Is Experience the Best Teacher? Extensive Clinical Practice and Mentor Teachers’ Perspectives on Effective Teaching

Situational Adjustment: Staying Within the Lines

As stated earlier, we felt that these definitions and understandings were best illuminated by the three focus questions on the self-assessment. MT responses about strengths or weaknesses/goals, strategies, and opportunities seemed to overwhelmingly emphasize the importance of situational adjustment—getting to know the context in which residents were placed—the teachers and people, the classrooms and teaching styles, and adjunct activities both instructional and non-instructional. Many MTs expressed great satisfaction when their resident “blended into the [school] community seamlessly,” was able “to see other teachers in action” or “visit other classrooms to observe different teaching styles,” and became “well integrated into the faculty and its various routines.” In a few cases, residents themselves were “very gregarious” or were “pretty good all on [their] own in terms of finding other teachers to observe.” However, for the most part, creating opportunities for residents to learn the local context and feel comfortable within it came across as one of the goals or strategies that MTs talked about the most. MTs “arranged for my Resident to visit many classrooms within my school,” or “found a way for [resident] to observe other teachers.” MTs described their “constant effort to help introduce the various opportunities for [resident] involvement in school activities” and also how they used their own relationships to help residents build their school membership. For example, MTs “introduced [resident] to everyone I interact with in our school community,” tried to “incorporate [resident] in each meeting that I attend,” and provided “a variety of opportunities for the mentee to participate in activities, from team meetings, professional development, and classroom activities.” Practices related to helping residents adjust to and become familiar with the local situation were overwhelmingly forwarded as areas of strength, practices, and strategies that MTs felt were in place and working satisfactorily. For those MTs who were not engaging in these practices as much or as well as they would have liked, they emerged as an oft-mentioned goal, a clearly articulated intention for the next term or the next time, accompanied by ideas for how to achieve this goal.

Undoubtedly, it makes perfect sense for those guiding the learning of residents to want to introduce their charges to all aspects of the context within which their work plays out on a day-to-day basis. Orientation and familiarization are typical activities provided to new entrants; coming to know “how we do things here” is a standard and natural expectation. However, what was of interest was not so much what MTs selected as areas of strength or focus, but what they seemed to attend to very minimally or what they did not include as they described their mentoring work. Thus, the indicators on the self-assessment that were associated with challenging or questioning the status quo, digging more deeply into teaching and learning, or inquiring into practice were selected by very few—in some cases, almost none—of the MTs. For example, only one MT talked about the practice of conveying to the resident “an understanding of the complexities of the students, classroom environment, and broader school community and university contexts.” Only three MTs described working with their resident on using data to improve practice—although in each of these cases, the data used were from high-stakes tests, as opposed to student work samples, classroom observations, or formative assessments. One MT mentioned taking into account the resident’s prior knowledge, while one other thought that it was important for him to consider a resident’s beliefs about teaching and students. The rest of the MTs bypassed this indicator entirely. There were, however, a small handful who did not engage in these practices but instead expressed frustration because they had “made a lot of assumptions about what the resident would already come in knowing,” and had expected the resident to possess specific technical skills or knowledge such as “backwards planning, the idea that the aim should match the materials taught, the workshop model of teaching, etc.” Reflecting on this assumption caused at least one MT to remind himself that his role was that of “a professional teacher of teaching for the resident” versus “as a peer or coworker.” In contrast, however, most of the MTs who commented on this indicator because they had come to “discern major flaws in [resident’s] thinking,” described pulling back and giving the resident “small and targeted tasks, much less room to make decisions,” becoming more directive and less collaborative. Indeed, the idea of talking about teaching or problem solving around teaching was prominent for its absence—only a small handful of MTs used the practice of carving out some space for residents “to voice concerns about teaching practices” even while the majority of MTs had time set aside to regularly meet and plan with their resident, and also described communication with residents in positive and frequent terms.

