Teaching Education

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Student teacher challenges: using the cognitive

load theory as an explanatory lens

Daniel C. Moos & Debra Pitton

To cite this article: Daniel C. Moos & Debra Pitton (2014) Student teacher challenges: using
the cognitive load theory as an explanatory lens, Teaching Education, 25:2, 127-141, DOI:
10.1080/10476210.2012.754869

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10476210.2012.754869

Published online: 01 Sep 2013.

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Teaching Education, 2014
Vol. 25, No. 2, 127–141, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10476210.2012.754869

Student teacher challenges: using the cognitive load theory as an

explanatory lens
Daniel C. Moos* and Debra Pitton

Department of Education, Gustavus Adolphus College, Saint Peter, MN, US

(Received 28 June 2012; accepted 15 November 2012)

Cognitive load theory (CLT) can explain the challenges faced by student teach-
ers. This study, guided by the CLT, included 26 pre-service teachers. Participants
completed a cognitive load self-report questionnaire and were interviewed at two
points during their student teaching. Results revealed that student teachers
decreased mental effort related to monitoring their students’ level of attention,
meeting needs of diverse learners, and managing internal and external distrac-
tions. Qualitative analysis revealed: (1) student teachers became aware of limited
cognitive resources; (2) lesson planning imposes cognitive load during student
teaching; and (3) cognitive overload limits the ability to make modifications
during teaching.
Keywords: cognitive load; mental load; pre-service teachers

Introduction
The amount of simultaneous activity requiring teachers’ attention is staggering.
Applying lesson plans that meet the diverse need of students, retrieving content
expertise, managing external and internal distractions, identifying verbal and nonver-
bal cues, monitoring students’ level of attention, and assessing students’ prior
knowledge all demand teachers’ attention. Successful teachers are able to effectively
manage these demands and it is expected that novice teachers demonstrate a capac-
ity to attend to these diverse facets of teaching. Such expectations can be seen in the
recent emergence of how pre-service teachers, and in particular student teachers, are
assessed. In the USA, pre-service teachers are individuals who are pursuing a degree
in education but have not yet received a teaching license. Student teaching typically
occurs at the end of an education program for pre-service teachers and involves
teaching in a classroom under the supervision of an experienced teacher. Several
states in the USA have adopted the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA) as a
measure to assess pre-service teachers’ performance in primary and secondary edu-
cation settings. This performance-based assessment is designed to offer pre-service
teachers the opportunity to synthesize and apply what they have learned in their
teacher education preparation program. Pre-service teachers describe, analyze, and
evaluate their teaching across a series of lessons, focusing on their planning, instruc-
tion, and assessment. Written commentary, work samples, and video of their teach-
ing are submitted for the TPA, all of which are assessed on standardized rubrics.

*Corresponding author. Email: dmoos@gustavus.edu

© 2013 Taylor & Francis

128 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

The language in these rubrics reveals the high standards that need to be met by
novice teachers. At a minimum, pre-service teachers need to demonstrate that they
plan activities with a clear alignment between standards, objectives, learning tasks
while also drawing upon students’ prior learning, design assessments that align with
the objectives, intellectually engage students, elicit and monitor students’ responses,
demonstrate a clear understanding of student performance with respect to the
standards, provide feedback to guide further learning, use assessment to inform
instruction, evaluate and adapt teaching practices to meet the students’ needs, and
support students’ academic language development.
Given these vast expectations, it is not surprising that novice teachers often
report feeling overwhelmed (e.g. Carre, 1993; Kagan, 1992; Wideen, Mayer-Smith,
& Moon, 1998). If it is assumed that these expectations of novice teachers are
appropriate, then the question arises as to how can we best prepare our student
teachers to meet these challenges. A first step in addressing this question is to care-
fully consider theoretical frameworks that explain the challenges novices face, an
issue that can be addressed by the expertise literature and the cognitive load theory
(CLT). This literature describes the relationship between the development of an indi-
vidual’s knowledge, represented as mental models, and the cognitive resources
needed to retrieve this knowledge. Mental models are internal, contextual, and
personalized representations of perceived reality. Through extensive experience and
practice, mental models become more sophisticated and robust and require less con-
scious effort to use effectively. Practice and experience foster the development of
discrete knowledge within the mental model, leading to automatization, a step along
the way to expertise. Experts can execute a task and/or retrieve knowledge related to
their domain of expertise unconsciously. This automaticity bypasses the limited
space associated with working memory and allows cognitive resources to be used in
other capacities (Clark, 2008). Within the context of teaching, expertise may
decrease the likelihood of feeling overwhelmed in the classroom. Novice teachers
may feel overwhelmed by the myriad of responsibilities in the classroom, while
expert teachers have sophisticated mental models that allow unconscious retrieval of
knowledge to meet some of these responsibilities. The challenges faced by novice
teachers can be furthered explained by the CLT.

