Although previous studies showed the pedagogical potential of short stories in language classrooms, only a few studies reported English teacher educators’ perceptions and experiences of using short stories in initial language teacher education courses. At the higher education level, not much has been explored about how short stories are integrated, what are the benefits and challenges and by involving English teacher educators as participants. For that reason, the current study attempts to fill the gap. It raises three research goals and questions to guide filling the research gap, such as (1) how do the English teacher educators integrate short stories into language learning? (2) what benefits do the English teacher educations perceive regarding the integration of short stories into initial language teacher education courses? and (3) what challenges do they encounter when integrating short stories into language learning?

This current study reported a narrative study with three English teacher educators in initial language teacher education in Indonesia. The data collection was conducted through semi-structured interviews. To ensure the validity of the data, this study used member-checking. This study used four steps to analyzed the data, such as (1) compiling, (2) disassembling, (3) reassembling, and (4) interpreting. The narrative inquiry method was used in this study to get the first-hand story of each participant involved.

Results revealed that short stories were integrated in two ways. First, short stories were used in extensive reading courses as teaching materials. Second, short stories were used as a basis for developing teaching and learning activities. From English teacher educators’ stories, as many as eight activities were identified. There were two benefits of using short stories for initial language teacher education, such as short stories as a tool to teach moral values, and it can help the teacher training students to learn how to teach English using short stories. English teacher educators commonly faced three challenges in integrating short stories into English language instruction: finding the “right” short stories, students' low interest in reading the short stories, and limited facilities and time to execute the planned activity. The findings imply that the selection of short stories play a central role. Future studies should be able to shed light on ways to help teacher in selecting the right stories and develop learning activities based on the stories.