Designing and Evaluating a Virtual Teaching Laboratory for Assessing and Developing Preservice Teachers’ Oral Presentation Competencies

Hatami, Javad; Maleki, Shima; Azimi Yancheshmeh, Esmaeil; Khosravi, Rahmat Alah

Designing and Evaluating a Virtual Teaching Laboratory for Assessing and Developing Preservice Teachers’ Oral Presentation Competencies

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Javad Hatami ¹

Shima Maleki ²

Esmaeil Azimi yancheshmeh ³

Rahmat Alah Khosravi ⁴

¹ 2 Professor in Educational Technology, Department of Education, Faculty of Humanities, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

² PhD in Educational Technology, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

³ 3Assistant Professor in Educational Technology, Department of Education, Faculty of Humanities, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

⁴ Assistant Professor, Department of Educational Sciences, Farhangian University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

This study aimed to design and preliminarily evaluate a Virtual Teaching Laboratory grounded in an eight-domain framework of oral presentation competence, while operationalizing six domains through a rule-based multimodal assessment module. The two non-operationalized domains, content organization and quality and audience interaction, were retained within the broader competency framework but were not included in automated assessment because of their semantic and interactional complexity. Adopting a Design-Based Research (DBR) approach, the study was conducted in four phases: needs analysis and identification of design requirements, development of the virtual teaching laboratory, validation and refinement of the design, and pilot implementation and evaluation. The laboratory integrated microteaching, an Electronic Performance Support System (EPSS), learning analytics, and structured feedback mechanisms. To examine preliminary outcomes and the feasibility of the environment, 26 student teachers participated in the pilot implementation. Data were collected and analyzed using an oral presentation competence rubric, a knowledge assessment, an attitude questionnaire, and a user experience questionnaire. The findings showed higher post-test scores than pre-test scores across the six automatically assessed domains of oral presentation competence. User experience findings also indicated that participants perceived the environment as useful, motivating, and authentic, and considered the feedback beneficial for supporting their performance. These findings provide preliminary evidence of improvement and feasibility associated with participation in the virtual teaching laboratory. However, given the single-group pretest–posttest design, the observed changes cannot be attributed definitively to the laboratory, as alternative explanations such as practice effects, task familiarity, Hawthorne effects, and maturation cannot be ruled out.

Keywords

Design-Based Research

Virtual Teaching Laboratory

Preservice Teachers

Designing and Evaluating

Oral Presentation Competence

Subjects

Education and Training in Virtual Environments

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