Analysis of benefits student-teachers perceive about co-teaching within an EFL basic course

Abstract

Adjusting to current times, two teacher-researchers from ÚNICA undertook the endeavor of devising a collaborative scheme intended to enrich a group of 12 Basic English student-teachers with knowledge on co-teaching, embodied in an array of methodologies, skills, expertise, and background. These benefits were encompassed in co-teaching, which implies two or more educators designing, teaching, and assessing a part or the entirety of a class. Through cross-examining a series of participant reflections and interviews, researchers found that student-teachers praised co-teaching as a strategy to incorporate in their future language classes to foster, on one hand, varied pedagogical strategies and resources, and on the other hand, their envisioning of the co-teaching roles in the future, which is connected to the construction of student-teachers’ identity, an aspect of professional development. Furthermore, participants assigned co-teaching metacognitive benefits related to self-regulation skills, autonomy, and ownership. They valued that collegial feedback entailed advantages in different aspects of their learning, propelled by the quality, promptness, customization, and practicality of remarks provided by the co-educators.