Bright Bullard, left, a first-grade teacher at Root Elementary School in Fayetteville, is mentoring Mallory Johnson of Weiner, a student in the Master of Arts in Teaching program at the University of Arkansas. Johnson was working Aug. 12 with Bullard helping her prepare the classroom for the start of school.
August 1, 2010
“I’m a better teacher because someone is watching me all the time,” said Helen Eaton about being a mentor to University of Arkansas education students. “I don’t waste time because I don’t when them to waste time. Being mentors raises our professionalism. We have to set an example.”
Mentor teachers play a vital role in the preparation of new teachers by the University of Arkansas. Mentoring is a big responsibility and requires significant work and effort on their part, but mentor teachers and their principals say the teachers, their schools and their students also benefit from the arrangement.
Tracy Mulvenon, principal of Holcomb Elementary School in Fayetteville, hired two graduates of the M.A.T. this year and three the year before.
“It’s a tremendous, tremendous collaboration for us,” Mulvenon said of the partnership with the university. “The interns bring in fresh new research and strategies and our teaching staff is interested in that. Our teachers are very passionate about helping all kids learn.”
Training Session
The curriculum and instruction department in the College of Education and Health Professions periodically arranges a morning of training for new mentor teachers who will shepherd university students through a year’s internship in schools in northwest Arkansas. Both the college’s five-year licensure program that results in a Master of Arts in Teaching degree and the four-year licensure program that results in a Bachelor of Science in Education degree require a yearlong internship. The students take university classes Mondays on the Fayetteville campus and Thursdays at the Global Campus in Rogers, and spend the rest of the week co-teaching.
“You are one of the most important parts of the teacher-education program,” Mike Daugherty, head of the department of curriculum and instruction, told the teachers gathered at Holcomb for the training this year. “I remember my first day student teaching, how nervous I was. I know you will be great teachers and build a trusting relationship with our students. We want you to cause our interns to reflect on what they are learning, and we want you to be a voice of constructive criticism. Praise them when they need it, and teach them when they need it.”
Heather Kindall, coordinator of both childhood education programs, explained that M.A.T. students complete an action-research project during the year that they are doing their internships and B.S.E. students complete a senior project in which they design a unit for their class with pretests, posttests and reflections. Students in both programs analyze data collected in their projects and present their results to a committee, similar to the thesis requirement in other degree programs.
Professors and instructors in the curriculum and instruction department serve as liaisons between the mentor teachers and the university students, meeting weekly with the groups separately and providing guidance on paperwork that must be completed by the mentor teachers. To be mentors, teachers must have three years of experience, which can include their M.A.T. year if they graduated from the University of Arkansas, and be trained in the Pathwise system of professional development offered by Educational Testing Service.
Panel of Expertise
Susan Riggs, an instructor who has coordinated field experiences in the MAT program for several years, put a panel of veteran teachers made up of Mary Briggs, Helen Eaton and Karen Stowe-Rains in front of the newcomers to the mentoring process.
“We want to ensure your success as mentors and the success of your interns,” Riggs said during introductions.
Briggs, Eaton and Stowe-Rains have had more than 100 interns among them during their careers. The three teach at Holcomb Elementary, and they have helped with the training session several times.
Briggs, Eaton and Stowe-Rains said they have enjoyed their experiences with interns.
“We have had excellent interns, we have had challenging interns, we have had exhausting interns,” said Eaton, a fourth-grade teacher. “It’s like poker, you have to play the hand you’re dealt. There are many wonderful things about having an intern.”
She and the others advised the new mentors to be sure their interns understand from the first day what is expected of them, including what time they should be at school and how late they should plan to stay, what items they can use in the classroom without asking permission, and what clothing is appropriate to wear.
“Give them their own space, a desk or a table,” Eaton said. “Put them in front of the class the first day of school. Make sure they know and your students know that the two of you are sharing the room and you are both teachers. You’re not the ‘real’ teacher and she’s not your ‘helper.’ I consider us co-teachers.”
They said sharing a classroom helps the mentor learn about herself or himself.
“Make sure you know your limits about sharing,” said Stowe-Rains, who teaches kindergarten.
“I consider things on my desk fair game, but I would like them to be put back in the same general area.”
“You will have to share everything, your students, your time, your pencils and your space so think about your own personality and decide how best to do that,” Eaton said. “It’s a partnership not unlike having a spouse or a roommate, and remember they were just college kids a minute ago. They won’t know everything about how to be a professional.”
Briggs, a fourth-grade teacher, recommended the mentor teachers keep a list of everything they tell their first intern so that, if they have another intern during the interns’ second and third placements of the year, they can refer to that list.
“It will be like a brand new experience so go over it all again,” she said.
The interns are not there just to grade papers or make copies, although those tasks will be part of their responsibility, the veterans said. They will help plan lessons and then do some planning on their own. They should participate in the lesson the other teacher is teaching, not doing something else while the other one is teaching. For example, Stowe-Rains said she often teaches with the children sitting in a circle on the floor, so if she is front of the class teaching her intern will sit on the floor with the children and vice versa.
“You will be teaching student interns all the time, while your kids are at recess, while you’re standing at the copy machine,” Eaton said. “They want to learn and it can be mentally exhausting.”
Briggs suggested establishing a signal the mentor teacher can use to interrupt the intern during a lesson if needed.
“Tell them that could happen,” she said. “Establish a safe environment for the intern.”
“Model everything,” Eaton said. “Talk to them about Facebook, too. They need to remove any pictures that could be embarrassing. They should not ‘friend’ their students or parents and they should never talk about a student or a teacher or a principal or a school on their Facebook.”
The panel members also gave suggestions on the evaluations that the mentors fill out weekly and then at the end of the year. They suggested filling out the weekly evaluations together with the intern so that areas for improvement can be discussed. Use the Pathwise guidelines, they said, to remove a personal or judgmental aspect from the weekly review. Refer to each as Mrs. or Mr. or Ms., not by first names, to be more professional, they advised.
Calling Roll
The university has 116 interns in schools in Benton, Madison and Washington counties this school year, 73 in the M.A.T. program and 43 in the B.S.E. program, according to Kindall. Each school can have a maximum of 12 interns.
“It benefits the school because they have extra hands,” Kindall said. “Once an intern knows the policies and procedures of a classroom, they are an asset.”
Denise Mounts, clinical assistant professor of childhood education who serves as one of the university liaisons, said modeling professionalism is a key to helping the interns understand the school environment.
“Don’t take anything for granted,” she said. “Tell them up front what is expected of them.”
Interns are considered part of the staff at Holcomb, Mulvenon said. They are able to gain valuable experience working with student assessments and understanding data, she said.
“A graduate we hired said one of the best professional development experiences she had was seeing how the teacher set up the classroom for the year,” Mulvenon said.
