Abstract
This study incorporates Kieran Egan’s imaginative approach (IA) into an elementary English teacher education course at a Japanese college. Introducing the IA as a theoretical basis, a preservice foreign language activity (FLA) teacher-training course was implemented. Throughout the course, English picture books were used to facilitate student teachers’ understanding of the IA and its related concepts. Subsequently, we argued how the student teachers’ concept of teaching FLA lessons was developed by analyzing their in-class performance, conversations during the group-work,and post-lesson written reflections. The results indicated that it was unclear whether the student teachers fully internalized the IA concepts and re-conceptualized their everyday concepts of EFL;however, data analyses revealed that some of the student teachers were in the process of this development. Finally, some pedagogical suggestions are provided for the further development of an effective language teacher training course design.
