Teachers do not always have the option to study abroad because of coursework and school/teaching obligations. Utilizing virtual exchange is an innovative instructional approach being used in higher education that can mimic a clinical virtual study abroad experience. Accordingly, this study reports on 20 participants that took a course on linguistics for ESL/EFL teachers. Teacher candidates in the U.S. were paired with EFL students at a university in Mexico taking a course to improve their spoken English. Through weekly journaling teacher candidates described student errors and reflected on the ties between what they learned in the linguistics class (theory) and made clinical decisions (practice) to help students improve their spoken English. Connecting teacher candidates with students from around the world via teleconference in this study showed evidence that these TESOL teacher candidates were positively influenced by their participation in this experience. This paper describes four patterns that focus on the ways virtual study abroad supported teacher candidates' learning as they interacted with EFL students: (1) Integration of challenging course material; (2) Application of course knowledge; (3) Connections made between culture and language; and (4) Recognition of stereotypes. Each of these four themes is highlighted with example quotes from teachers' journals.