ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CONNECTING THE BACHELOR'S PROGRAM TO THE COMMUNITY THROUGH CURRICULUM-INTEGRATED EXTENSION

Abstract

This article presents the impacts of a curriculum-integrated extension project linked to the course Methodology and Laboratory for Teaching English in the fourth semester of the Bachelor's Degree in Languages – Portuguese/English at the Osório campus of IFRS. Considering that most pre-service teachers lack prior teaching experience, the project's goal was to provide practical teaching experiences to student teachers and offer new language learning opportunities to students at a local public school through a partnership between the school and educators. This collaboration was established between the teacher educator and two English language teachers. The student teachers developed English teaching activities and delivered them to the partner school's classes in what was termed a "micro-teaching practice."The results, based on the analysis of the planning and execution of these practices, along with seminars throughout the course, suggest that the curriculum-integrated extension activities served as a catalyst, enhancing the development of future teachers' professional identity (Bronckart, 2006). The findings indicate that practical experience plays a crucial role in shaping future educators. It was observed that the more practical experiences are offered, the better the construction of the professional identity of future teachers. Furthermore, integrating experiential knowledge with the knowledge of professional training (Tardif, 2002) enables student teachers to establish an essential link between theory and practice. In summary, curriculum-integrated extension reinforces the social role of (trans)forming new teachers capable of reconfiguring their teaching practices.