Critical incidents as a strategy to enhance student teachers’ reflection about practice through immersive learning

ABSTRACT

Critical incidents are unanticipated events (either positive or negative) that teachers may encounter during a lesson or other situation causing them to reflect on their approach and change accordingly. .Critical incidents have great potential for learning as they are vividly remembered and set the conditions for systematic reflection. However, despite the importance of the critical incident technique for professional learning in Initial Teacher Education (ITE), it is not generally used in teacher education programmes until the practicum stage when video-analysis is used. This study aims to analyse student teachers’ individual and group reflections regarding two cases recorded on video in Portugal and Spain. Under the context of an Erasmus research project entitled ‘Digital Practicum 3.0: Exploring Augmented Reality, Remote Classrooms, and Virtual Learning to enrich and expand preservice teacher education preparation (2020–1-ES01-KA226-HE - 096,120)’ two cohorts of 39 and 22 student teachers, respectively, reflected upon two critical incidents previously selected by the student teachers who had taught the two lessons that were video recorded. They had to watch the videos and analyse the incidents both in group discussion and individual reflection. Findings suggest that such a strategy is key to enhancing the development of critical reflection in Initial Teacher Education.

KEYWORDS:

• Critical incidents
• practicum
• student teachers’ reflection
• initial teacher education

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Correction

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article was originally published with errors, which have now been corrected in the online version. Please see Correction http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14623943.2024.2335704

Additional information

Funding

This work has been supported by the research project entitled: Digital Practicum 3.0 (PRAC3): Exploring Augmented Reality, Remote Classrooms, and Virtual Learning to enrich and expand preservice teacher education preparation. PRAC3 is a project that has been funded under the ERASMUS+ in Higher Education Programme (2020-1-ES01-KA226-HE- 096120) of the European Union. The European Commission supports the production of this publication but it does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views of the authors. The Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Notes on contributors

Juanjo Mena

Juanjo Mena is an Associate Professor and Head of the Department of Education at the University of Salamanca, Spain. He is the treasurer of the International Study Association of Teachers and Teaching (ISATT). He has been a visiting scholar in a number of universities including The Netherlands, Canada, Australia, USA, Finland and Mexico and has been recently awarded the BBVA bank project “Cultural creators: Leonardo 2022 Scholarships”. He also spent 5 years as a classroom teacher before joining USAL as full-time professor. His research interests: (Digital) Teacher Education, mentoring, practicum, and use of ICT in Education.

Maria Assunção Flores

Maria Assunção Flores works at the University of Minho, Portugal. She received her PhD in Education in 2002 at the University of Nottingham, UK. Her research interests include professionalism and identity, teacher education and professional development, curriculum and assessment, leadership and higher education. She has published extensively on these topics both nationally and internationally. She is currently co-editor of the European Journal of Teacher Education and executive editor of Teachers and Teaching Theory and Practice. She is also the director of the Research Centre on Child Studies.

Eva Fernandes

Eva Lopes Fernandes is a junior researcher at Research Centre on Child Studies at the Institute of Education of the University of Minho, Portugal. She completed her PhD in Educational Sciences, Specialisation in Curriculum Development at the same university. Her research interests are assessment, compulsory education, teacher education, teachers’ work and professional development, pupil voice, teacher leadership, and higher education. She has published papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals and participated in national and international research projects.

Odiel Estrada-Molina

Odiel Estrada-Molina is an assistant professor at the International University of Valencia, Spain. He holds a PhD and Master in Educational Sciences, Master in Communication and Audiovisual Education, and Engineer in Computer Science. He has led and participated in several funded international research projects. His experience as a teacher and researcher in Education allowed him to be awarded various national and international awards. He is Associate Editor of IPSA Scientia and Member of the Editorial Board of the IAES International Journal of Artificial Intelligence (Institute of Advanced Engineering and Science, Indonesia) and the Journal Opuntia Brava. His research interests revolve around teacher education and educational technology.