The goal of this study is to investigate how student teachers benefit from authentic researcher experiences as part of their pre-service education. Student teachers regard research studies as an important part of their education.Research studies also affected students' ability to deal with learners' differences and collaborate with different partners in educational questions, and even helped them in their everyday classroom teaching. Furthermore, active learning experiences in teacher education reinforce the research studies' positive effect on professional competences. Student teachers' professional competences were much higher when both research studies and active learning experiences supported them.