Theory Application in School and Meaning-Oriented Learning Opportunities at University—Resources for Teaching Quality

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The title as well as the introduction raised expectations about your manuscript and research. The topic you are addressing would be a relevant addition to existing literature. Thank you for this valuable contribution. I will structure my feedback in (a) general remarks (these comments cover feedback applicable in the entire manuscript), and (b) specific remarks (feedback on sentence and/or word level). The specific remarks can include a quote from your original manuscript to refer to a specific section. The specific remarks will refer to page (emphasis added in boldface; e.g., 1.15/16) and row(s; e.g., 11.15/16).

 

General remarks:

The overall manuscript is neat and written concisely—with relevant information for existing literature. One aspect that you can focus on is the abstract. The main document is written concisely, with sufficient detail to understand the German context. For specific remarks about the abstract, see below. The information relevant albeit I would suggest to let a Native English speaker go over your manuscript (the use of the English language displays signs that the English language is not fully mastered; i.e., the manuscript contains a few grammar issues). Furthermore, please examine and read English manuscript to familiarize yourself with the language that is used in the manuscripts. With time, this will lead to the use of more appropriate terminology. Overall great work. The quality can be lifted to a higher level by focusing on the small details.

 

Specific remarks:

p.1.5                I find issues with the term “meaningful”. Is this word necessary?

p.1.7                I would replace “investigated” with “examined” (also apply this to the remainder of the study). This also works better in the dependent clause. In that sentence, I would replace “analyse” by “examine” as well. The verb “to analyse” is a bit odd there.

p.2.72/73         This is not a stand-alone paragraph. This can be added to the previous paragraph.

p.3.figure1      The figure is rather small. Can you increase at least the font size? Make sure that it isn’t pixelated.

p.5.205–235    What do the number mean before the hypotheses? You can number it from 1 till 5 (rather than using the numbers before the hypotheses). It is confusing.

p.5.211            “and test this…” à “We assume positive associations between all of the three variables and test this with the first hypothesis” = We assume positive associations between all of the three variables, which is hypothesized as… Moreover, the hypotheses follow logically from your introduction and theoretical work. As a result, the first part of that sentence is redundant (as this became clear in the previous sections).

p.5.219            “Our second hypothesis follows on from this” à “follows on from this” is an odd way of describing this. For example, the introduction of the hypotheses related to RQ3 is sufficient.

p.6.255            Is this a header? In a similar vein, are the words in row 276 part of a header? Page 7 row 291 as well. Please check the remainder of your work for this. It is confusing for the reader.

p.9.368            The title of the figure is formatted incorrectly. Can you adjust this?

p.references    Report on the doi’s consistently (compare reference 4 with reference 18). Also the capital letter use is inconsistent (compare reference 2 with reference 5). The publication has been mentioned in reference 10. And what is up with reference 31?

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

many thanks for your advice! I hope I have met all the points productively. If there are still points of criticism, I will be happy to improve them. The changes that have been made are marked in yellow.

The corresponding author

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear authors, 

Thank you for allowing me to access to your research. The topic presents some relevance for the teacher education. It also presents significance in the improvement of the relationships between initial teacher education and the schools reality. Let me show you some concerns and things I think you should revise: 

-After reading the paper, the title does not seem to be the most appropriated considering the concepts and theoretical topics you work with. Specifically, the "professional development" concept is not well shown throughout the manuscript. I would eliminate if from your approach, or I would strengthen it more in terms of the methodological design (which means to re-make the research and is not the most successful pathway...).

-In the introduction, the first paragraphs lack of some references to support the explanation you present. Why is important to check and go depeer in the theory application? Who or from what approach is it highlighted?

-Lines 55-57: why these topics are important to be worked in this manuscript and in general for the educational research right now? I suggest you to connect this point with international calls related to reinforce and stregnthen the initial teacher education, specifically the practicum experiences. 

