Guiding growth: deciphering the nature of feedback to preservice teachers during teaching practice

Feedback provided to preservice teachers during teaching practice is a fundamental component of their professional development. The central question guiding this study is: What are the feedback approaches used by university lecturers and mentor teachers in South Africa to support preservice teachers’ during teaching practice? The paper is theoretically grounded in Sadler’s understanding of feedback and Shulman’s model of pedagogical reasoning and action. Using qualitative document analysis, the study examines a dataset comprising written feedback from university lecturers and mentor teachers, spanning a three-year period and involving 42 preservice teachers. The feedback was categorised by emergent and a priori coding. Findings are that university lecturers and mentor teachers provided preservice teachers mostly with positive feedback and were less focused on highlighting concerns and providing guidance during teaching practice. This study contributes to the ongoing discourse on teacher education and has implications for teacher preparation in other contexts, too.