Nineteenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities

Abstract

As pre-service English Teachers are entering the classrooms during their early filed experiences (FEs), they face several realities of their profession. The biggest of them is teaching students who have different socio-economic status, educational, and ethnic, or cultural backgrounds. This paper offers the results of the narrative inquiry study examining the preservice English teachers’ perspectives after the first field experiences (FE) in high school placements. During the third year in the teacher preparation program, the pre-service teachers are placed in the secondary English classroom, in which they are teaching independently for five consecutive hours in the same classroom for the first time. Besides being the first planning and teaching experience, it is complicated by the fact that the pre-service teachers are 100 White with 85% of them being females, and the secondary school students are 98% African Americans. The paper considers the findings providing direct quotes from the participants. To conclude, a review of practices with FEs and suggestions for possible solutions for the issues raised by the participants in this study is included.