Given these findings, our conclusion is that MTs seemed primarily intent on helping residents become familiar with the already known, and to replicate what is in place. This conclusion is further illuminated by some very telling statements, shared spontaneously by MTs. Lily ³ felt that it is important for the resident to “learn the most important and relevant parts of teaching while still holding true to the model used in the school,” while Brittany stated that “There is no need to reinvent the wheel, we can use what we have and what others have created.” Elijah “tried to really let my resident shadow me throughout the residency” thus enabling him to experience almost all of what Elijah feels there is to know about teaching. Even Heather, who sees herself as invested in change, “stressed the importance of understanding the environment before trying to change it. I’ve also been clear about ‘going with the resistance’ in order to change the tide.” Meredith simply stated, “Observing other teachers. I think this is the best way to learn how to teach.”

Effective Teaching Through Technical Know-How, Modeling, and Replication

Data analysis also revealed that much of MTs’ talk around resident or novice teacher learning emphasized the technical or discrete. MTs identified many things they wanted to teach residents, to make sure residents developed competency in terms of particular knowledge or specific skills. Given that the residents in this program all were preparing to become teachers of students with disabilities, or teachers of emergent bilinguals who speak English as a new or second language, it is not surprising that much of the technical know-how MTs listed had to do with these particular certification areas. Several MTs spoke of “compliance work” or “tedious compliance issues” and their responsibility to “instruct (residents) on compliance needs.” Their long list of things for residents to know and do included developing Individualized Education Programs (IEPs), the Common Core Standards, and becoming familiar with all manner of testing and standardized tests—some of which were specific to the population with whom they were working (e.g., language assessments), some of which were specific to the state (e.g., Regents exams). MTs also spoke of smaller, more contained skills such as developing a management plan, or writing letters to parents, or about a very particular instructional strategy such as literature circles. A good proportion of the technical knowledge that MTs wanted to be sure residents received related to newly designed data and information systems for digital record keeping, student tracking, and student comparisons. Given the context of the study as a “Race to the Top” state, the rapid creation of such computerized systems and therefore the urgency for all teachers to operate them come as no surprise. However, what was a surprise is the lack of any critical questioning or assessment of these systems and their technicalization of learning and student progress. Absent also was any troubling of the ethics of collecting extensive information about vulnerable populations such as are often found in large urban centers such as NYC—new immigrants, possibly mixed documentation status families, poor communities, speakers of languages other than English, and so on. These groups often lack the social capital to question the practices of education authorities, and may not be aware of the extent to which their children are tracked and sorted.

The fairly long list of things to know and do aside, all the MTs expressed a commitment to helping residents develop their teaching practice, but detailed descriptions of what this meant were quite absent. What was also absent was any discussion of instructional decision making, helping residents to make appropriate choices about student learning—for example, how to think about what goes into an IEP versus learning how to fill out the new IEP forms or access them through the new digital data bank. Again, the talk revolved around residents doing as MTs do. A comment by Brittany seemed to exemplify this notion of covering the curriculum of teaching knowledge and uploading one’s knowledge into a resident:

I actually have no problem in sharing everything I know with a person like Debra because I know that she pays close attention to everything I show her and I know for fact that she tries and will try anything I propose her to try. I try my best to share with Debra all the aspects of a teaching job, but we have not had enough time to cover all the materials I want to cover with her.

Thus, a primary mentoring strategy and stance seemed to be modeling, “teaching by example.” Mentoring was deemed successful when a resident could replicate an MT’s practice and “by the end of the year . . . [be] able to implement her own lesson plans, lessons and assessments based on the models I had led her through earlier in the year.” In fact, “significant progress” could be attributed to a resident’s “ability to learn from [MT’s] example.” Learning from example is a practice that connects well to Cochran-Smith and Lytle’s concept of knowledge in practice—practical knowledge embedded in the day-to-day work and actions of teachers. MTs clearly expressed their willingness to share what they know. Yet, most of this knowing seemed to be knowing in the moment, because very few of them identified the sharing of their personal experiences as a consistent practice, as a strength, or even as an area in need of improvement.

