Development of Creative Thinking Skills in Teacher Teaching Foreign Language Programme

doc. dr. Ivana Cimermanova, PhD., Faculty of Arts, University of Presov;     Abstract: Foreign language teacher training programmes aim to provide quality training of professional development in two areas that might seem to be two different areas; however, they must be understood as a whole. The result of teaching should be two-in-one graduate, namely a good language user and a good teacher. The graduates have to not only understand the theory of foreign language teaching and learning but also be aware of approaches, methods and tools to develop autonomous, independent, creative and critically thinking learners. This means they also have to experience such approaches and methods in their preparation and learning. The motivational power of creativity has been a subject of different studies proving its positive effects. This paper builds on the author's earlier research, which focused on teacher creativity in preparing materials for students. These results are compared with the results of the current research, the object of study of which were video recordings of student teachers during their teaching practice carried out in a pandemic Covid 19 situation. The focus of the study was the pre-service teachers' creativity (1) in their teaching and (2) how they were developing their learners' creativity. The results suggest that student teachers who realised their teacher training in an online setting used creativity less than their older colleagues.