I recently read in the Washington Post that the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education issued a report recommending that students preparing for a career in teaching should spend less time in course work and more time in real classrooms for clinical practice. According to the article, the report states that this would be more in the model used for medical Doctors. The report advocates less coursework and more practical experience for pre-service teachers. Of course the overriding theme of this article implies that the failure of our system is with the failure of the teachers, so it must be the failure of the way that teachers are prepared.
I see an additional problem in that the report in the recommendation for evaluating the student teacher on the performance of their assigned students on standardized tests.
“All programs held to same standards; data-driven accountability based on measures of candidate performance and student achievement, including gains in standardized test scores. Data drives reform and continuous improvement.”
This however, will require the attention of a second Post at another time.
Before any committee recommends less time in course work and expanding time in the classroom experience for teacher candidates, it should explore the in-school experience as it exists in today’s model. I do not know what other schools require for their student teacher programs. I do know what is required for my students. It is fair to say that my entire opinion on this subject is based on that background and may not necessarily apply to other student teacher programs or programs in other states.
Students seeking a career in education are not required to master one area of content, but two. They need to be experts in their subject area and they need to be experts in the area of education. To accomplish that, a reduction in course work might be counter-productive. The in-class experience might best be improved in quality as opposed to quantity. The way it is set up now is a “crap shoot” for student teachers, and the colleges have little control over the student-teacher experience.
The college controls the courses candidates are required to take. They are also responsible for holding candidates accountable for 100 hours of class observations of real classes as an eligibility requirement for student teaching. Once the student begins student-teaching the bulk of that experience is in the hands of the Cooperating teacher. That would be the teacher to whom the student is assigned for the student-teacher assignment. On the secondary level that would be half of their time in a middle school setting and half on the high school level with separate cooperating teachers. The college is connected to the student teacher through the weekly seminar class to deal with the reflection of experiences and guidance through day-to-day problems.
The weak link in the chain of the student-teacher’s experience often lies in the relationship with the cooperating teacher. Most cooperating teachers are well-intentioned and want to do their best in their role as a mentor for an aspiring teacher. However, this is not true of all cooperating teachers. The flaw in the system seems to be more in the selection process of the cooperating teacher as well as the training for cooperating teachers.
The idea of student-teaching is to place a student with a working teacher as an apprentice. The student teacher is expected to teach classes as a teacher from the onset of the assignment. This takes place over the length of a college semester. The student teacher is responsible for teaching and assessing students under the guidance of the cooperating teacher. This all works well, if: the student is prepared, the teacher is prepared, the student is receptive, the teacher is giving, the student is professional, the teacher is flexible. This is a short list of the many “ifs” required for a successful student teaching experience. Little of this is controllable by the college.
Teachers are not trained to be cooperating teachers and it is not an ability that one is born with. They are volunteers or in many cases they are volunteered. They are not compensated by the school district and the compensation from the college usually comes in the bartering of course credits or small monetary stipends. Cooperating teachers are required to turn over the duties of teaching to a student teacher while still having the responsibility for their own students’ success. In today’s climate that may impact their own assessment for maintaining their position (job), if the successful performance of their students is not indicated on standardized tests.
To further complicate the situation we must ask: Are the philosophies and experiences of the student teacher and cooperating teacher a match? Do they see eye to eye on the integration of technology in education? Do they agree the needs and use of formative and summative assessment? Has the cooperating teacher remained relevant in the world of education? Is the student teacher given respect from the cooperating teacher or viewed as a teaching assistant? Will the student teacher be allowed to create original lessons or will he/she be required to teach lessons of the cooperating teacher?
Colleges try to offer guidelines for cooperating teachers on most of these concerns, but the primary goal of a cooperating teacher does not lie in the interest of the student teacher, but rather with the students of their own classes. I do realize and I do explain to my students that it is how one handles the experience that benefits one’s education. I do believe that, but even I need to question things when students relate some of the experiences they endured under less enlightened cooperating teachers.
Now, I must address the recommendation of the enlightened committee. If I understand this, they are recommending fewer courses to master two areas of expertise. They are promoting placing students into a mentoring environment with cooperating teachers who are not trained, not screened, not adequately compensated, and being held personally responsible for the effect that student teacher has on the assessment outcomes of their students. Is this the model our medical profession trains physicians with? Maybe we should consider quality of the program instead of quantity. More hours of a flawed system of mentorship does not necessarily create better teachers or physicians.
