Multi-level mentoring practices in a Teacher Education Program in Greece

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 256-270 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vasiliki Brinia ◽  
Paraskevi Psoni
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Experiential Learning ◽  
Professional Identity ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Specific Program ◽  
Mentoring Practices ◽  
Multi Level

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to reflect the multi-level mentoring practices of a Teacher Education Program in Greece and the mentors’ perceptions on them. The mentoring practices of the specific Program are unique in Teacher Education in Greece; and therefore, the paper examines the extent to which they are considered as capable of developing in mentors and mentees specific skills that contribute to the development of student-teachers’ professional identity. Design/methodology/approach The case study is based on qualitative research and 32 interviews with mentors of the specific Program who report their experience. Six mentees have also been asked to provide the researchers with comments, so as to observe whether their answers confirm the mentors’ perceptions. Findings The different types of mentoring of the specific Program are perceived as able to enhance the mentors’ and the mentees’ professional development and self-confidence as well as to the latters’ improved transition and engagement to the Program. The authors also contribute to the fostering of the mentees’ experiential learning and to the capitalization of knowledge in Teacher Education. The EES teacher mentoring is considered of important adding value to the formation of student-teachers’ professional identity, according to the mentors interviewed. Mentees comments were found to confirm the mentors’ perceptions. Originality/value The conclusions of the paper are of significant value, since multi-level mentoring as a holistic approach to teacher-candidates’ experiential learning and professional development examined in a single paper is rather rare. Moreover, the Program of the paper’s case study follows this multi-level innovative approach, which includes EES teacher mentoring, and which is of considerable adding value, according to the mentors and the mentees interviewed. It could, therefore, constitute a paradigm for other Teacher Education Programs in Greece and in other countries.

scholarly journals Teacher Education through Art: How to Teach Social Sciences through Artwork –The Student-Teachers’ Views

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 57
Author(s):  
Vasiliki Brinia ◽  
Reni Giannimara ◽  
Paraskevi Psoni ◽  
George Stamatakis
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Teacher Candidates ◽  
Teaching Method ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Fine Arts ◽  
Specific Teaching ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Collaborative Skills ◽  
First Time

The present paper aims at presenting an innovative approach to educating teacher-candidates through the art. More specifically, it aims at exploring the benefits of this approach for student-teachers and for their future teaching of social science subjects. It is an experiential approach, based on a multi-level methodology, developed and implemented through the collaboration of the Teacher Education Program of Athens University of Economics and Business with the Aalto University and the Athens School of Fine Arts. After the completion of the implementation of the specific teaching method, the student-teachers have been interviewed, in order to detect their views on the effectiveness of this method, which has been introduced for the first time in the Teacher Education field in Greece. The results are positive with the interviewees reporting having achieved an in-depth and multi-perspective understanding of the matter in discussion as well as enhanced collaborative skills among other benefits.

Lesson study with didactical engineering for student teachers in Brazil

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-138
Author(s):  
Aluska Dias Ramos de Macedo ◽  
Paula Moreira Baltar Bellemain ◽  
Carl Winsløw
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Lesson Study ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Strong Potential ◽  
Didactical Engineering

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to experiment with ideas from didactical engineering (DE) in student teachers’ first experience with lesson study (LS). Design/methodology/approach This is a case study. Findings LS in pre-service education can be enhanced by elements from DE. Originality/value The idea indicated in the purpose is new and holds strong potential for the use of LS in teacher education.

Designing a pre-service CLIL teacher education program

2019 ◽  
Vol 64 (3 (253)) ◽  
pp. 173-193
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Brzosko-Barratt
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Mentor Teachers ◽  
Instrumental Case Study ◽  
Early Primary ◽  
The University

This paper is a part of a larger instrumental case study exploring the process of creating a CLIL teacher education program for early primary level at the University of Warsaw. The paper identifies some challenges related to program design and describes areas of growth of student teachers specifically related to CLIL planning instruction. The data were collected over a period of five years and included interviews and focused groups with student teachers, teacher educators and mentor teachers as well as the analysis of CLIL units created by the student teachers.

scholarly journals Learning to Teach: A Case Study of Student Teachers’ Practicum and Policy Recommendations

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Urip Sulistiyo ◽  
Amirul Mukminin ◽  
Kemas Abdurrahman ◽  
Eddy Haryanto
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
English Teacher ◽  
Teaching Practicum ◽  
Beginner Teachers

