Due to the COVID 19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021, higher education institutions were forced to embark on online teaching and learning. This came at a point where the entire teacher fraternity was not prepared for this shift from traditional face-to-face interaction to virtual learning. This qualitative, exploratory study was undertaken as a comparative analysis of the teaching, learning and facilitation experiences of three Teacher Educators. The focus was on teacher educators who engaged in a formal online teacher training program with first year pre-service teachers enrolled on the Bachelor of Education qualification.  Data was collected from the Teacher Educators in the form of interviews and reflective reports prepared at the conclusion of the 2021 academic year.  The data was thematically analysed to distil common lessons, challenges and points for the 3 Teacher Educators with the intention of learning from and improving on practice.   The paper addressed three research questions which guided the study and presents the researchers findings in the areas of student access to the learning platform; knowledge transfer from online lectures to practical application in the form of portfolio of evidence and the alignment between theory and practice. Recommendations include using a hybrid approach to preservice teacher preparation; using formative and summative assessment in making a judgement on competence and mastery and re-focussing student feedback as reflective essays.

Background: Academic literacy(ies) is a major determining qualifier for success in a university qualification. Academic literacy(ies), in this study, are seen as social practices or discourses that occur within specific academic disciplines. Students therefore needed to ‘learn’ the academic literacy(ies) discourse of the faculty.Aim: This study investigated the way lecturers and the course facilitators understood literacies and their students’ literacy demands.Setting: The early childhood practitioners were attempting to obtain a B.Ed degree on a piloted degree career path at a university.Methods: Data were collected from individual and focus group interviews, one assessment task, and one assessment report from each respective course. Two lecturers and two course facilitators participated in the individual interviews, and three lecturers and three course facilitators participated in the focus group interviews.Results: The study revealed that the course facilitators’ and lecturers’ understanding of literacies was not cognisant of literacy as a set of social practices, nor of the enormous changes students needed to make at the level of identity to progress in their academic careers.Conclusion: The findings from the study showed a disjuncture between the understanding of the meaning of academic literacies by course facilitators and lecturers. A focused and cohesive discussion on academic literacy needs to occur in order to facilitator the practitioners’ progress.