Cultivating preservice teachers' reflection on their practice has been a major objective in teacher education over the last twenty years. Teacher educators have designed a number of activities, usually related to coursework, to facilitate preservice teachers' reflectivity. These kinds of assignments might be described as asking preservice teachers to reflect on demand. Studies in the past have typically focused on the discussion of specific strategies used to elicit reflection or descriptions of reflective teacher education programs. This study explored how preservice and first-year teachers understand and engage in reflection in different contexts while learning to teach. A sample of seventeen respondents, education students enrolled in coursework, student teachers, and first-year teachers, was selected to participate in the study. The data consisted of interviews, classroom observations and the examination of related documents. Preservice teachers taking courses engaged in introspection or self-reflection. This time was spent exploring their emerging identities as teachers. As respondents got opportunities to work in school settings, they began to reflect more on content and students. First-year teachers applied some of the reflective strategies they learned during coursework in their own practice. Several factors appeared to enhance preservice and first-year teachers' ability to reflect as they moved from coursework into student teaching and their own classrooms: (1) building relationships with teachers and students in K--12 classrooms, (2) engaging in reflective dialogue with 'more knowledgeable others'---university faculty and practitioners, and (3) having opportunities to teach on a regular basis.

This study explored how preservice teachers perceive the influence and value of an embedded, school-based field experience. Information was gathered from preservice teachers using surveys and a focus group interview. The data collected showed that an embedded field experience tied to a language arts methods course was generally a positive influence leading to great self-efficacy. Further, the data compared similarly to research supporting the notion that embedded field experiences generally have the effect of strengthening preservice teachers’ self-efficacy. Looking at Bandura’s work in Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioral change, it shows that early interactions and successes will boost the self-efficacy of preservice teachers. This study found that successful experiences help preservice teachers value their embedded, school-based field experiences and help view it as something positive. Even if the experience had its difficulties, preservice teachers were able to learn from the situation and if they ever find themselves in a similar circumstance, they will feel more confident about handling things. Therefore, when these preservice teachers become in-service teachers, they will feel more confident about their abilities compared to in-service teachers who did not have similar experiences in their teacher preparation program.

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