Cognitive load theory

Salomon (1984, p. 648) described cognitive load as mental effort representing,
“the number of non-automatic elaborations necessary to solve a problem.” Given
the finite amount of processing space in working memory, the number of nonau-
tomatic elaborations processed in this space can lead to cognitive overload.
Consider the challenges of learning about new information in a foreign language.
Unless the individual is fluent in foreign language, this context provides the addi-
tional burden of translating the language while also learning the new information.
In this scenario, the cognitive load may be much higher than trying to learn new
information in a native language. This situation of cognitive overload can be
translated to the experiences of teachers. Imagine the situation where a teacher
has not yet reached a level of expertise with classroom management, and thus
may experience heightened cognitive load because of the need to consciously
process issues related to classroom management while simultaneously thinking
about how to apply the lesson plan.
 Teaching Education 129

These examples highlight a key assumption of the CLT, which focuses on the
relationship between long-term and working memory. While long-term memory has
the capacity to store an almost limitless amount of information, working memory
has limited capacity to process and store information (Paas & van Merriënboer,
1994; Sweller, 1994). Three types of cognitive load (intrinsic cognitive load, extra-
neous cognitive load, and germane cognitive load) have the capacity to consume the
limited space of working memory (e.g. Gerjets, Scheiter, & Catrambone, 2004;
Kester, Kirschner, & van Merriënboer, 2005; Ngu, Mit, Shahbodin, & Tuovinen,
2009; Sweller, 2004; van Merriënboer & Sweller, 2005; Verhoeven, Schnotz, &
Paas, 2009). From a theoretical standpoint, the interactivity and the number of
elements within a task affect the extent to which intrinsic cognitive load is imposed
on working memory (Chandler & Sweller, 1991). Both individual characteristics
(e.g. prior domain knowledge) and task features (e.g. inherent difficulty) affect the
amount of intrinsic cognitive load that is imposed on working memory (Kirschner,
Paas, & Kirschner, 2009). In the context of the classroom, the extent to which teach-
ers experience intrinsic cognitive load is a function of their prior domain knowledge
as it relates to the content to be taught and the pedagogy necessary to teach the
content. In contrast, extraneous cognitive load occurs in the presence of information
and/or task elements that do not directly contribute to the successful completion of
the task. This type of cognitive load may manifest in teaching through the presence
of irrelevant events, such as disruptive noises from an adjoining classroom.
Germane cognitive load, on the other hand, occurs in the presence of information
and/or task elements that support the successful completion of the task. For example,
teachers need to be aware of students’ prior knowledge of the topic, monitor their
engagement, and assess both verbal and nonverbal cues, all of which consume work-
ing memory space in the form of germane cognitive load. Attending to these aspects
of teaching will support students’ learning and impose germane cognitive load.
These three types of cognitive load (intrinsic, extrinsic, and germane) are additive
(Kirschner et al., 2009; Paas, Tuovinen, van Merriënboer, & Darabi, 2005), and thus
excessive consumption by one of these types can lead to an overload of available
working memory resources. For example, teachers who expand valuable, conscious
processing space to address irrelevant events in the classroom that do not affect
learning (extraneous cognitive load) will then have less conscious process space to
devote to practices that foster learning (intrinsic and germane cognitive load).

CLT: implications for the classroom

Given the assumption that novices need to consciously process domain-specific
information, one could imagine that expert teachers do not share the challenges
faced by beginning teachers. Extensive experiences of expert teachers enable them
to effectively determine which information is relevant to attend to while teaching, a
process that limits the consumption of working memory space by extraneous cogni-
tive load. Novice teachers, on the other hand, do not have the experience to effec-
tively differentiate between irrelevant and relevant information. Thus, beginning
teachers may unnecessarily devote valuable cognitive resources attending to irrele-
vant information, which results in a portion of working memory being consumed by
extraneous cognitive load. Furthermore, novice teachers need to consciously process
each component of effective teaching (among other things, retrieve relevant content
knowledge, manage internal and external distractions, assess verbal and nonverbal
130 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

