Turning windows into mirrors: Digital stories as a teaching strategy to explore the apprenticeship of observation in pre-service teachers

Abstract

This article shares the critical reflections of a teacher educator who utilised digital stories as a teaching strategy in a professional development module for final-year pre-service teachers. Action research, through a participatory narrative inquiry approach, was employed, and data were gathered from digital stories, scripts, and reflective essays. The findings suggest that a platform was created for students to collaboratively share their perceptions, beliefs, and memories regarding teaching as a profession and to reflect on the impact that this lived experience had on their developing professional identity and ideas of good practice. Suggestions are made for recognising autobiographical stories as essential to all facets of teacher education and for acknowledging the influence of the apprenticeship of observation on individual pre-service teachers and on teacher-training programme curriculums.