This qualitative case study was conducted to gather information on the implementation of teaching practicum in order to improve the quality of the program in an English teacher education program at a state-owned university, Jambi, Indonesia. Information was gathered from five recent teacher graduates, five beginner teachers, five school principals, and five teacher educators on their perceptions of English Foreign Language Teacher Education Program (EFLTEP) graduates as beginner teachers. This qualitative study employed a background survey, document analyses and interviews for data collection. Document analyses were used to examine the aims and content of the English teacher education program and official Indonesian English teacher education curriculum and policies. Semi-structured interviews were used to explore the main data from graduates and collect information from the beginner teachers. Interviews with principals and teacher educators were used to obtain further data and evidence about the beginner teachers’ knowledge and preparedness to teach. We organized our analysis, findings, and discussion around the implementation of teaching practicum. The analyses of the documents and texts revealed that major themes related to (1) the standards for implementing the teaching practicum in the program, (2) quality of the teaching practicum, (3) duration of the teaching practicum, (4) the roles of mentor teachers and teacher educators, and (5) selecting school partners for the student teacher practicum. Particularly, the findings indicated that teaching practicum projects undertaken during the program provided suitable but limited experience for student teachers to translate their knowledge learnt at university into the real practice of teaching at school levels. For future improvement of the program, the role of supervising teachers and teacher educators in assisting student teachers during the teaching practicum project should be a priority. The organisation and management of school–university partnerships for schools taking part in the teaching practicum require attention to maximise benefits to student teachers.

E-Portfolio

2018 ◽  
pp. 165-174
Author(s):  
Jasmine Jain ◽  
Johan Eddy Luaran
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Reflective Thinking ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Academic Setting ◽  
Preparatory Program ◽  
Local Case ◽  
School Placement

This chapter focuses on the potential of using eportfolio in an academic setting, specifically in a teacher preparatory program. The advantages of using eportfolio as compared to its paper portfolio counterparts is also discussed in making the case of using eportfolio stronger. This chapter also discusses the benefits and challenges of using eportfolio as a tool to encourage reflections among the student teachers when they are on school placement, by quoting examples from a local case study. The study revealed that there are three ways student teachers look at the usefulness as well as three challenges they faced while constructing and developing eportfolio. The findings of the study gave insights about how eportfolio can be better used to improve students' reflective thinking, in line with the goals of the university's teacher education program.

scholarly journals Roles, relationships and emotions: Student teachers’ understanding of feedback as interpersonal

2021 ◽  
pp. 003452372198937
Author(s):  
Caroline Elbra-Ramsay
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
First Year ◽  
Case Study Methodology ◽  
Study Methodology ◽  
Undergraduate Programme ◽  
Phenomenological Case Study ◽  
International Teacher

This paper reports the findings of a small-scale study seeking to investigate how student teachers, within a three-year undergraduate programme, understand feedback. Feedback has been central to debates and discussion in the assessment literature in recent years. Hence, in this paper, feedback is positioned within the often-contradictory discourses of assessment, including perspectives on student and teacher feedback. The study focused on two first year undergraduate student teachers at a small university in England and considered the relationships between their understanding of feedback as a student, their understanding of feedback as an emerging teacher, and the key influences shaping these understandings. A phenomenological case study methodology was employed with interviews as the prime method of data collection. Themes emerged as part of an Nvivo analysis, including emotional responses, relationships and dialogue, all of which appear to have impacted on the students’ conceptual understanding of feedback as indelibly shaped by its interpersonal and affective, rather than purely cognitive or ideational, dimensions. The paper therefore seeks to contribute to the wider feedback discourse by offering an analysis of empirical data. Although situated within English teacher education, there are tentative conclusions that are applicable to international teacher education and as well as higher education more generally.

scholarly journals Assessing pre-service teachers’ professional identity construction in a three-phase teacher education program in Iran

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fariba Haghighi Irani ◽  
Azizeh Chalak ◽  
Hossein Heidari Tabrizi
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Professional Identity ◽  
Identity Construction ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Teacher Identity ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Assessment Tools ◽  
Problem Solving Skills

Abstract The critical role of teachers suggests that assessing teacher identity construction helps teacher educators understand the changes in teachers and design materials in harmony with their needs in teacher education programs. However, only a few studies have focused on assessing pre-service teachers’ identity in the long term in Iran. To address this gap, the contribution of a pre-service teacher education program consisting of three phases, namely engage, study, and activate to the professional identity construction of eight pre-service teachers in an institute in Tehran was assessed. Pre-course and post-course interviews, two reflective essays, ten observation notes, and two teaching performances were gathered over a year and analyzed as guided by grounded theory and discourse analysis. Findings revealed two significant changes in the participants’ identities when they transitioned from engage to study and from study to activate phases that yielded study phase as the peak of the changes. Overall, three major shifts were identified in the participants’ identities: from a commitment to evaluation towards a commitment to modality, from one-dimensional to multi-dimensional perceptions, and from problem analysis to problem-solving skills. Current findings may facilitate teacher identity construction by designing local programs matching the needs of pre-service teachers. It may also assist teacher educators by assessing the quality of teachers’ performance and developing teacher assessment tools.