cues). Given the extensive nature of these activities, it is not surprising novice teach-
ers often report feeling overwhelmed (e.g. Carre, 1993; Kagan, 1992; Wideen et al.,
1998). These feelings can be traced to the extensive, cognitive mental effort required
of teaching, which limits the abilities of novice teachers to adapt effectively within
the context of a classroom. Clark (2001) suggested that, “when working memory is
exceeded, the more recently learned (and presumably more effective and less
destructive) strategies will be inhibited in favor of the older and more automatic and
destructive alternatives” (p. 274). If novice teachers find themselves in a situation in
which they are cognitively overloaded, they may rely on a “fast and frugal”
reasoning strategy (Feldon, 2007). For example, despite a novice teacher’s desire to
implement a democratic approach teaching as might be advocated in a pre-service
education program (e.g. Kohn, 1996), this teacher may instead rely on a more
authority-based approach instead because of the cognitive overload experienced.

Current study
The CLT outlines assumptions that offer cognitive explanations of the challenges
student teachers face in the classroom. However, these explanations remain largely
theoretical in nature. A paucity of empirical research exists in this area and this
current study attempted to provide additional research through the examination of
the following three research questions:

(1) What type of cognitive load do pre-service teachers experience in the begin-
ning of their student teaching placement?
(2) (a) What type of cognitive load do pre-service teachers experience toward
the end of their student teaching? (b) What types of cognitive load signifi-
cantly change throughout the course of student teaching?
(3) To what extent do the student teachers experience three different types of
cognitive load, as evidenced by semi-structured interviews?

Method
Participants
Participants included pre-service teachers from a small liberal arts college located in
the midwest region of the USA. The pre-service teachers at this college generally
progress through the elementary or secondary program as cohorts, with each cohort
typically limited to 30 pre-service teachers. A majority of pre-service teachers in
two cohorts agreed to participate in this study, which included 26 participants over
their full student teaching placement (14 weeks). This sample included 16 females
(62%) and 10 males (38%), 10 (38%) of which were student teaching at an elemen-
tary school, six (23%) were teaching at a middle school, and 10 (38%) were at a
high school.

Measures
This study measured cognitive load, which was assessed through both a self-report
questionnaire and interviews at two different points during the 14-week stu-
dent teaching experience. Paas, van Merriënboer and colleagues’ previous research
(Paas, 1992; Paas & van Merriënboer, 1994) was the foundation for the self-report
 Teaching Education 131

questionnaire. This research advocates for a subjective cognitive load measure

(SCL), which is a questionnaire that asks individuals to self-report their mental effort
on a nine-point scale (1 = Very very low mental effort … 9 = Very very high mental
effort). The self-report questionnaire for this study included eight questions related
to extrinsic, intrinsic, and germane cognitive load (see Feldon, 2007 for a discussion
of cognitive load measures in the context of teaching). Research has demonstrated
that this measure is reliable and valid as evidenced by Whelan’s (2006) study, which
compared several measures of mental workload (SCL; the Task Complexity Index,
Braarud, 2001; and the Workload Profile Index, Tsang & Velazquez, 1996). In addi-
tion to the self-report Cognitive Load questionnaire, semi-structured interviews were
used. The qualitative analysis was drawn from the participants’ responses to these
interviews, which included 12 questions.1

Procedure
Pre-service teachers were recruited immediately prior to the start of their student
teaching placement. They were provided an overview of the study during this
recruitment phase. No incentives were given for those who agreed to participate.
Following the receipt of a signed consent form, one of the authors contacted each
participant to schedule two sessions for the interview and administration of self-
report questionnaire. In this particular teacher education program, student teaching
lasts 14 weeks. Typically, pre-service teachers have two placements in student teach-
ing, with each placement lasting seven weeks. In order to capture changes in cogni-
tive load associated with student teaching, the first interview session was scheduled
during the beginning of the first placement and the second interview session was
scheduled at the end of the second student teaching placement. Each session was
identical for every participant. First, the self-report questionnaire was completed.
Next, one of the researchers conducted the semi-structured interview, which typi-
cally lasted 40 min. The interview was tape recorded and later transcribed verbatim.