Praise and Compliments: The Limitations of Emotional Support

A final major finding that emerged from an analysis of MT self-assessments was the importance of emotional support for new teachers from their mentors. MTs in this study overwhelmingly chose to talk about acknowledging and celebrating residents’ professional growth. The vast majority identified this as an area in need of improvement “because this is so important to the confidence of a new teacher.” Several mentioned that they did not acknowledge resident accomplishments as much as they should “due to a lack of planning time,” which translates into “rarely [having] time to reflect on development” or the “time to meet to discuss progress.” When these MTs talked about their intention to “recognize how hard some of these things are for novices,” they often talked in terms of “praising what a resident does well,” and many used the word “compliment.” Thus, MTs talked about taking “a few minutes to make sure I am complimenting him,” increasing “the amount of compliments for the growth that he shows,” and remembering that “praise is so important to our students, but sometimes as a mentor teacher I forget to do the same for [resident].”

MTs’ desire to increase praise and compliments, contrasted quite starkly with the modest attention they paid to providing residents with positive or constructive feedback. Only a handful of MTs selected this practice as a strength; far fewer identified it as an area in need of strengthening. Again, the issue of limited time for reflection prevailed; each day MTs found that “there was so much that still had to be done that we didn’t reflect as much as I would have liked,” and “ever changing schedules and the demands of teaching” seemed to be an intractable barrier to educative mentoring. MTs were quite unanimous that they had little time for Noticing Signs of Growth or for Finding Openings for productive talk about teaching. Still, as mentioned earlier, the majority of MTs had successfully set aside weekly planning time for/with their resident; a good number of them also described meeting with their resident informally as well (or at least). Most MTs reported feeling quite positively about their use of mentoring strategies such as questioning, active listening, and probing; a good number felt that they consistently engaged in thinking aloud, to render their planning and decision making transparent to their resident. Almost all the MTs described the numerous ways in which they communicated with their resident, utilizing a wide variety of digital tools and platforms including email, Google docs, Facebook, mobile phones, texting, even Skype, to connect with residents in the evenings as well as on weekends. It appeared that MTs and residents were finding many openings for talk; the question was, what were they talking about?

We found some clues to this question in the words and language MTs used to describe talk about teaching. Several spoke in terms of “tricks” or “tricks of the trade.” Debriefs seemed to happen on the fly in “limited time,” “a few minutes to debrief,” “when we are going from class to class or at lunch.” This press for time could, apparently only support mostly simplistic or dichotomous ways of thinking about teaching—“pros and cons,” “what worked well and how we might change elements of the lesson,” “strengths and weaknesses,” and “provid[ing] feedback that [resident] could incorporate immediately.” All these seem antithetical to notions of educative mentoring moves designed to Probe Novices’ Thinking at depth and length, Model Wondering about Teaching, or Reinforce an Understanding of Theory.

Educative Mentoring and Teaching Knowledges?

In keeping with our findings so far, it was not surprising then that the majority of the MTs in this study demonstrated a perspective on mentoring grounded in Cochran-Smith and Lytle’s description of knowledge-in-practice. From this perspective, MTs expressed a belief that residents need to learn practical knowledge, that which is “generated by competent teachers as they deal with classroom situations that are inherently indeterminate” (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999, p. 268). Furthermore, residents develop this knowledge through observation, replication, and reflection on teaching practice. This perspective on mentoring and learning from practice is evidenced in mentors’ discussions of effective mentoring. They felt that they were successful as mentors when they supported their resident in increasing responsibility in the classroom toward greater degrees of independence. The more residents engaged in practice, especially on their own, the more they were able to learn how to be a teacher. Thus, MTs’ responsibility in part was to figure out how best to ensure residents had ample opportunities to engage in independent practice. MTs also expressed an awareness of the critical importance of reflection on practice as part of the learning process for residents, but as we discussed earlier, the lack of structured time for reflection was one of a set of challenges that they faced in enacting their understanding of mentoring.

