Developing potentiality: pre-service elementary teachers as learners of language immersion teaching

ABSTRACT

Research has shown immersion to be effective, yet our understanding about the integration of language and content in Irish-medium immersion (IMI) pedagogy remains incomplete. This article reports on how the teaching of mathematics in the IMI elementary setting, supported pre-service teachers in bridging the language and content gap. The study utilised Japanese Lesson Study (LS) to design and implement mathematics lessons and qualitative data were collected from a variety of sources. Findings provide unique insights into the knowledge demands related to designing and implementing content lessons and reveal the challenges for pre-service teachers in providing balanced language and content instruction.

KEYWORDS:

• Immersion education
• language and content integration
• lesson study (LS)
• mathematics education
• initial teacher education (ITE)
• elementary education

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Nonlexical elements of communication by speech e.g. a characteristic style or manner of oral expression.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by An Chomhairle um Oideachas Gaeltachta agus Gaelscolaíochta.