Results
Question 1
To examine the cognitive load experienced in the first student teaching placement,
descriptive analyses were run on each of the items in the self-report questionnaire.
The following scores represent the self-reported mental effort, with higher scores
indicating more cognitive load: Addressing the needs of diverse learners (M = 7.23;
SD = 1.75), Effectively teaching class (M = 7.00; SD = 1.09), Monitoring level of
attention (M = 6.77; SD = 1.04), Identifying verbal/nonverbal cures (M = 6.12; SD =
1.02), Teaching content (M = 6.07; SD = 1.33), Managing distractions (M = 5.99;
SD = 1.67), Developing a lesson plan (M = 5.78; SD = 1.83), and Identifying prior
knowledge (M = 4.74; SD = 1.27; see Table 1).

Question 2(a)
What type of Cognitive Load do pre-service teachers experience towards the end of
their student teaching? To examine the cognitive load experienced in the second
student teaching placement, descriptive analyses were run on each of the items in
132 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

Table 1. Mean (and standard deviation) of self-reported cognitive load during the 1st and
2nd placement of student teaching.
1st placement 2nd placement
of student teaching of student teaching
(weeks 1–7) (weeks 7–14)
N = 26 N = 26
Addressing the needs of diverse learners 7.23 5.70a
(1.75) (1.30)
Effectively teaching the class 7.00 6.32
(1.09) (1.21)
Monitoring level of attention 6.77 5.891a
(1.04) (.99)
Identifying verbal/nonverbal cues 6.12 5.89
(1.02) (1.03)
Teaching content 6.07 5.88
(1.33) (1.03)
Managing Distractions 5.99 5.08a
(1.67) (1.03)
Developing a lesson plan 5.78 5.88
(1.83) (1.15)
Identifying prior knowledge 4.74 5.25
(1.27) (1.39)
Note: Lower scores indicate less mental effort.
a
Self-reported cognitive load significantly lower during 2nd placement for student teaching.

the self-report questionnaire: Effectively teaching class (M = 6.32; SD = 1.21),

Monitoring level of attention (M = 5.89; SD = .99), Identifying verbal/nonverbal
cures (M = 5.89; SD = 1.03), Developing a lesson plan (M = 5.88; SD = 1.15),
Teaching content (M = 5.88; SD = 1.03), Addressing the needs of diverse learners
(M = 5.70; SD = 1.30), Identifying prior knowledge (M = 5.25; SD = 1.39), and
Managing distractions (M = 5.08; SD = 1.03; see Table 1).

Question 2(b)
A repeated measure ANOVA was used on each item in the cognitive load question-
naire, with participants’ reported mental effort at two time points (Time 1: First
student teaching placement; Time 2: Second Student Teaching placement) as a
within-subjects factor. The analyses revealed that student teachers, on average,
reported significantly changed mental efforts with respect to monitoring level of
attention, meeting the needs of diverse learners, and managing internal and external
distractions. The sphericity assumption was met in these analyses. With respect
to monitoring level of attention, the main effect was significant, F(1, 15) = 7.646,
p = .014, η² = .34. Additionally, the main effect was significant for meeting the needs
of diverse learners, F(1, 15) = 8.830, p = .010, η² = .37. Lastly, the main effect was
significant for managing distractions, F(1, 15) = 4.527, p = .050, η² = .23. All three
analyses indicated that the student teachers experienced significantly decreased lev-
els of mental effort for these three items in the second placement of student teaching
(see Table 1).
 Teaching Education 133

Question 3
Participants in the interview shared words, thoughts, and phrases (indicators). The
interviews were semi-structured in the sense that the set of questions guided the
interview, while the interviewer was allowed autonomy to use probes to further clar-
ify the participants’ comments. Words and phrases uttered during the semi-structured
interviews were analyzed and the below themes emerged, an approach that Glaser
(1978) referred to as “the concept-indictor model” (pp. 62–63). Interviews were
audio-recorded and then transcribed verbatim by one of the researchers or research
assistants. The researchers independently engaged in open coding of the transcripts,
guided by the questions What is going on? and What is being referenced here?
Through discussions, the researchers collaboratively developed and refined themes
(Strauss & Corbin, 1990). The researchers then engaged in a process of systemati-
cally validating the relationships by “confirming and disconfirming examples and
filling in categories that needed further refinement and development” (Strauss &
Corbin, 1990, p. 116). This process resulted in the following themes.

Pre-service teachers became aware of their own limited cognitive resources and
emerging automaticity
Interviews during the second placement of student teaching revealed that participants
began to understand limitations in their own cognitive resources and the importance
of automaticity, particularly with respect to extraneous cognitive load. One pre-ser-
vice teacher reported in the second half of the student teaching placement:

I was constantly thinking about it all the time [class management during the beginning
of student teaching placement]. But I let myself automatically react [class management
during the end of student teaching placement] because I know I can’t think about it
because I don’t have time to do that. So, I just kind of let it happen and I reflect after-
wards.