Observing and Replicating Instruction

The majority of MTs’ vignettes and focus group discussions about effective mentoring demonstrated that they felt they had done well when their resident did well. The data indicate that MTs seemed to measure effective teaching in terms of residents’ ability to complete and follow through on MTs’ suggestions or instructions and/or replicate practice modeled by them. They were successful mentors when their residents took their suggestions or adopted their practices. Olivia identified a moment of effective mentoring that clearly demonstrates this perspective:

I had created assignments for students and told Abby [my resident] that in my experience, students responded better to questions in a box, and you give them a box where they can put their answer because when [the space for them to respond is] open, for some reason they freak out. So whenever making an assignment for them, I always put everything in boxes . . . So when [Abby] was with a new teacher in the same classroom, the new teacher let her create assignments . . . and I told the teacher in the past to use boxes . . . and she didn’t do it. But she let Abby do it, and then said, “Oh, the students made so much progress,” and she showed me all the assignments, and I’m looking at the assignments, and I’m like, “Yes, they’re in boxes!”

Guiding residents to replicate their practice occurred in smaller moments, such as designing assignments, and in more involved teaching tasks, such as curriculum planning. For example, Elijah “gave [his resident] the task of designing the project for the unit” and the template to do so. He expressed assurance in the resident’s abilities because “she had seen me lead students through other projects.” We see then that the process of replication begins with the MT showing and telling, after which the resident tries on the same procedures for size, with fidelity to the model supported by the structure provided by tools such as a template.

For MTs, effective mentoring also meant that residents took up routines that had been established around management or instruction, with the support of MT modeling. Polly, for example, noted an effective mentoring moment when her resident “took class routines that we’d been engaging in through the year and used them,” while Angie seemed pleased to report that “after we had that discussion and after he watched what I was doing, his classroom management changed dramatically.” Similarly, Nathaniel “felt effective with my teaching resident . . . when he included checks for understanding . . . after watching me model the skill.” This protocol was part of a “school-wide initiative,” and Nathaniel observed how his resident “began to do it more and more, with cues from me.”

Developing Independence

Although part of their success as mentors occurred when their residents replicated their instructional methods, MTs also felt successful in their mentoring work when they saw their residents becoming more independent in terms of leading instruction. When asked to describe an incident in which he felt particularly positive about his mentoring, Elijah wrote,

The resident I worked with ultimately was hired to teach at my school next year. Her demo lesson stands out to me because it exhibited her successes over the year, and the results of our work together. The resident could clearly lead the class through the lesson and objectives she planned. The lesson unfortunately does not stand out in my memory . . . she had a presence and confidence in the class that I think really exemplified her learning and progress—this was a marked change from the beginning of the year when she was more reserved and less willing to take the lead role.

Elijah’s reflection is representative of the MTs’ emphasis on residents developing independence over the course of year. Notably, he does not recall the content of the lesson that his resident, Margarita, taught, but instead focused on her ability to lead the class by herself, something that she had not been able or confident to do at the start of the year. In reflecting on his mentoring, Blake’s thoughts are similar to Elijah’s. He felt positive about his mentoring when his “resident felt comfortable enough to have (i.e., teach) her own, totally self-sustaining elective course.” Chloe knew her mentoring was effective not only when her resident used class routines, and brought in appropriate materials, but also “took on the task of adapting content” and “was able to say [to her], ‘I don’t think this approach is totally working,’ and to change the content accordingly in order to engage students more effectively.”

MTs frequently referred to residents’ developing independence as a transition from the beginning of the year until the end, where they began as an observer and ended by leading the class. Chloe, for example, when reflecting on a moment when she felt effective as a mentor, said that

It wasn’t more of a specific event of success but more of a transition period . . . from the beginning of the year to more of a co-teaching model at the end of the year . . . this transition from him being an observer . . . [he] didn’t step on any of my toes, and didn’t step on our responsibilities in the beginning and wanted to take it all in. And then there was this really smooth transition, I felt, in which he just took on head-first what I need to do in order to be the teacher of a class . . . taking on the planning and the instruction of the morning class which was the beginner, the beginner lower-level group.

