Promoting pre-service teachers’ engagement in an online professional learning community: support from practitioners

Abstract

Purpose: this study investigated the role of experienced practitioners in promoting pre-service teachers’ knowledge construction and social interaction in an online professional learning community.

Design/methodology/approach: a repeated-measures design with control and experimental groups was adopted. Two practitioners supported pre-service teachers in the experimental group to discuss issues around teaching practice. Social network analysis (SNA) and content analysis (CA) were used in the analytical approach.

Findings: CA revealed that the practitioners increased pre-service teachers’ levels of knowledge construction and high-cognitive discourse. SNA showed that the practitioners enhanced pre-service teachers’ professional ties. Though collaboration in high-level knowledge-building occurred predominantly with peers in the same discipline, the presence of the practitioners facilitated the development of more cross-disciplinary ties in the experimental group.

Practical implications: the practitioners can be used as a pedagogical tool to enhance pre-service teachers’ engagement in the process of professional learning. This study suggests that in order to enhance the collaboration among pre-service teachers from different departments, the online activity should be designed to enhance interdisciplinary collaboration.

Originality/value: the study contributes to new knowledge about the ways in which practitioners can enhance the collaboration among pre-service teachers in an online PLC. It also provides insight on how to combine CA and SNA to examine professional learning.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Christopher Downey: orcid.org/0000-0002-6094-0534

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