This increased automaticity was reflected in another pre-service teacher’s comment

during the second placement:

Um, I am able to think on my toes a lot better than I did last placement … I think just
being more comfortable, from all the practice last placement, and being in class all the
time.

Other participants articulated challenges so often faced by novices, simultaneously

processing information from multiple sources and the resulting cognitive overload.
One stated,

I think identifying their level is okay, but being able to adhere to them and watch what
they’re doing all the time and pay attention to my own teaching, too, it’s just … hard.

Another student teacher’s comment revealed the sense of feeling overwhelmed due
to the need to consciously process and attend to a diverse body of information
quickly:

… right now in student teaching, I’m at the beginning stage. I’m thinking of, what are
their names, what are their needs, and how do I address all these things quickly.
134 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

Lesson planning continued to impose cognitive load throughout both placements

While the self-reported mental effort to complete the lesson plans was comparatively
lower relative to the other activities, there was not a significant decrease in reported
mental effort during the second placement. In other words, the process of creating a
lesson plan and its application to teaching remained a conscious effort that did not
reach automaticity. In the beginning, the pre-service teachers tended to acknowledge
the challenges of implementing lesson plans:

I think this comes from [the high mental effort reported for developing and implement-
ing lesson plans] not having taught much, where I still have to figure out what I am
going to do, what strategies I am going to use, and how, you know, I am going to allot
the time … we talked [the student teacher and cooperating teacher] about filling the
time, you know, there is a lot of direct instruction in science, there tends to be, but you
can’t do 90 minutes of direct instruction. Sometimes, it takes a lot of effort to figure
out what’s going to be an activity, how to work activities in, that what it takes [high
mental effort] figuring out how to creatively create lessons, how do line them, to keep
attention.

The challenges of lesson planning continued during the second placement, as high-
lighted by another pre-service teacher:

Um, I think my biggest problem, or with planning is figuring out how much, how long
everything is going take and then also … return the homework, pass out the home-
work’s sheets … because I forget about those when I’m planning them.

Another pre-service teacher discussed the conscious effort, and subsequent

challenge, of applying the lesson plan to teaching,

I think one of the things I struggle with the most is the chronology while I’m teaching
and keeping track of what comes next and doing it in a quick …

Cognitive overload may limit their ability to make modifications during teaching
Modifications generally were only made following the lesson, possibly due to the
cognitive load experienced while teaching. For example, one secondary pre-service
teacher discussed how she made changes for the last section of a class,

… but right now it’s really helpful to be able to teach it a few times and then change
things, and put it all in [ for the last section of the class] …. I realized when I was
working with the first class … as I was lecturing … I did it for the whole time in a
monotone … I knew they were getting bored … yes, I knew that they were bored, but
I just couldn’t make any adjustments that class. The second class, though, I taught the
same thing and made some adjustments. I just knew they were more engaged during
this class.

Other pre-service teachers could not articulate any changes between their lesson plan
and their actual teaching,

Um, I didn’t make any changes, I’m trying to think …

 Teaching Education 135

Discussion
The goal of this study was to use the theoretical lens of CLT to discuss the chal-
lenges faced by novice teachers, and student teachers in particular. Novice teachers
often report feeling overwhelmed, a challenge that can be described through the
assumptions of the CLT. Quantitative results from this study indicated that pre-ser-
vice teachers reported significantly decreased levels of mental effort in their second
student teaching placement. These decreased levels of mental effort were related to
managing distractions, which is associated with extraneous cognitive load. This
movement toward automaticity, at least for some components of teaching, was
articulated in the semi-structured interviews (I am able to think on my toes a lot bet-
ter than I did last semester). However, both the quantitative and qualitative results
suggest that mental effort devoted to developing and implementing lesson plans did
not significantly change throughout student teaching. These results underscore the
importance of pre-service teachers developing pockets of expertise before they stu-
dent teach. Expertise is defined by automaticity and acquired through deliberate
practice. Can pre-service teachers acquire expertise with lesson planning, for
example, before they student teach so that knowledge related to this process is auto-
matically retrieved? If so, creating and applying lesson plans would not consume
valuable working memory space, which could then be consciously used for other
components of teaching for which pre-service teachers have not yet acquired
expertise. These findings present practical implications for teacher education
programs, which are outlined in the following section.