For Elijah, this residency program was attractive in comparison with other student teaching models because the residents did not just take on “one or two classes the whole semester”; instead, they were “thrown in there” and had opportunities to experience what teaching is like. Although program staff did not advocate “throwing” residents into the classroom, they did share with MTs a general framework for the types of tasks residents might engage in throughout the year. However, several MTs found this framework too loose. At the end of one of the mentor focus groups in 2011-2012, for example, one group asked, “If I’m going to move from taking this brand-new teacher at the beginning of the year to have them actually basically be a full-fledged teacher by the end, how do I get there?” This focus group wanted more direction from the program around figuring out exactly how to gradually increase their residents’ responsibilities in the classroom and where residents should be, when.

Educative Mentoring in the Current Policy Context

Educative mentoring seems almost impossible in the fast-paced, highly demanding, mandate-heavy, test-driven environment in which MTs practice. The teachers in this study have our every respect because they persist in these high-need, immensely challenging settings that exhibit all the characteristics of an “urban intensive” district (Milner, 2012), including students with multiple vulnerabilities; high teacher turnover and shortages; inadequate (inequitable) resource distribution and funding; and racial, socio-economic, and linguistic segregation (Hollins, 2012; Weiner, 2002, 2006). At the same time, they choose to take on additional work by welcoming our residents into their classrooms and spending their most valuable asset—their time—on the partnership with the university and on the future of the profession. It is no surprise then, that in teachers’ talk, we heard glimmers of educative mentoring and attention to teaching as a lifelong learning process, fueled by teachers’ own questions or reflections:

Perhaps we can find time to answer or research big questions that we have about things, like addressing behaviors in the hallways. Julie (2011-2012)

(Lorna/resident) and I shared similar philosophies and practice in teaching and education, it seemed very seamless at times to plan and execute lessons. I would have liked to build off that common ground more to explore other possibilities outside of our comfort zones–thereby truly building upon our current practice. (Emma, 2012-2013)

My resident is allowed to observe teaching practices that sometimes do not represent effective teaching and productive student engagement. We discuss his concerns and use these instances, not to engage in teacher bashing, but to develop strategies that would allow students to maximize their potential. (Morgan, 2011-2012)

In terms of the experiences, I think it’s good to share the successes but also to share the failures and own them, so the resident sees that you too fail at things and you have to rethink and assess your practice constantly. It is an ongoing process. It also shows the resident that being a teacher is a learning experience, and that you have been there and it models to them what you did when similar things they go through happened to you. (Kelsey, 2011-2012)

Admittedly, these glimmers of educative mentoring were limited. Our evidence reveals that most of the talk about mentoring, and therefore teaching, was procedural, technical, and instrumental, focused more on the short-term than a long view of learning. Still, glimmers aside, it is important to reiterate that participants consistently voiced concern for the development of their residents and acknowledged quite often that they knew they were not able to support their resident in all the ways they wanted to or in ways that conceptualized teaching as more reflective, thoughtful, and filled with knotty dilemmas. In fact, the distance between MTs’ intentions and their teaching realities could be framed as dilemmas versus deficiencies.

Dilemma 1: Observation and Then What?

Cochran-Smith and Lytle (1999) warn that knowledge-in-practice does not mean that learning happens just within schools. They caution that “good teaching can be coached and learned (but not taught) through reflective supervision” (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999, p. 269). If an MT tells a resident to replicate a practice without explaining why or debriefing afterward, Cochran-Smith and Lytle (1999) would not characterize them as sharing their practical knowledge, which entails joint conversations about practice. For the most part, when MTs in this study tried to tell residents to do something without discussing the purposes behind it, they found themselves to be less effective mentors. When they shared their thinking about practices with their residents, they found that residents were more likely to successfully implement the strategies. Aiden, for example, shared his struggles around working with his resident, Jacob, on class management:

One experience I had mentoring that I thought was particularly effective was when I asked my resident to develop and use methods of [the school system for] classroom management. Jacob struggled a bit . . . and wasn’t always clear on “why” I used methods of assessment for learning and “attention grabbers” . . . After getting the purpose of these methods, Jacob used them a lot more effectively and his classroom management improved as well as his ability to assess student learning . . . Jacob also took it to the next level, improving and putting his own spin on these methods to make them his own.

