Investigating preservice teachers’ emotions and dialogic teaching practices in simulation-based learning with artificial intelligence-powered virtual student agents

Preparing preservice teachers to foster students' critical thinking through productive and constructive teaching practices is a central goal in teacher education, yet difficult to accomplish in clinical settings. Virtual reality (VR) simulations, featuring artificial intelligence (AI)-powered student agents, offer a promising avenue for developing and rehearsing core teaching skills. Despite this potential, limited research has explored preservice teachers’ emotional experiences, and their development of dialogic teacher talk in such simulations. This study investigated emotions and dialogic teaching practices of preservice teachers as they engaged with AI-powered virtual students in a VR-supported teaching simulation. Twenty-two preservice teachers from teacher preparation programs participated in the study. An explanatory sequential mixed-methods design was employed. Quantitative data were analyzed using data mining and heuristic evaluation techniques, followed by qualitative analysis to interpret emotions and patterns of dialogic teaching practices. The findings suggested that preservice teachers' feelings of “frustration and anger,” accompanied by “satisfaction” (i.e., when observing AI-powered “students” improve and make progress), contributed to positive emotions such as “joy.” The findings also support the critical idea that the dialogic teacher talk enacted in the teaching simulation allowed for many of the activities seen in real word discussions, including probing students’ ideas, building on those ideas, and moving toward consensus in group knowledge construction. VR teaching simulations with AI-powered students can elicit authentic emotions and foster meaningful dialogic teaching practices among preservice teachers. These tools show promise as a complement to traditional field experiences in teacher education. • Preservice teachers' frustration, anger, and satisfaction were associated with joy. • Idea building and probing practices linked to consensus building. • Observed student gains are vital to professional growth after teaching challenges. • AI-powered student agents foster preservice teachers' constructive teaching.