We present, from first principles, a direct method for evaluating the exact fermion propagator in the presence of a general background field at finite temperature, which can be used to determine the finite temperature effective action for the system. As applications, we determine the complete one loop finite temperature effective actions for 0+1 dimensional QED as well as the Schwinger model. These effective actions, which are derived in the real time (closed time path) formalism, generate systematically all the Feynman amplitudes calculated in thermal perturbation theory and also show that the retarded (advanced) amplitudes vanish in these theories.

5 pages, revtex, typos fixed, references added, to be published in Physics Letters B