engleski

The role of the EPOSTL in the evaluation and development of teacher education programmes in Croatia

In line with the general concept of portfolios (see e.g. Paulson, Paulson and Meyer 1991), the aims of the EPOSTL (p.2) reflect a twofold dimension of this document: it is both product-oriented and process-oriented (see Westhoff 1999). The product-oriented dimension of the EPOSTL is mainly seen in its function as a self-assessment tool: it helps to describe competences attained and gives evidence of their attainment. The process dimension is particularly evident in encouraging reflection on learning and teaching experiences and in monitoring student teachers’ development. Given these dimensions, the EPOSTL is extremely valuable to student teachers. It helps them to identify and reflect on their strengths and weaknesses related to their underlying knowledge and teaching skills. It also stimulates their awareness of the positive growth that is taking place during the study, thus ‘enhancing their self-esteem and nurturing further growth” (Schafer 1993, cited in Bailey 1998: 216). This latter use of the EPOSTL not only indicates the student teachers’ achievements but can also reveal much about their teacher education programme and help in its further improvement. Drawing on the (self)-assessment function of the EPOSTL, we conducted a study to examine the use of the EPOSTL in the two-year master level study programmes in teaching English and/or German as a foreign language at the Faculty of Philosophy in Osijek, Croatia. This study is a part of a small scale project on the use of the EPOSTL in the pre-service teacher education at the Faculty of Philosophy in Osijek, Croatia. The project started in March 2009, and will be completed in June 2011.

teacher education, EPOSTL

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