How can novice special education teachers improve their practice and grow as professionals? How can veteran teachers remain connected to their profession and share their knowledge and skills? In this readable, research-based guide, the authors outline a program of collaboration to enable novice teachers to gain insight from their more experienced…

Language teacher education is widely identified as one of the most important areas that needs addressing in order to improve early language instruction, yet research into teacher education for early language teachers remains relatively sparse. This volume responds to this gap by compiling studies with diverse methodological tenets from a wide…

The goal of this study was to evaluate the effects of the joint training activities of a cooperating teacher and a university supervisor during an advisory visit on (a) the professional development of a preservice teacher's activity and (b) the reorganization of mentoring activity following this visit. The results are considered from a theoretical…

Educational researchers have recently suggested that Schon's influential model of the "reflective practitioner" lacks a prospective, or future, dimension. In this study, we examine instances of future-oriented talk produced by novice English as-a-second-language (ESL) teachers during mentoring meetings in one North American university…

Thousands of educators who are involved with teacher professional development--from training to hiring, mentoring to supervising--rely on this authoritative book to focus on cultivating teacher qualities that are most apt to raise student achievement. Now, this new edition extends this results-based approach to include teachers who work with…

Outlines a fictitious but ideal school in which staff work cooperatively and are encouraged to develop their talents. (MD)

The mentoring model described in this paper assumes teachers to be self-directing professionals, and adopts the formalized mentor-protege relationship as the starting point and the individual teacher's professional development as the organizing principle for the induction of teachers into the profession. The essential elements of a mentor's…

Intended to help beginning vocational teachers make a smooth transition into the field of teaching, this document contains five guides that give a complete set of instructions for implementing, operating, and evaluating a comprehensive Professional Development Program for Beginning Vocational Teachers. The guides follow an introduction and…

The fields of instructional supervision, adult development, teacher education and mentoring, and ongoing professional development are synthesized in this text. Examples and case studies are drawn from local systems in North Carolina as well as state, national, and international public school/university consortia to identify emerging trends in…

Argues for the use of colleague mentors to increase retention rates among new teachers. Describes mentors' role as offering emotional support, suggestions about effective instruction, and information on the mores of the school community. Identifies characteristics of good mentors. Stresses the importance of shared decision making in teacher…

Year One of the 3-year Montana Beginning Teacher Support Program (BTSP) was conducted as a pilot study to investigate mentor-mentee pairing functioning under the study parameters as evidenced by a sampling of Montana participants, and to develop a manageable research model to be implemented during the second and third years of the study. The study…

This book and its accompanying video highlights three interpersonal approaches to instructional improvement, observation skills, and the complete reflective clinical supervision process. Based on the principles of reflective practice, the kit is a professional development tool for educational leaders and staff members. Chapter 1, "Cycles of…

This report is the second of three annual reports to the Montana Certification Standards and Practices Advisory Council (CSPAC) on the effectiveness of mentoring new teachers. Specific research topics for the study were: (1) whether mentoring conducted under an exclusive one-on-one relationship has an effect on the new teacher's development as…

This report is the third of four reports on the Beginning Teacher Support Program (BTSP) on the effectiveness of mentoring new teachers. The paper focuses on technical aspects of the study. Study data are summarized in tables, including a comparison of teacher retention rates over the three years of BTSP, a summary of administrators' evaluations…

The purpose of the final report on the Montana Beginning Teacher Support Program (BTSP) is to provide a comprehensive description of all phases of the program as it was conducted from 1992 through 1995. The purpose of the BTSP was to study the effect of a formal mentorship relationship between master teachers (mentors) and teachers in their first…