UNEXPECTED DRIFTS & CHALLENGES IN TEACHING-LEARNING PRACTICES: ONLINE INTERNSHIP OF TRAINEE TEACHERS

Abstract

Internship lays the foundation to development of teaching skills, application of pedagogy & gaining confidence in classroom instructions. Post-Covid, educators were nearly compelled to embrace technology causing an unforeseen transition from in-person to online mode. This study is the primary step to our ongoing study and survey on the impact of COVID19 on the teacher education program. Internship is a well-accepted active learning method for trainee teachers. The objective is to understand the challenges faced by trainee teachers during online internship & to discuss the measures to overcome some of these challenges. During internship trainee teachers can develop their interactions & lesson planning abilities, to understand their students in a better way. An abrupt transition from offline to online mode implied many challenges and overcoming huge obstacles. Few challenges discussed are shirking traditional mindset to embrace virtual classrooms, lack of infrastructure and facilities for shifting to online teaching, non-availability of schools & inadequate number of lessons for trainees, less than expected exposure to classroom teaching and so forth. Some of the possible measures are planning more practice lessons among peer groups, observations by peers & experts, arranging guidance by experts, videos of lessons by trainees etc. Through this program, trainee teachers are molded to understand subject content, broadening of mindsets, practices in pedagogy, psychology of students etc. Internship plays a crucial role in imbibing appropriate skills & attitude in future teachers. The question that arises is- can online internships adequately prepare trainees to handle situations that arise in T-L contexts?