In this instance, Aiden felt Jacob’s abilities to manage the classroom and assess students improved, when he was able to help Jacob understand the purposes behind using a specific technique. He found that observation or replication without discussion was insufficient for learning—discussion, debriefing, or reflection was required. Through his work with Jacob, Aiden realized that effective mentoring was more than just modeling:

. . . it taught me something because it taught me that you can’t always just show people, you can’t always just tell people. There has to be a combination of both and discussions as to why you’re doing it, what is the purpose of the things that you’re doing and making that explicit so that [residents] understand, and when they’re doing it or when they’re alone, they remember it.

Overall, however, MTs shared relatively few instances of how they made their knowledge in practice explicit to residents, reflecting on practices together or talking about the purposes behind their actions. Instead, MTs more frequently noted a lack of time for the much-needed practice of co-reflection. Sonja shared that

within a classroom there are so many things to do, and it’s really difficult to carve out space and sometimes patience to answer all of the questions as a push to be incredibly explicit in the decision-making if your resident can’t kind of see what or why you make certain decisions.

All of the MTs agreed that there was not enough time, and one mentor, Elijah, suggested that the residency program and the host schools co-develop structures to “build a way for the mentors to work together with the residents. That would help increase our collaboration among staff, but also build our capacity and commitment to [the residency program].” At the end of the year, his focus group recommended that the program work on “carving out time for reflection and scaffolding [residents’] experience.” As Paige reflected, “Although there was open communication, it did feel as if there was never enough time.” One cannot help noting the irony in asking the university (program) to carve out space for reflection in schools, authority universities do not have.

The lack of time may be especially critical for residents who work with MTs in co-teaching situations—the MTs, who have special education or ESL certification, co-teach with general education content teachers. However, as one mentor, Summer, noted, “my schedule doesn’t allow for co-planning with other teachers.” Another, Sonja said that

I had one prep a week, so you know, and that prep . . . like I had IEP meetings, it was crazy, so we did have to talk before school started or during lunch, you know, we’re trying to eat and talk about what we’re doing.

If MTs already are struggling to find co-planning time, it is no surprise that the struggle does not lessen when they need additional time to confer with their residents. When MTs do not have set blocks of time to plan, assess, and reflect with their residents, it seems likely that residents will have fewer opportunities to develop knowledge in practice. Instead, as MTs are focused on the daily demands of teaching, they are more likely to tell residents what to do with limited elaboration.

When MTs do not have time to reflect with their residents, instead of residents gaining knowledge-in-practice, they are more likely to perceive their MTs’ knowledge-in-practice as a more formal body of knowledge that they need to master, termed knowledge-for-practice by Cochran-Smith and Lytle—learning strategies “that are already worked out” (1999, p. 269). MTs frequently spoke about sharing their knowledge with residents, using their most frequent mentoring strategies: telling, suggesting or cueing, or modeling; they told “[residents] different things to do”; “talked through a lot of the objectives and . . . coached”; provided “subtle clues as to when [the resident] should do it”; and “modeled for [residents] a number of times how it should look.” These type of actions assisted residents to do teaching, but offered little insights into how residents were guided to think about teaching, a critical component of educative mentoring.

Dilemma 2: Sharing the Classroom

MTs face a paradox—residents’ opportunity to teach independently is dependent on their own ability to relinquish control of the classroom. They shared several reasons that made them reluctant to do so. Aiden, for example, had previous negative co-teaching experiences (with another teacher, not another resident) where he constrained his practice because he “didn’t want to step on anybody’s toes,” and he was concerned that he might feel this way working with a resident. Angela felt that she had to become

comfortable letting go and knowing that someone is going through a [learning] process, because you’re used to playing this lead role. You have to kind of hold back and let them grow, because without those experiences, they won’t have time to practice.

