Dr. Denis Weger

Today's perception - tomorrow's interaction: Developing preservice teachers' professional vision for translingual education

Supervisor: Eva Vetter
Period: 2017-2022
Kontakt: denis.weger@univie.ac.at

Over the past two decades an intensive discussion has revolved around obstacles for the academic success of pupils whose language use does not comply with language use at school, focusing especially on immigrant pupils and pupils from families with low socio-economic status. In this context, learning environments that support the acquisition of the language/s of schooling as well as the development of pupils’ full linguistic repertoire are seen as a key factor to promote educational success. However, research on how preservice teachers acquire the competencies necessary to create learning environments for such translingual education is scarce. In my study, I address this underexplored issue by examining how a specially developed video-based teacher education course influences competence development in the area of translingual education of three cohorts of preservice teachers (n = 45) studying different school subjects. In the study, the impact of the course on preservice teachers’ professional vision is investigated, as it is seen as premise and indicator for the development of professional competence. The data was collected using a pre- and postvideo analysis task in combination with stimulated recall interviews and was analyzed using Qualitative Content Analysis. First analysis indicates a shift in preservice teachers’ professional vision as they notice relevant teaching structures more often and demonstrate more sophisticated levels of analysis of potential learning processes shown in the impulse videos. These preliminary results suggest, that the preservice teachers in this study integrated the content of the course into their professional competence, which should lead to its appropriate use in the preservice teachers’ future classroom practice.

You can download the extended abstract here.

Wissen für Schule und Gesellschaft: Denis Weger explains his research in a YouTube-Video.