Section archive - Mentoring & Supervision

This article draws on Lampert’s three-pronged model of teaching practice (Lampert, 2001) to explore the possible contributions of elementary classroom teachers to the learning-to-teach-mathematics experiences of preservice teachers (PSTs). The authors focus on a third-space context in which mentor teachers (MTs), PSTs, and university teacher educators collaborated to plan and analyze task-based problem-solving interviews of children. The authors analyzed the MT's contributions to a third-space activity involving the task-based interview. This analysis also suggests ways in which university teacher educators might enhance the development of methods/field third spaces by anticipating and preparing to leverage MT contributions.

The present study was designed to elicit answers to the following two questions: (1) What are the perspectives of early childhood cooperating teachers regarding early reading instruction in the Jordanian context? and (2) Does the perspectives of early childhood cooperating teachers engaging in early reading instruction change as a result of working with student teachers? The results revealed that the student teaching experience had no effect on the perspective of cooperating teachers regarding early reading instruction and the perspectives of cooperating teachers do not become similar to those of their student teachers who were WL-oriented.

The purpose of this study was to understand the ways in which undergraduates grew and developed through participation in a holistic peer-mentoring experience. Twenty-two patterns of protégé growth emerged from the analysis of the data, which were organized conceptually into six overarching, emergent themes of protégé development: academic skills and knowledge, career decision-making, connectedness to others, maturity, physical wellbeing, and aspiration. The authors argue that the very high rates of protégé growth within the themes of academics, social connectedness, and maturity raise the possibility that growth in these thematic dimensions may be synergistic and mutually reinforcing.

In this study, the authors examined mentors working with at-risk youth in a school-based mentoring program. The authors examined changes in mentor perceptions, motives, and efficacy. The findings reveal that mentors were highly motivated to gain experience. Mentors were less motivated to gain recognition and increase creativity. In addition to motives, the authors considered mentors’ expectations about the relationship. They found that mentors’ initial expectations were not related to mentor satisfaction with the experience, perceived costs or benefits, and time spent mentoring.