Here's What (...TC Learning at York)
Today's teacher candidate is tomorrow's teaching colleague. It is important to develop a spirit of collaborative learning that will carry forward to the future. As teachers we recognize the value of the Professional Learning Community and the power of observing lessons that are co-planned and co-taught among colleagues. Becoming an active part of a professional learning Mentor Teacher and Teacher Candidate relationship during the pre-service years allows Teacher Candidates to develop an inquiring state of mind.
So What? (...Linking to Practice)
While Teacher Candidates look forward to assuming additional responsibilities for classroom teaching as they progress through the Bachelor of Education program, this does not mean the end of the valuable process of dedicating time to observe the practice of the classroom teacher and the learning processes of students. Particularly for ED1 TCs, a significant portion of the day should continue to be dedicated to "participant observation" (Bogden & Biklen, 2002, p. 261), which integrates ongoing observation into active engagement with student learning, and/or co-teaching/planning. TCs coming to the end of their pre-service program should also continue to have time to observe, co-teach and co-plan throughout their blocks.
Now What? (...Suggestions for MT and TC Collaboration)
- Work together within a professional learning relationship, collaboratively analyzing and learning from lessons that both MT and TC teach independently and as co-teachers/planners.
- Make time daily to observe the teaching and learning in the classroom.
- Dedicate time to thinking aloud and co-teaching/planning, which greatly facilitates skills development. Understand that demonstrations of successful skills development for lesson planning, assessment, student engagement, professionalism and reflective practice serve as the indicators of successful achievement of the learning outcomes and exit requirements of the program.
- Provide significant active engagement for ED1 TCs and significant teaching time for ED2 TCs to successfully demonstrate their ability to meet the learning outcomes/exit requirements of the program, with the understanding that a quantitative measurement of the percentage of time the TCs spends in front of a classroom does not necessarily reflect skills development.
