A Sentiment Analysis of the Beliefs of the Pre-Service Practicum Students
Çukurova University, Turkey
ABSTRACT
In contemporary teacher education practice, teachers’ beliefs, practices and attitudes have always been an important aspect of training continuum and important for understanding and improving educational processes. Beliefs are supposed to be linked to teachers’ strategies to handle the difficulties in their professional life and to their overall psychological mood. Furthermore, they essentially construct students’ learning ambiance and influence their motivation and achievement. They are also considered as means to handle the effects of professional policies – such as revisions and improvements in curricula for teachers’ initial education or professional development on student learning. The purpose of this study is to investigate teaching practice from the perspective of student teachers' experiences and personal views using the sentiment and semantic analysis of the students’ essays on their views on practicum. The participants of the study are forty-seven senior year ELT students of Cukurova University. The sentiment analysis tool, LIWC, used was developed by Tausczik and Pennebaker (2010) based on psychometric properties of the categories of the lexical items.
KEYWORDS
Sentiment Analysis, EFL Teacher Beliefs, Pre-service ELT Students