Function of teaching practices in the acquisition of professional knowledge

In this paper we are presented some of the results obtained in the European Project “Action-oriented teacher knowledge” ACTTEA, with the participation of Estonia, Finland, Holland and Spain. Here we only present Spanish results. The objective of the project is to assess how the trainee teachers learn from their practical school experience, ie, value the practical knowledge that the aspiring teachers actually assimilate in the Primary Education Practicum. An empirical study was carried out following three phases. In Phase 1, teachers in training videotaped lectures given by them; In Phase 2 they analyzed critical incidents, both positive and negative; And in Phase 3 they prepared an individual report of what they had learned. In the three phases three types of reflection were used: (a) individual reflection; (b) reflection with peers; (c) reflection with the teacher-tutor. Three analyzes were performed. In the first analysis, they identify the critical incidents obtained from the positive and negative recordings; In the second, the most frequent topics that appear in the sessions were selected; Finally, in the propositional analysis, the discourse is divided into the basic ideas classifying the types of practical knowledge in narrative (recalls and appraisal), inferential / application (rules and artifacts) and explanatory (practical and theoretical justifications). The results obtained allow us to understand that teachers in training under condition C are better able to learn a more sophisticated and generalizable type of professional knowledge to apply in class, while conditions A and B allowed a better understanding of the intervention performed.