The Views of Teacher Candidates Toward Distance Education: Open Education Practices

Abstract

The aim of this study is to reveal the opinions of teacher candidates on open education practices, in particular regarding the advantages and disadvantages of distance education. In line with this aim, the participants who were enrolled in Sakarya University Faculty of Education receiving formal education were selected by purposeful sampling for the purposes of the study which was designed as a case study based on qualitative research methodology. The participants were teacher candidates selected upon the following criteria: They were sampled from among a group of teacher candidates who were actively continuing their education in an open education program while also attending a formal education program. The data were obtained from semi-structured interviews and an open-ended form developed by the researchers. During the process of the development of the form, the structure and dialogue dimensions of Moore's "Theory of Transactional Distance" (1993) were used. The candidates' opinions regarding the advantages and disadvantages of open education programs were obtained through the open-ended form, and the data were analyzed by using the descriptive analysis technique. The participants indicated that there are many advantages and disadvantages of distance education. Whereas its advantages include being able to learn independently from time and place (structure), simplicity and understandability (interface), idea sharing in student-student interaction (dialogue), and content richness in teacher-student interaction (dialogue), the disadvantages reported by the participants are complexity (interface), lack of supervision in student-student interaction (dialogue), and lack of feedback (dialogue) in teacher-student interaction. Finally, it was concluded that the underlying reason for teacher candidates' enrollment in open education programs is their concerns regarding their future, which is one of the most striking results of this study. Teacher candidates see it as a way to increase their employment opportunities to address the problem of limited teacher recruitment. Based on all these results, it is suggested that the open education practices should be freed from the traditional teaching practices, and should have a more interactive structure. Reducing the negative transactional distance perceptions of students can result in more positive perceptions of the quality of the education delivered.