Digital stories, material transformations: reflections of education students in a pre-teacher program

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Louise Romero-Ivanova ◽  
Paul Cook ◽  
Greta Faurote
Keyword(s):  
High School ◽  
Teacher Education ◽  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Digital Storytelling ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Education Students ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Peer Reviews ◽  
Digital Stories ◽  
K 12

Purpose This study centers on high school pre-teacher education students’ reviews of their peers’ digital stories. The purpose of this study is twofold: to bring digital storytelling to the forefront as a literacy practice within classrooms that seeks to privilege students’ voices and experiences and also to encapsulate the authors’ different experiences and perspectives as teachers. The authors sought to understand how pre-teacher education candidates analyzed, understood and made meaning from their classmates’ digital stories using the seven elements of digital storytelling (Dreon et al., 2011). Design/methodology/approach Using grounded theory (Charmaz, 2008) as a framework, the question of how do high school pre-teacher education program candidates reflectively peer review their classmates’ digital stories is addressed and discussed through university and high school instructors’ narrative reflections. Through peer reviews of their fellow classmates’ digital stories, students were able to use the digital storytelling guide that included the seven elements of digital storytelling planning to critique and offer suggestions. The authors used the 2018–2019 and 2019–2020 cohorts’ digital stories, digital storytelling guides and peer reviews to discover emerging categories and themes and then made sense of these through narrative analysis. This study looks at students’ narratives through the contexts of peer reviews. Findings The seven elements of digital storytelling, as noted by Dreon et al. (2011, p. 5), which are point of view, dramatic question, emotional content, the gift of your voice, the power of the soundtrack, economy and pacing, were used as starting points for coding students’ responses in their evaluations of their peers’ digital stories. Situated on the premise of 21st century technologies as important promoters of differentiated ways of teaching and learning that are highly interactive (Greenhow et al., 2009), digital stories and students’ reflective practices of peer reviewing were the foundational aspects of this paper. Research limitations/implications The research the authors have done has been in regards to reviewing and analyzing students’ peer reviews of their classmates’ digital stories, so the authors did not conduct a research study empirical in nature. What the authors have done is to use students’ artifacts (digital story, digital storytelling guides and reflections/peer reviews) to allow students’ authentic voices and perspectives to emerge without their own perspectives marring these. The authors, as teachers, are simply the tools of analysis. Practical implications In reading this paper, teachers of different grade levels will be able to obtain ideas on using digital storytelling in their classrooms first. Second, teachers will be able to obtain hands-on tools for implementing digital storytelling. For example, the digital storytelling guide to which the authors refer (Figure 1) can be used in different subject areas to help students plan their stories. Teachers will also be able to glean knowledge on using students’ peer reviews as a kind of authentic assessment. Social implications The authors hope in writing and presenting this paper is that teachers and instructors at different levels, K-12 through higher education, will consider digital storytelling as a pedagogical and learning practice to spark deeper conversations within the classroom that flow beyond margins and borders of instructional settings out into the community and beyond. The authors hope that others will use opportunities for storytelling, digital, verbal, traditional writing and other ways to spark conversations and privilege students’ voices and lives. Originality/value As the authors speak of the original notion of using students’ crucial events as story starters, this is different than prior research for digital storytelling that has focused on lesson units or subject area content. Also, because the authors have used crucial events, this is an entry point to students’ lives and the creation of rapport within the classroom.

scholarly journals ELT Student Teacher Identity Construction: Exploring Teacher Roles and Domains of Expertise

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 113
Author(s):  
Nafiye Cigdem Aktekin ◽  
Hatice Celebi
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Identity Construction ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Teacher Identity ◽  
English Language ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
English Language Teaching ◽  
Teacher Roles

In this study, we direct our focus to identity construction in an English language teaching (ELT) teacher education program. We explore the teacher roles in which student teachers are struggling to position themselves comfortably and the teacher expertise domains (subject matter, didactics, and pedagogy) that they are dedicating themselves to improving. To address our research focus, we have collected reflections and survey responses from 18 student teachers in an ELT education department. Our findings indicate that ELT student teachers find it difficult to position themselves as experts in and about the English language and that they feel a need to be equipped with expertise first and foremost in the subject matter, and then in didactics, followed by pedagogy. These results imply that in ELT teacher education, certain language ideologies are still prevalent and need to be dealt with by teacher educators for transformative outcomes in education.

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