Teacher Trainees’ Vision of Their Future English Classes

In recent years, there has been a growing body of literature focusing on teacher identity and teacher beliefs, which are key aspects in understanding classroom processes. While there is an increasing number of studies regarding the identity and beliefs of practising teachers, studies on trainees are rare, and studies aiming to compare and contrast different learning environments are even less frequent.

The aim of the present study is to investigate the ways in which different socio-cultural contexts influence student teachers’ vision of their future professional identity and that of their future ideal lessons.

Our participants are English-language teacher trainees from Szeged (Hungary) and Miercurea Ciuc (Romania). At the time of the data collection, they had not yet started their methodology courses or their teaching practice. As the first step of a longitudinal study, they were asked to create a visual image of their ideal future lesson by drawing or making a collage. Also, they were asked to supplement their images with a written explanation.

The results indicate that pre-service teachers have very specific ideas about their ideal lessons, and their images reflect plenty of details and a great variety of different aspects.