Introduction                                                                                                                   How can teacher students refine their peer feedback strategies for purposeful opposition when discussing final degree projects? This ongoing study explores the contribution of peer feedback in relation to degree project in teacher education. The aim is to explore the role of the dialogues during a preservice teachers’ seminar was observed during participation in opposition. A sample of 210 minutes recorded data was analysed qualitatively.  The preliminary results showed that peer feedback during oral opposition is predominantly monological, evaluative in nature, with no room for the respondent to participate in a dialogue. However, there were some dialogic acts and constructively oriented comments during the opposition which we present in this paper and consider in our ongoing analysis.

Previous research and theoretical concepts                                                              Peer feedback is an important part of the learning process in a teacher education programs. Oral opposition on final degree projects is a key element of the evaluation cycle, and as such this type of examination provides an opportunity for peer feedback. However, little is known about what happens during these oral opposition sessions during the dialogues between students. Even though a vast body of research exists in the area has highlighted production process in relation to degree projects, like supervising (Jansson et al., 2019), students’ or experiences, (Råde, 2019) or assessment of quality of these projects (Stolpe et al., 2021).  To gain insight into this specific type of peer feedback, we conducted an observation study to analyze the dialogical features of peer feedback during oral opposition sessions on final degree projects in Swedish teacher education. In this paper we present our preliminary analysis and several findings as well as their implications for teaching practice in teacher education.

Theory

The theoretical point of departure for this study is the dialogical tradition within the sociocultural perspective on learning (Bakhtin, 1981). Some principles of student peer feedback in Nordic teacher education (Ellengard et.al., 2022) point toward dialogue being a productive way of learning through feedback. One way to constitute productive communication is by using dialogical feedback and dialogism (Bakhtin, 1981; Heron & Reason, 1997). The basis of dialogism is that the language we chose for communication contributes to meaning (Franke & Kullberg, 2010). This is particularly interesting in relation to giving feedback. When the opposition of final degree projects was previously studied in the Swedish context (Franke & Kullberg, 2010), the results showed that the opposition can have a monological or dialogical character. Also, it showed that each of the participants set the tone for his or her own opposition. This raises the question of what dialogic acts (Alrø & Skovsmose, 2004) are made by the students during opposition as a form of peer feedback and how can they be further developed in order to be useful in degree project process. In this study, by applying the two dichotomic orientations of peer feedback during oral oppositions, monological and dialogical (Franke & Kullberg, 2010) we analyse peer feedback with a focus on dialogic acts made by teacher students.

Aim and question

Considering that students spend one eighth of higher education on doing degree project work, there is a gap of knowledge and research results regarding what kind of knowledge student teachers chose to develop in their theses. Therefore, the aim of this study is to mitigate this gap by identifying dialogical features of peer feedback in final degree projects in primary teacher education. The research question is: Which dialogic acts can be identified in the feedback during the opposition of degree projects in teacher education?

Methodologically, in order to investigate the dialogical features of peer feedback during oral opposition on final degree projects in teacher education, an observation study was conducted. The data were collected through audio and video recordings of six final degree project oral oppositions, involving 4 teacher education students. The data were analyzed using dialogical analysis, a method developed by Heron & Reason (1997). First, we analyse the content of video recording from 4 opposition seminars (210 minutes) observations of oppositions of final degree projects in two different teacher education programs for primary teacher education. The sessions are selected to mirror high quality opposition, which received the minimum of grade Pass. The data collection takes place at a faculty in Sweden, where teacher education programs are predominant. The 4 participants come from three different contexts of teacher education programs where the data was collected are for students who mostly have a high school degree when they enter the program (GLP), for teachers who have been in-service for many years but lack teachers’ licence (VAL) and for foreign teacher who wish to validate their teacher degree (ULV). Each opposition concerns a project consisting of a 20–40 pages written thesis, composed in line with structure and style of an academic text in educational science. Data was audio recorded via zoom, with permission of all participants and following the ethical recommendations of Swedish council (2017). Considering data analysis, a deductive content analysis (Prior, 2020) of student communication was conducted, based on categorisation of the utterances made by the students during the opposition into monological or dialogical features.

Peer feedback including dialogic acts included acts such as: - Questions for the respondent - Taking turns in a balanced way - Challenge the respondent to rethink his or her choices in the project In the empirical data, we can see how Opponent 3 chose a dialogic way to open the session. Opponent 3: The aim and questions of this projects, how come you chose them? Respondent 3: Well, I thought this is how it is meant to be done. Opponent 3: How do you mean? Respondent 3: Well… You see here… eehm the aim is broad, “to identify how teachers percoekt texbooks in mathematics” Opponent 3: Really? Respondent 3: Yes. And the questions are supposed to… Narrow it out. Or am I wrong? Opponent 3: No I do no think you are wrong, I just want to make you think. Respondent 3: Thank you, yes, now when I think about it… I have… But I have five research question to narrow down… Opponent 3: Narrow? By five questions? Respondent 3: Yes! Or… Maybe question 1 and 2 are… the are similar, is that what you where meaning? Opponent 3: In my opinion, there are to many questions to possible answer in a thesis like this. How do you answer question 4, for example? Let’s look at the results section and… (Seminar 3, 05:10) This, ans similar examples will be analysed and discussed during our presentation.

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