Although MTs had different degrees of comfort with letting go, they also had different ideas about when their residents were ready. For Elijah, his ability to give more control of the classroom to his resident Debra was based on his perception of her readiness. In his first year as a mentor, he found himself

constantly thinking about day to day, how much can I give to Debra . . . that she’s going to be able to do effectively and also not get her overwhelmed or overworked, and also—but then not give her too little. You know, try to find that balance.

Aiden also spoke about finding balance and being unsure about how much he could ask of his resident. He reflected that

there were times during the year where I felt I gave him too much and I brought it back, but I would have never known what was too much or what he could do if I didn’t just throw him out there and said Do it.

At other times, Aiden was aware that “I couldn’t lean on Jacob because he just had so much overwhelming stuff to do” (i.e., his university coursework). This was another consistent concern expressed by MTs that university coursework at times took residents away from their K-12 classrooms. Sonja, who has worked with multiple residents throughout the program’s existence, noted that “my first resident did not know how to manage her school work and teaching. She spent a lot of time like doing her reading and doing her assignments in the back on the computer.” When MTs perceived their residents as overwhelmed by the task of teaching or by their university coursework, they were less likely to encourage independence or ask more of their residents. Residents were also more or less willing to volunteer to take on teaching tasks, and Ava thought this might be because some “residents don’t like teaching on their own.” In instances where residents were less willing to volunteer, they were less likely to develop independence as teachers.

MTs also had different perceptions of their residents’ content knowledge, which made them more or less willing to let their residents take on more of an independent role in the classroom. For example, Chloe found her resident “already had had experience teaching adults, so there was definitely an understanding of language acquisition, language development, the broken-down components of learning a language,” while Olivia found that her resident’s background in journalism meant she could “just . . . throw an idea at her.” In contrast, Kayla, who taught living environments, worked with a resident who said at the outset that he was “not a science person.” She felt that she needed to “model everything” for him and review his lesson plans daily, and never fully relinquished control. In fact, she felt that what made her mentoring most effective was her resident’s ability “to listen.” Similarly, Agnes’s resident was never given opportunities for independence because Agnes felt she lacked sufficient content knowledge to plan and teach as a team or independently. Agnes reflected,

We never made it to the full-on co-planning stage. I always felt that my resident’s grasp on the content was not strong enough. I was pretty frustrated and often just gave her the aims, vocabulary, and readings and had her plan her delivery and activities around these “set” items that needed to be included in the lesson. I wish I had devised this earlier on to use as a routine so she could have a smaller task in designing mini-activities targeted towards the teaching of a larger idea.

Sharing the classroom can be especially difficult in the current teaching context that emphasizes students’ test scores as measures of student learning, teacher effectiveness, and school effectiveness. Ava said that . . .

I’m one of those people who had a difficult time relinquishing control this year. I think that it had a lot to do with expectations by the administration. Even though they embraced the program, if they came in, they wanted to see me teaching, right? And it was said, “I don’t want to come in and see the resident teacher, I want to see what you’re doing.” And so a lot of that pressure to make sure that when [the resident] was teaching, that everything is lined up and set up.

Of course, there is always pressure on MTs to ensure that students are learning from a resident or student teacher, but MTs in schools focused on high-stakes testing were especially cognizant of this.

Related to MTs’ view of effective teaching as independent practice, a secondary dilemma is the perceived readiness of the resident to “teach”—lead a lesson, plan a unit, and so on. MTs had varying perceptions of their residents and expressed a desire for support from TRP around how to know when residents are ready for certain tasks. In reflecting on the year, mentors suggested that TRP develop a series of benchmarks to guide them in knowing when to increase residents’ independent practice.

MTs faced an additional dilemma as co-teachers in ESL and Integrated Co-Teaching (ICT) classrooms. In these contexts, MTs certified as ESL teachers or as teachers of students with disabilities were expected to work in collaboration with general education teachers, referred to as co-teachers or content area teachers. However, MTs struggled to create spaces for residents to engage in independent practice in co-taught classrooms when the general education teacher did not support team teaching. In such classrooms, residents did not have opportunities to develop lessons or lead class as a whole, which affected MT assessments of residents’ effectiveness and re-directed their mentoring focus. For example, Natalia shared a moment of effective mentoring in helping resident Madison navigate the ICT context:

My mentoring was effective one time during the year when Madison was having difficulty collaborating with a co-teacher. We had a long discussion on making the best of the co-teaching experience when personalities don’t mesh well together . . . we discussed strategies . . . I believe my openness, ability to listen, being honest and doing my best to support her, helped her address the situation in a professional manner. Throughout the year, even though Madison may have not agreed with the teacher and his teaching style, she was able to still contribute to the class.