Practical implications
From a theoretical standpoint, extraneous cognitive load should be minimized so
that load associated with fostering performance in any given context (intrinsic and
germane) is allotted the maximum space in working memory. Translated into the
context of classroom teaching, this theoretical assumption suggests that student
teachers would benefit from limiting the distractibility of irrelevant information
(extrinsic cognitive load) so that they can consciously think about the lesson’s
content (intrinsic cognitive load) and the pedagogy necessary to teach the lesson
(germane cognitive load). Irrelevant information can come in many different forms
while teaching, though there may be unique challenges for student teachers. Mentor-
ing is a critical component of the teaching experience, yet it has been documented
that the presence of a mentor (such as a principal or supervisor) increases the proba-
bility that student teachers engage in less-effective pedagogy and make mistakes that
they would not normally experience (Leinwand, 1998). An affective reaction, such
as nervousness, may explain the effect of observation on student teachers. The
cognitive implications of observation, though, have been explained through the
notion that student teachers are aware of the observer during teaching and this
awareness consumes valuable working memory capacity (Feldon, 2007). Further-
more, this awareness is not related to the effective execution of teaching, and thus is
considered extraneous cognitive load. As a result, the student teacher will have less
capacity to focus on processes that will lead to effective teaching, which explains
why student teachers may experience heighted mistakes while being observed.
Much has been written on the need for mentors to develop a positive relationship
with their mentee (Hobson, 2002; Pitton, 2006; Smith, 2005). In the absence of any
sort of a relationship, the observation process can be very intimidating and
136 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

distracting for the novice educator. For student teachers, the expectation that their
cooperating teacher or their college supervisor will be mentoring them includes the
reality that these individuals will be watching the novice educator teach. Without the
development of a positive relationship between the individuals observing in the
classroom and the student teacher, this evaluative process can be fraught with
anxiety. Faculty serving in a supervisory role need to build a relationship with their
protégée so that observations do not feel threatening or “distracting” to the student
teacher. Communicating the expectations for the roles of mentor/observer can help
lessen the anxiety that often accompanies observations. Opportunities for conversa-
tion outside of observations can also be helpful. Asking a student teacher for input
related to what they would like feedback on during the observation and following
their lead early on in observations can also lessen the tension of these experiences.
In addition, using co-teaching as a model, where the cooperation and student teacher
co-plan and work together in the classroom enables the student teacher to cogni-
tively process less at the early stages of their student teaching experience. Creating a
positive relationship or using co-teaching may decrease the amount of working
memory consumed by extrinsic load caused by the presence of an observer. Supervi-
sors can also limit note taking, sit where they are not in the direct line of the student
teacher’s vision, and use other tools to help minimize their impact in classroom.
Keeping in mind their body language and nonverbal expressions during observations
also can alleviate distractions for the student teacher, as the observer will not appear
threatening. Such efforts by teacher education institutions to address the impact of
the observation may minimize the impact of the presence of the observer and lessen
the extrinsic cognitive load experienced by student teachers.
Decreasing the student teacher’s awareness of observations would limit extrane-
ous cognitive load and create additional capacity for germane and intrinsic cognitive
load, a situation that would certainly benefit student teachers. Data from this study
suggest that the student teachers experienced decreased cognitive load in a few
dimensions of teaching, namely addressing the needs of diverse learners, monitoring
level of attention, and managing distractions. However, there were other dimensions
with which the student teachers reported no significant changes throughout their
entire teaching placement, most notably the mental effort associated with effectively
teaching the class. Student teachers often report feeling overwhelmed (Carre, 1993;
Kagan, 1992; Wideen et al., 1998), so it is not surprising that the participants from
this study reported that effectively teaching the class continued to impose a high
level of mental effort. However, decreasing the impact of extraneous cognitive load
through carefully considering the impact of observations may create additional
working memory space to focus on effectively teaching the class.
Mentoring student teachers so that they are capable of discerning relevant and
irrelevant information, beyond that of the presence of observers, will equip them to
more efficiently capitalize on the capacity available in working memory. Research
using task analyses (Leinhardt, 1990) reveals that expert teachers have the ability to
process less irrelevant information because of their attentional behaviors (Hogan,
Rabinowitz, & Craven, 2003), and thus are able to more efficiently utilize the capac-
ity in working memory (Masunaga & Horn, 2000). Novice teachers, on the other
hand, may not have the necessary schemas to differentiate between relevant and
irrelevant cues (Allen & Casbergue, 1997), nor have they acquired the automaticity
that affords additional working memory space. As such, student teachers would
benefit from explicit mentoring that includes an approach advocated in the
 Teaching Education 137

decision-making literature (e.g. Velmahos et al., 2004). In this approach, the mentor
explicitly identifies both relevant and irrelevant cues and discusses effective
responses and consideration of these responses under various circumstances (Sherin
& Han, 2004). The first step in this process, though, is identifying the importance of
differentiating between relevant and irrelevant cues, particularly from the standpoint
of understanding one’s own limited cognitive capacity. Data from this study suggest
that student teachers slowly become more aware of their own limited capacity
throughout the student teaching placement, as evidenced with comments, such as

