Linguistic Differences in Pre-Service and in-Service Teachers’ Online Reflections and the Implications

Abstract

Reflections can make considerable contributions to teachers' professional development. They can also reflect teachers' inner thoughts and professional skills. In this study, we collected 261 in-service primary teachers' reflections in a teacher training activity about the application of information technology in teaching. And we also collected 141 pre-service teachers' online reflections in a course named "modern educational technology". These text reflections are analyzed by a linguistic inquiry and word count tool named to get the linguistic features. Then a comparative research was done between pre-service and in-service teachers' reflections. The results show that: 1. There are significant linguistic differences between pre-service and in-service teachers' reflections. 2. Pre-service teachers tend to use more first-person pronouns, achievement words and emotional words. They also have more words per sentence and wordcount in their reflections. 3. These differences could be helpful in teacher training.