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The expectations-reality dissonance in student teaching: a discourse analysis of one pre-service teacher’s perspective

  • Jean Kaya

    Jean Kaya is Adjunct Assistant Professor and Postdoctoral Associate in the Werklund School of Education at the University of Calgary. His publications and research are in the areas of teacher education, international education, language learning and teaching, discourse analysis, critical literacies, and identities.

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Published/Copyright: March 17, 2023
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Abstract

Student teaching has been conceptualized as an experience that translates into ample teaching practice and meaningful teacher knowledge. Such a conceptualization misses issues that emerge from student teaching as social practice (i.e., the distinctive ways people engage in activities associated with a particular domain of knowledge in a specific social context). Using interview data from a larger qualitative study that investigated pre-service teachers’ learning experiences, I conducted a discourse analysis of Lany’s perspective on her student teaching experience. Unlike other student teachers, Lany perceived the social practices at her placement to be unjust, holding student teaching with contempt and wanting it shortened. Findings indicated an expectations-reality dissonance in student teaching and the reproduction of socially constructed school norms and unequal social relations between school personnel and Lany. These constrained Lany’s abilities to practice teaching and shaped her identities. The study sheds light on the need for teacher educators and other tangential agents to more actively advocate for those who are apprenticing teachers to ensure quality education.


Corresponding author: Jean Kaya, Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, 2500 University Dr NW, Calgary, AB T2N 1N4, Canada, E-mail:

About the author

Jean Kaya

Jean Kaya is Adjunct Assistant Professor and Postdoctoral Associate in the Werklund School of Education at the University of Calgary. His publications and research are in the areas of teacher education, international education, language learning and teaching, discourse analysis, critical literacies, and identities.

  1. Research funding: None declared.

  2. Author contributions: All authors have accepted responsibility for the entire content of this manuscript and approved its submission.

  3. Competing interests: This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. There is no actual or potential conflict of interest with any person or organization.

  4. Informed consent: Informed consent was obtained from all individuals included in this study.

  5. Ethical approval: The local Institutional Review Board approved the study.

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Received: 2022-12-29
Accepted: 2023-03-01
Published Online: 2023-03-17
Published in Print: 2023-06-27

© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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