Student Teachers’ Perspectives Toward Teaching

Abstract

This research aims to investigate the student teachers’ general perceptions of reflective journal. The participants of this research were 40 student teachers in English Language Education Program of Satya Wacana Christian University who taught in junior high schools. In this research, the data were collected using the questionnaire. The result revealed that the majority of participants considered reflective journal as a self-assessment tool which helps them improve their teaching performance. They also considered it as a motivation tool which enables them to share their feelings and problems they encountered during teaching session. Regarding the reflective journal’s contents, student teachers included some important contents which are describing, comparison and criticism stage. On the describing stage they shared their feelings and problems they encountered. On comparison stage they included their strength and weakness and mentor’s or friends’ feedback. On criticism stage they shared possible solution to the problems the encountered and the teaching strategies they used. There were only few of the student teachers who included the related theories on their reflective journal which was meant to help them monitor and generate their improvement in teaching process.