a State University in Türkiye

Abstract

Teaching programs in Türkiye consist of a 4-year process. Internship practice takes place in the last year of this process, each in two separate terms. Prospective teachers observe, evaluate, prepare course content, and teach under the guidance of in-service English teachers in public schools affiliated with the Ministry of National Education and with the support of supervisors at the faculties and complete their internship. However, the timing of the process is thought to be too late, which is carried out during the 4-year education period and where prospective teachers will be actively involved in schools/real teaching environments and gain experience. "Early Field Experience", which is also found in the world literature and has exemplary applications, has been implemented in some private universities in Türkiye today but has not yet found its place in state universities. This current research studies the subject of “Early field experience”. The present study focussed on the effects of "Early Field Experience" practice in a state university in Türkiye. The study analyses the reflections of Early Field Experience (EFE) on prospective teachers' anxiety and makes the voices of prospective teachers heard. In this convergent mixed method study, STAS (Student Teacher Anxiety Scale - Hart, 1987) was used as a quantitative data collection tool, and a semi-structured interview form consisting of open-ended questions was employed for the qualitative part. In the study, prospective teachers of English had an EFE implementation process covering 10 weeks of observation and internship. The results of the quantitative data showed that there was a significant difference between pre-test and post-test scores for the level of anxiety of PTEs (t=4.16; p< .05) in favour of the post-test. Findings of interviews revealed that the prospective teachers' concerns were in the areas of teaching, students’ background, classroom management, readiness to teach, and burnout before the EFE; and after the EFE, they experienced improvements in classroom management, appropriate language use, readiness to teach, experience and teaching content.