Foreign Language Teacher Education in Finland and Turkey: A Comparative Glance at Teaching Practice

An effective teacher education system should unite theoretical knowledge and practice together and teaching practice has vital importance in training qualified teachers. This study is a comparative education research, which aims to compare the teaching practice period of foreign language teacher education systems in Finland and Turkey and to offer suggestions for Turkey. While teaching practice period lasts for four terms in Finland, it only lasts for two terms in Turkey. Although duration of these periods varies, teaching practice period, which starts with observations under the strict supervision of cooperating teacher and with limited responsibility, goes on with short teaching performances and finishes with extended and regular teaching performances with high responsibility in two countries. While in Finland, teaching practice is done in practice schools of education faculties, in Turkey teaching practice is done in any school which meets some criteria. This is one of the most important differences between two countries. In Finland and Turkey, teaching practice period has four components. These are teacher candidate, other teacher candidates, university supervisor from faculty of education and cooperating teacher from practice school. In both countries, it is emphasized that interaction and communication among the stakeholders need to be ensured