Potential and Limitations of Student Research

Implications for Research-based Learning in the Teaching Practicum

Abstract

Research-based learning in North Rhine-Westphalia has been a major issue since the implementation of the teaching practicum in the course of the teacher training law of 2009 and has become a central module in the professionalization process during the teacher-training course. During the internship, students write their own empirical work in which school and teaching are viewed with an evaluative research habitus. Through this approach, students reflect their theoretical knowledge and their own convictions and gain valuable insights into school fields  of  action.  Successful  student  study  projects  from  the  first  two  cohorts, which demonstrate this intended development process and were developed during the teaching practicum in educational sciences at the WWU Münster, were turned into  an  anthology published in February 2018. The thematic focus is, for example,  on  teaching  quality,  inclusive  education,  inclusive  school  development,
teaching communication and teacher-pupil interaction.  The presented study projects are convincing in a multi-perspective way. The results of the research are of practical relevance to school practice, for example through interesting questions, precise methodical procedures, or the practical relevance of the  research results. The article outlines the idea and the implications of the volume, reports on its development process, focuses on the question of opportunities, potentials and limitations of student project reports and research, and points out options for   the further  development  of  student  research  results.  This  is  always  associated  with references to the meta-level (the teaching practicum at the WWU Münster,  further  development  potential  of  the  Münster  concept,  university  teaching  consequences for seminar design, quality criteria of student research, etc.). Conclusively,  transfer  possibilities  to  other  seminar  formats  and  university  locations  are outlined.