I was constantly thinking about it all the time [class management during the beginning
of student teaching]. But I let myself automatically react [class management during the
end of student teaching] because I know I can’t think about it because I don’t have time
to do that. So, I just kind of let it happen and I reflect afterwards.

This self-awareness of working memory’s limited capacity is the first step for
student teachers in understanding the importance of differentiating between relevant
and irrelevant information.
Despite this progress, student teachers at the end of their 14-week placement
were still experiencing challenges related to cognitive overload. These findings are
consistent with previous empirical work. Sabers, Cushing, and Berliner (1991), for
example, examined how novice and expert teachers viewed video-taped classroom
practices. While novices attend to behavioral events of students, teachers with more
experience were able to integrate information from a diverse set of cues within the
classroom. Presumably, teachers with greater expertise are afforded automaticity that
allows them to process additional pieces of information. Thus, simultaneously focus-
ing attention on instruction and classroom management does not overload the
working memory of expert teachers. Novice teachers, on the other hand, face diffi-
culty in splitting their attention across the diverse requirements of effective teaching.
The challenges of attending to and integrating multiple sources of information have
been theoretically described as the “Split-attention effect”, whereby the limited
capacity of working memory is overloaded and leads to decreased performance
(Sweller, 1994; Sweller & Chandler, 1991). This theoretical assumption provides a
framework for research that has found novice teachers are challenged to meet the
needs of individual learners while teaching (Schempp, Tan, Manross, & Fincher,
1998) and unexpectedly adapt their teaching (Borko & Putnam, 1996). How could a
novice, who already faces cognitive overload while trying to instruct and manage an
entire class, further allocate cognitive resources to meet the needs of individual
learners? This “split-attention” may occur for beginning teachers as they simulta-
neously attend to and integrate information from multiple resources.
Data from this study highlight the impact of cognitive overload for student teach-
ers. Many of these beginning teachers offered unsolicited comments during the inter-
view that revealed their challenges with the more sophisticated components of
teaching. For example, a number of secondary student teacher identified the impor-
tance of teaching several sections of a class and then making modifications to the
lesson plans only after having taught it. Other student teachers explicitly noted that
they did not make any changes to the lesson plan during the actual teaching of the
lesson. Adaptive instruction, classroom management, and other facets of effective
pedagogy require understanding of individual students and the cognitive resources
to split attention. This expectation can be seen in the TPA.
138 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

External cognitive load caused by the completion of required assignments, such

as the TPA and state standard portfolios during student teaching, need to be recon-
sidered. Student teachers’ work completing the TPA teaching episodes requires prep-
aration, research before teaching, as well as the focus and awareness of in-class
behaviors and actions of the students and their own behaviors. These requirements
add to extrinsic cognitive load and require novice teachers to split their attention.
Students need to describe their planning, analyze the plans, articulate and meet the
needs of their students, and discuss their video-taped lessons and assessments in a
more detailed manner. While engagement in this type of work typifies effective
teaching, the need to “capture” this work for evaluation intensifies the extrinsic load.
One can imagine that student teachers are constantly thinking:

Did I deliver that lesson plan in the manner required for the TPA? Do I need to remem-
ber what the students said so I can use that in my reflection? Was my description for
that part of the portfolio detailed enough? Do I spend time planning my lesson or
completing my portfolio entries?

This “noise” or extrinsic distraction only compounds their feelings of being over-
whelmed.