Most Cooperating teachers do the best job they can to help and mentor their student teachers, but there are many improvements which would help them in this noble endeavor.
My Island View 
Thank you, Tom, for a really thoughtful post. I’m a preservice teacher myself and although I haven’t yet been admitted to formal student teaching, I’ve participated in fieldwork for the last year and a half, both observing and also implementing lessons.
This component of preservice education is a double-edged sword; on the one hand, being in a classroom environment and interacting with the students keeps me sane when it seems like going into education is the last thing I should be doing! It has also provided me with some great experiences and close contacts in the profession.
At the same time, I know exactly what you mean regarding the quality of the relationship between the cooperating teacher and the student. On at least one or two occasions, I’ve been slightly uncomfortable with the practices that I’ve felt obligated to participate in. I’ve also had a few “pointers” thrown my way that I reflexively repressed and promised myself that I would never use.
I’m not sure how this relationship can be guaranteed to work better. I’ve seen my classmates get stuck in classrooms where the teacher allows them an hour a week to actually implement their lesson plan, while they spend two-thirds of their time passing out worksheets and acting as a teacher’s aide. At the same time, I was proud to watch as an entire grade-level at one school district adopted the project approach to learning when one of our student teachers did such a good job at demonstrating it.
I’ll be student teaching next fall and so I might slip by without these changes affecting me, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s a real problem, and one that I’m not sure enough attention is being paid to.
Tom:
Thanks for the thought provoking post. The way we deal with student teaching may serve to perpetuate problems more than it advances the discipline. Some student teachers get to see the best in action, while others have to learn from negative examples. The better teachers may be hesitant to get out of the way, while the ones who are less accomplished may be only too happy to turn their classes over. At the secondary level, teachers need to be strong in their discipline and comfortable with bordering fields. It is up to people like you to make sure they get to see the best exemplars of our craft in action somehow. This can be done via video and on site visits. After that, how about we give them their own students to work with after the end of the school day? I am sure there are charter schools who would welcome them in if you can’t find public options. Finally, it may be time for something like a traditional student teaching placement. What do you think?
I agree that the cooperating teacher is the big factor here. I know a few new teachers who had terrible cooperating teachers.
One was burnt out and did nothing but have students read the text and do the questions at the end of the chapter. One lectured and did nothing else. One left the student alone after the first day. None spent any time working with the student teacher.
A cooperating teacher can make or break the student teaching experience. We need to focus on that aspect soon.
Tom, there are so many variables beyond “data” of contact hours, as you point out so well. One inherent problem in this is that colleges of education are desperate to recruit enough cooperating teachers to place all of their student teachers and other students in practicum experiences. Often, they cannot afford to be all that selective. As you also point out, cooperating teachers are reimbursed very meagerly for what we all know is a tremendous responsibility. Perhaps some (many?) cooperating teachers don’t put their heart into it because of this lack of compensation. And, inasmuch as the student-teachers need to be evaluated, we all know that they cooperating teachers should be selected and evaluated more rigorously than currently takes place.
But, like always in the field of education, “beggars can’t be choosers”, right? 😉 So, how does this model get changed to work more effectively for all concerned?
Can’t disagree with anything you say, Tom. (Is that the same thing as agreeing with you?) But I’d add a few things…
Not sure that NCATE is recommending less coursework but is definitely recommending more “clinical practice” time (e.g., more student teaching). But that is akin to rearranging the deck chairs on a sinking Titanic. An Oliver Twist approach (“Please, sir, I want more.”) to just add more hours, clinical experiences, etc., while needed, does not address the more fundamental issues of how teacher candidates (i.e.., preservice students) are prepared to be teachers. To wit, we need to review what (not necessarily how many) courses are required for undergraduate students in teacher preservice programs. Instead of adding more courses (e.g., how to incorporate technology in daily teaching), look at the existing course requirements, asking tough questions that might well “rock the boat.” And examine the quality of students admitted into teaching programs. Accept the fact that “quality” does not necessarily equate solely to SAT or ACT scores. Also, look at the numbers of students graduating from teacher education programs. In New York State, there were some 26,000 teacher ed graduates. Someone needs to get good, hard numbers on how many teacher openings occur and compare with the numbers of graduates. Too many potentially great teachers cannot find jobs because undergraduate teacher ed programs produce too many graduates. And there are other fundamental issues that educational reformers need to address. We don’t need yet another report with superficial recommendations. Let’s dig deeper into the root causes of the problem of poor teacher candidate preparation and start identifying new solutions.
