This is the eighth part in a series I’ve been writing over the past two weeks about the report, How the World’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top, which is an analysis of the world’s school systems to find out why some schools succeed and others do not.
Today, my focus is on the section of the report that suggests education school programs train teachers the same way that medical school programs train surgeons, which is a topic I’ve previously written about.
The bottom line: Teachers should be trained in authentic settings.
The problem:
Research shows that in the United States many teacher education programs have little impact on teacher effectiveness. Frequently, this is because the connection between what the trainee teachers do during their training, and what they are expected to be able to do once they arrive in the classroom, is not strong enough. Angus McBeath, former superintendent of Edmonston’s schools in Alberta, noted, “We would never turn out a freshly minted doctor and say, ‘go operate on somebody’ without three or four years of practice—guided practice. But we turn out teachers, put them in classrooms, and ignore them.”
The solution:
Boston has introduced a graduate teacher training program based on a medical-residency model, combining a large amount of practical experience, a strong theoretical background, and a higher-level (masters) degree qualification. After an initial six-week summer school, trainee teachers spend one year on an apprenticeship in schools. During this year they spend four days each week working with an experienced teacher, and one day a week doing coursework. During their second year, each new teacher is allocated a mentor who provides two-and-a-half hours of in-class coaching each week. Mentors “model, co-teach, observe and help with classroom management, lesson planning and instructional strategies.” In order to improve the quality of mentoring on the program, Boston now employs a number of full-time specialist mentors, each of whom supports 14 new teachers.