Future directions
How might teacher education programs increase the probability that pre-service
teachers experience success during their student teaching? Though teacher education
programs typically offer opportunities for candidates to present brief lessons prior to
student teaching (e.g. microteaching; Metcalf, Ronen, Hammer, & Kahlich, 1996),
these experiences may not allow pre-service teachers to engage in substantial repeti-
tions of skills on a regularized schedule. Feldon (2007) argues that certain skills
should be the focus of repetition in these experiences because they translate across
teaching situations, and thus can efficiently automate. The benefit of reaching auto-
maticity with certain skills prior to student teaching is threefold: (1) It increases the
available cognitive resources in working memory so the student teacher can focus
on more diverse cues; (2) It increases the probability that cognitive overload will be
met with desired teaching behaviors because of the automatized skill; and (3) It
overall reduces the probability of cognitive overload (Feldon, 2007). The challenge
for future research is to determine specific skills for developing expertise to the
point of automaticity. As noted by Clark (2008), skill automaticity does not develop
in the absence of sufficient practice.
Are there areas where pre-service teachers can move toward automaticity and
lessen their need to expend so much intrinsic and germane cognitive load in the
preparation and teaching of their lessons? Lesson planning, through repetitive use of
a planning tool that focuses the pre-service teacher on the thinking and planning
processes that create successful lessons, can possibly move novice teachers towards
automaticity. In methods classes where students typically create lessons plans, teach
mini lessons, work in a practicum setting where they prepare and teach mini lessons,
the use of a common planning tool could help move these pre-service teachers
closer to automaticity and perhaps speed up the internalization of these processes.
In addition, the need for student teachers to search for the knowledge to prepare les-
sons that meet students’ needs, takes significant cognitive effort. Lesson planning is
 Teaching Education 139

a process that can be taught, developed, and honed in a college classroom, enabling
a pre-service teacher to internalize this process. With an internalized format for
planning in mind, student teachers might have more mental capacity to devote to
activities that impose intrinsic and germane cognitive load. Initially, pre-service
teachers develop a mental model related to lesson planning and teaching. This
mental model becomes more sophisticated and robust through extensive experience
and practice. With increasing sophistication and development of discrete knowledge,
mental models require less conscious effort to use effectively. Thus, practice and
experience are critical for mental models to develop to the point where there is an
automated procedure for employing them. While no student teacher has the luxury
of using a planning process that works effectively in all settings and for all students,
having sufficient experience that enables an automated procedure for applying a
lesson plan may maximize cognitive resources to be used for other facets of teach-
ing. With these assumptions in mind, future research would benefit from addressing
the following questions:

 Which skills should teacher education programs strategically emphasize prior

to student teaching and how can programs structure training so these skills
become automatized?
 How much time is required for pre-service teachers to develop expertise with
the above-mentioned skills?
 Does the development of expertise with these skills lead to better performance
during student teaching and can this performance be attributed to more
efficient use of cognitive resources in working memory?

Limitations
While this study provides empirical evidence that supports the importance of consid-
ering cognitive load in challenges faced by student teachers, there are several limita-
tions that need to be considered. First, the sample was small, and thus the
generalizability of the findings is limited. Second, understanding the complex rela-
tionship between cognitive load and teaching also requires empirical evidence of
teacher performance. In other words, does cognitive overload matter? Theoretically,
the impact of cognitive overload could lead to maladaptive cognitive defaults (“fast
and frugal” approach) and/or inattentiveness to important cues within the classroom,
which would presumably have a negative effect on the teachers’ effectiveness. This
study did not measure actual student teaching performance, nor did it empirically
document the relationship between their cognitive load and students’ performance.
Given the paucity of empirical research that has examined the impact of cognitive
load in student teachers, the authors deemed it appropriate to first run an exploratory
study. However, future research could further the understanding of this line
of research by also empirically examining the relationship between student
performance, student teacher cognitive load, and teaching.

Note
1. The interview questions included: (1) We would like to understand your lesson planning
process more fully. Can you describe your process of planning a recent lesson? (2) Talk
about how you get started, what materials you use, how you decide on the objectives
140 D.C. Moos and D. Pitton

and goals for your lesson, and how much time do you use to plan the lesson. (3) How
does the lesson connect with the content or the curriculum that your students are
learning? (4) What is easy for you in planning? (5) What challenges do you face while
you plan? (6) What are you thinking about as you plan the lessons? What is going
through your mind? (7) Can you talk about why you rated yourself for the mental effort
required to teach the content of this lesson? Manage the external and internal distractors?
Effectively teach this lesson? (8)What are you beginning to learn about yourself as a
teacher as you apply the lesson plans that you create and design into your classroom with
your students? (9) Can you talk about how you embedded classroom management into
your lesson planning and teaching? (10) Can you talk about how you supported learning
of all students in your lesson planning and teaching? (11) What strengths do you see for
yourself now as a lesson planner? (12) What more do you want to work on in term of
lesson planning?

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