Abstract:

The Covid-19 circumstances made the need to integrate online teaching and learning methods and the use of connective technologies into the curricula of universities in Palestine even more pressing. Toward this direction, this paper aims to offer a deeper insight into opportunities and barriers that arise from the implementation of teacher training online in a Palestinian university. To do so, the study will discuss and analyze the perspectives of mentor-teachers and student-teachers that emerged through participation in teacher education training during practicum. The focus is on the study participants’ perspectives on teaching, online learning and the learning environment.

For the analysis, the study uses qualitative methods and content analysis of the participants’ responses to an open-ended questionnaire that was administered during the training. The training took place within the framework of OLIVE, an international project with a focus on teacher education development. The project is a partnership of four universities (two in Palestine and two in Finland). 103 mentor-teachers and 76 student-teachers participated in the study.

The initial analysis shows that mentor-teachers’ and student-teachers' perspectives can be both convergent and divergent. For example, the students focus more on the importance of issues that relate to teaching approaches. On the other hand, the teachers mentoring university students focus more on the concept of mentoring and what the role of the mentor would be like. In this case, the students’ and teachers’ perspectives seem to diverge.

Also, when it comes to online learning, the students focus more on the importance of supportive technologies in e-learning during the practicum training, and to some extent on the importance of building up abilities and capacity for the use of technology in teaching and learning. On the other hand, in addition to the importance of supportive technologies for e-learning the mentors-teachers focus more on the importance of building up abilities and capacity for technology use in teaching and learning.

However, when it comes to learning environments, both the student-teachers’ and the mentors-teachers’ perspectives converge, as they seem to agree that teaching skills and school management are equally important for the professional development of mentors and the establishment of the principles underlying mentorship.

As perspectives are both convergent and divergent, teaching, online learning and the learning environment seem to present both opportunities and barriers for the study participants. It is, therefore, significant to further investigate into dimensions of the wider areas of teaching, online learning and the learning environment what constitutes opportunity or barrier.

In this way, we will be able to make solid suggestions on ways education and learning can be opportunities for deeper learning for mentors and students, grounded in both the analysis of experiences and perspectives and the relevant body of literature.

Keywords:

Mentors, student-teachers, perspectives, mentoring, teaching and learning.