Impacts on New Teachers Instruction of Reflective Teaching Practices on International Teaching Field Experiences

International teaching experiences are intended to improve pedagogical practices and can be transformational, yet many international teaching experiences simply provide short-term educational excursions or cultural trips providing little impact on educational practice. This study sought to understand how observation experiences transition from activity descriptions to value comparisons, and ultimately to influence pedagogical practice. Linking these domains to international teaching provided a structure of reflective classroom practice. Korean pre-service teachers participated in a sixteen-week teaching assistant program where reflective practices of observational journaling and action research were utilized to increase the capacity to identify and incorporate newly experienced pedagogical strategies into personal teaching practice. The result of the study implies that international field experiences must transition from cultural experience to educational opportunities that positively impact instructional pedagogy.