PRESERVICE LITERATURE TEACHERS' INSIGHTS GAINED FROM ONLINE CLINICAL SIMULATION WITHIN DISCIPLINARY TRAINING

Clinical simulations are an effective tool for coping with complex professional situations. With the inte- gration of clinical simulations into teacher education for pedagogical training and following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the human-based clinical simulations were adapted for online use. This case study concerns preservice literature teachers who participated in an online clinical simulation as part of their discipline-specific training. The goal was to understand how literature preservice teachers (PSTs) perceived the use of simulation-based learning (SBL) within their discipline-specific training, and specifi- cally to examine the insights gained from the (SBL) experience pertaining to the process of learning and teaching literature. Three data collection tools, namely, reflections, observations, and focus groups, were used to examine the perceptions of 98 literature PSTs. The data analysis yielded three types of perceived gains: (1) The strengthening of PSTs' discipline-specific involvement (2) The formulation of a professional understanding of learning and teaching processes related to future discipline-specific teaching (3) Ways to promote meaningful in-class literary discussions. The study expands the field of clinical simulation use in teacher education to include discipline-specific gains, by demonstrating the interplay between the world of simulation and the world of literature.