Maltese student-teachers' reactions and attitudes to the microteaching programme

Abstract

The aim of this dissertation is to give a general perspective of the concept of microteaching in relation to actual teaching practice. It outlines microteaching both as a training programme for the development of teaching skills as an education programme for the development of students' understanding of teaching and of themselves as teachers. This work attempts to present the developments in microteaching practice and rationale and reports descriptive research of microteaching in action. It also presents a systematic study of Maltese student-teachers' reactions and attitudes to the microteaching programme. When microteaching was first introduced in 1963, it was presented largely as a behaviour modification technique to improve teaching performance. Thus, the training aspect in the preparation of teachers was emphasized. Today, microteaching has spread considerably as it is used very widely as a component of teacher education and training programmes. This dissertation is a contribution to charting the development of microteaching practice and theory and to understanding its potential and flexibility. The author reports the research into microteaching at the University of Ulster from 1974 to 1984 and describes the ways in which it has been used in this institution. This research is also linked to ongoing developments elsewhere, especially in the United Kingdom and presents an understanding of what microteaching is and the various ways in which it can be used.