Great post and a fantastic topic to dig into..as one of those cooperating teachers for years, I can tell you that we need to improve the course work and increase the quality and quantity of time. I agree with John that we should look at how many and who gets into these programs as we did when I was in school. But the quality of the cooperating teachers is essential. Why subject these or any students to poor teachers and poor teaching habits. Love to be part of that overhaul of who we choose.
Yes: the unacknowledged problem of ‘clinical practice’–the complete and utterly random set of experiences student-teachers have in the classrooms themselves. Any teacher-educator has a series of horror stories and a set of amazing cooperating teacher stories to share as well.
I was a Syracuse University graduate in 2001 – English Secondary Education. I had two student-teaching experiences… one as a junior in college, and one as a senior. Each assignment was approximately one semester long, though I was not required to stay the full day in my junior year. Cooperating teachers were carefully screened by the University, and I was placed with my cooperating teachers by my faculty advisior, who matched us partially based on our personalities. My senior year student-teaching experience was full-time… I came into the building early in the morning and left when the day was over. In my senior year, the university required me to attend a field-experience seminar once a week at night. I was strongly discouraged from taking any other classes, and I didn’t. In that semester, I computed grades, I called parents, I attended meet-the-teacher night… I was an integral part of the school community. My experience, in my opinion, was invaluable.
I’ve mentored three student teachers since I began working on Long Island. All three were in my classroom for a very short period of time (approximately six weeks), and only for a small part of the day. This, in my opinion, is not really a valuable experience. I believe that pre-service teachers should have the experience of teaching a full day and a variety of different preps, as this mimics a “real” teaching experience. They should be able to attend faculty meetings and department meetings after school. They should be involved in extra-curricular activities if they so choose.
I do think that many colleges need to overhaul their pre-service teacher programs, specifically in the area of the student-teaching experience. While two of the teachers that I mentored turned out to have much success in their future, a lot of that had to do with certain innate qualities that I couldn’t have “taught” them. I think that is true for most teachers, which is why my personal philosophy in mentoring student teachers has to do with giving them as much “freedom” as they feel comfortable with to take risks and measure their successes independently from my heavy input. This is one credit that I gave to my own cooperating teacher. He sat in the back of the classroom when I taught his classes and surfed the web. He only broke into my lessons if he felt I was doing something wrong. Otherwise – everything was left up to me.
I’ve been teaching 9 years… I think I did OK. =)
Tom,
I cannot disagree that the quality of experience is highly important; cooperating and pre-service teachers HAVE to be good matches. Otherwise both individuals will spend the whole semester frustrated.
I have to disagree some that taking away some university content hours will be as counterproductive as you suggest. We all know that the best way to learn something is to teach it, and I found that quite true as I brushed up on my Amer. History during my student teaching semester. I went on to teach math, and when I took the Praxis to add 9-12 while teaching middle school math, I can attribute passing that on the first try to the foundation and practice of concepts I gained by teaching the math.
As usual, great post!
Dr. Whitby,
As a principal and instructional leader I agree with most everything that you have written. I am passionate about training the next generation of teachers. One of the problems that I run into to is that some of my best teachers no longer want to give up their instructional time to train teachers. Some have control issues and yet others have been burned by the pre-service teaching process in the past with bad student teachers. As principal I try to spend time with the student teachers by doing walk-throughs and encouraging them to visit some of these great teachers during their planning period. I also recommend that the read books like “Teach Like Your Hair is on Fire.” For an elementary school teacher this book is a very powerful resource. Thanks for your leadership.
Mike Roberts
Mike, that’s an important perspective in this complex scenario. Inasmuch as there can be poor cooperating teachers, we all know that there can also be poor student teachers… and having such an experience as a classroom teacher can be enough to cause one to shy away from participating again by having a student teacher in one’s classroom. I can recall quite vividly my own first student teacher. Let’s just say, this young man was a disaster from the very beginning. How he ever made it far enough to get to the student teaching phase was beyond me. After he left, I never wanted to have another student teacher again. It pained me greatly to watch him “torture” my students in the way that he did. At one point, I actually refused to let him teach due to his lack of knowledge, preparation, creativity, and professionalism.
The sad part is that sometimes these folks go on and are granted a teaching license despite their inability to demonstrate required competencies. This young man’s family actually went on to try and sue the education department for not granting him his diploma. He won. He is now someone’s child’s teacher. Who knows… perhaps he just took longer to mature and learn.
It’s just not that easy to fix some of these systemic problems…