The intercultural challenges of Indonesian EFL pre-service teacher in teaching English to Thai students in an international teaching internship program: A case study at a State Islamic University in Bandung, Indonesia

As the world develops, teachers are required to have a global competence. To prepare the pre-service teacher to have the global competence, some universities in the world have conducted an International Teaching Internship programs, including in Indonesia. Many types of research also have been conducted to reveal the advantage of the program. However, there is still a limitation of the research that reveals the challenges that the pre-service teachers face during the program. The present research aims to investigate the intercultural challenges that an Indonesian EFL pre-service teacher faced during an international teaching internship program in Thailand. It also aims to elaborate the way the pre-service teacher coped with the challenges. By using a qualitative case study with a purposeful sampling, the researcher focuses on analyzing one of the thirteen pre-service teachers that joined the program and explores the data obtained from the video documentation, semi-structured interview, and open-ended questionnaire. The results of the study reveal that the lack of pre-service teachers’ intercultural competence regarding the cultural self-awareness, communication skill, and attitudes aspects emerges the challenge. The findings also show that the pre-service teacher could deal with the challenges by being more flexible, open, curious, and adjust to the Thai culture. In conclusion, the intercultural challenges emerges mostly in the beginning of the program because the pre-serevice teacher is still not aware of cultural differences, and is still bounded by the culture and experiences that the pre-service teacher had. The recommendations are posted for the future program to facilitate the pre-service teachers a workshop or teaching-training to foreign students