-If you mention the Bloom's taxonomy (line 68, reference 19), it could be more developed and better linked to other theoretical topics you introduce in this paragraph.

-Line 87: Interesting the established relationship of the paper with Hargreaves' contribution on tinkering. Perhaps, this could be more noticeable in your explanations; specifically, pointing out and supporting with more references (I suggest you Zeichnner and his extensive work in the field of practicum) what happens with the previously acquired training (university setting) when preservice teachers go to their practicum (school settings). 

-The word "sustainable" appears several times in the paper. It needs to be explained in which sense the authors want to introduce it. In line 107, what do you mean with sustainable training process? 

-Paragraph from line 106 to live 116 is conclusive: conclusions are established without citations that the authors consider about the link between initial teacher education and the practicum of future teachers. I again recommend reading Zeichnner's research to understand and give more presence to the dimension of practicum /teaching practices in the schools.

-Line 126: we should always refer to future teachers, who also bring a previous training background (I read they are secondary educators, so they probably come from other specific background...), and who are not in service in the schools. Therefore, I think the construct of "teaching quality" is not well fitted here, that is, it is too wide and more related to in-service teachers...

-Section 2.1, quality teaching is not enough or well described: where does it defined or explained broadly? This concept needs to be more and better explained since it also appears in your research hypothesis. It can be quite hard to understand in the same way in different contexts. The Education Sciences journal will be a place to read your article worldwide, so the generalization of theoretical and educational terms will not help you in the prospective scope.

-Section 2.2: first paragraphs. "Professional development" is mentioned for the first time, but it has not been discussed before. However, it is part of the title of the article; thus, I think that more importance should be given to this concept. Specificaly, it should be better linked to the other concepts you work with (theory-oriented practices, the practicum...). The term "teaching quality" could be more appropiated to be used in the title, instead of using "professional development". 

-In the sample section (3.1), the description of the sample, in terms of academic background or starting point to study the teacher education course described below, needs to be here. It is also important to highlight they are secondary future teachers, they are not studying to teach in primary education or early childhood education. I also consider important to tell the process of collecting the information and answers of the participants and explain how the "anonymize process" was followed. It was one of my main concerns regarding you developed the research some years ago.

-Line 299: it is too wide the range of puntuations for the confirmatory analysis, that is: it is difficult to see coherence in the results expected and the consideration of punctuations in this range.

-Line 301: you explain that the values of these punctuations are acceptable: according to what reference or theoretical explanation to consider it?

-Line 304: change the word "albeit", it cannot be understood by other less specialized audience. "Although" seems to be more coherent.

-Line 309: reference 68 is not correct, it wil be probably 67 according to the titles of both references in your list of references. Maybe it was my misunderstading....

-Line 340: I miss here a close parentheses.

-Section 4.2, lines 348-353: This finding is related to plenty of studies already conducted about the influence of expectations and misconceptions about the teaching reality. However, terms used here as theoretical constructs already appeared in the last decade as different terms: for example, placement-practicum-student teaching experiences and the reality shock experienced by preservice teachers. Maybe the authors need to read more literature to use more common terms for the educational research since using the ones you decide could seem to be a "fraud" for the readers. It is possible the readers ahave already heard and read similar constructs called in other ways. If we have already read about this issue with other "names", maybe this article is not going to seem as relevant as it pretended ("Teaching and Teacher Education" and "Revista de Educación", Spanish's Ministry one, are interesting databases to investigate). 

-Lines 408-415 are more conclusive lines. Authors explain really well this part, but in this location of the article it lacks of impact. I suggest you to move it and reformulate it in the conclusions section.

-Well introduced and presented statistical analyses, but quality of images when maximizing the screen is sometimes poor. 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2,

many thanks for your valuable comments! I hope I have met all the points productively. If there are still points of criticism, I will be happy to improve them. The changes that have been made are marked in green.

Kind regards, the corresponding author

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf