ERIC Number: EJ857481
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2009
Pages: 19
Abstractor: ERIC
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0737-5328
EISSN: N/A
Personal Attitudes and Technology: Implications for Preservice Teacher Reflective Practice
Shoffner, Melanie
Teacher Education Quarterly, v36 n2 p143-161 Spr 2009
The increasing importance of technology in today's world challenges teacher educators to create technology-proficient teachers, practitioners who can utilize existing technology, learn to work with emerging technology and adapt as needed when confronted with technological issues. Acknowledging the need for technologically proficient teachers, teacher educators across the nation now infuse some degree of technological competency into the preparation of their preservice teachers. Teacher educators face several obstacles to the implementation of technology into teacher preparation, however, among them the attitude held by preservice teachers toward the technology itself. While providing opportunities for preservice teachers to engage with technology personally, academically and pedagogically, teacher educators must also consider the attitudes toward technology that influence preservice teachers' experiences with that same technology. Technology has a place not only in preservice teachers' emerging classroom pedagogy but in their professional development as well. Reflective practice is one area currently drawing on different technologies, as teacher educators incorporate a range of technology into preservice teacher reflection. Drawing from a qualitative study in which weblogs were used for voluntary preservice teacher reflective practice, this article examines preservice teacher attitudes toward a specific technology and the influence of those attitudes on the use of that technology for voluntary reflection. The researcher uses the term "voluntary reflection" to express reflection that is undertaken by choice, outside course or programmatic requirements, with all aspects of the reflective activity (such as topic, quantity, formality and medium) determined by the preservice teacher. This article opens with an overview of reflection in teacher education and the use of asynchronous communication technologies in reflective practice, with a focus on the specific technology of weblogs. The study, in which preservice teachers volunteered to use a weblog for their personal reflection while completing a teacher preparation program, is then briefly explained. Next, the preservice teachers' use of reflective weblogs is presented, followed by a discussion of the role played by individual attitudes toward technology in the use of reflective weblogs. The article concludes by considering the implications of preservice teacher attitudes toward technology for teacher educators. (Contains 1 table.)
Descriptors: Preservice Teacher Education, Preservice Teachers, Teacher Attitudes, Reflective Teaching, Teacher Educators, Student Attitudes, Computer Attitudes, Computer Literacy, Technology Uses in Education, Reflection, Electronic Publishing, Web Sites, Professional Development, Qualitative Research, Interviews, Asynchronous Communication
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A