Angela also saw her role as a mentor to “coordinate him and his co-teacher . . . often—she was going in one direction and he was going in another, so it was about getting them back on the same page.” Morgan too spoke about co-teaching settings where she and her resident were “not welcome” and working with her resident around what to do in ICT classrooms where the general education teachers did not share teaching responsibilities with the special education teachers. In these instances, Morgan could only help her resident consider how things “should have been modified” in the absence of opportunities to actually teach.

Dilemma 3: Opportunities to Fail

As MTs advocated the need for residents to be able to practice independently, they also identified an accompanying dilemma that residents might need to “fail”—have a lesson not go well—to develop their practice. For Aiden, this idea was based on his own experiences in learning to teach:

I’m a pretty good now but when I began, what really helped me to learn was failing, making the wrong moves and feeling comfortable enough to try something, and seeing what the outcome would be. And I think for Jacob, just giving him that opportunity and making him feel comfortable enough to try something, and even if it’s never been modeled for him and he’s brimming with ideas, but if he has all those ideas and we stand there and say, “No, I don’t think that’s going to work, or no, no, don’t do that,” he’ll never really learn or they’ll just become a clone of you, you know, and you don’t want that.

According to Aiden, allowing his resident to try new things, even if they were unsuccessful, would support Jacob in developing—and owning—his own teaching practice.

Concomitant with opportunities to fail was the need for residents to teach, unafraid. For mentors, fear of failure could hold their residents back, but giving them opportunities to experiment and fail was possible when residents felt safe trying something new. Olivia, for example, let her resident know that making mistakes was okay, which “took the pressure off her a little bit about ‘I’m perfect.’” Olivia focused less on whether she made mistakes as a teacher, because she felt students’ reactions and learning were most important, and she worked to impart this stance to her resident, reminding her “this is not your education, this is [the students]. You’re there to help them learn. Everything that we did was for them.” In this manner, Olivia centered the class on students’ experiences, modeling for the resident that it is okay for teachers to fumble.

However, when residents “fail,” if their mistakes negatively affect student learning, MTs are the ones who are ultimately responsible. Thus they face a paradox in allowing residents to make mistakes while ensuring that students are learning required content and skills.

Implications

These dilemmas have implications for preservice programs, which may find problematic MTs’ emphasis on residents teaching as MTs themselves do. This concern should not be read as criticism of mentors’ practices, but instead asks teacher educators to consider why MTs may emphasize “technical advice” with novice teachers. For example, intense pressure to raise test scores and the limited time for MTs and residents to confer clearly constrain opportunities for educative mentoring. The pressure to raise test scores is even greater in urban districts given the persistence of the achievement gap between White students and their Black and Brown counterparts, and the majority–minority complexion of urban classrooms. Moreover, if most time spent in clinical experiences involves replicating prevailing practices, classrooms cannot become sites for evolving or innovative practice. Teacher preparation programs that value intense clinical experiences need to be mindful of working with MTs along with residents. Instead of assuming that the benefit of the field experience occurs entirely in the field, possibilities for MT professional development in conjunction with their residents may offer a way to support both experienced and novice teachers in re-imagining education—and mentoring.

A second implication is especially relevant in terms of preparing teachers for students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. We witnessed MTs struggle with relinquishing classroom control, in some cases because they lacked confidence in residents’ content knowledge. In inclusive and/or co-teaching situations, practices increasingly embraced by educators, new teachers will be working with general education teachers who may or may not welcome them and will likely find themselves supporting students (and general education teachers) in subjects beyond their undergraduate content preparation and knowledge base. We found this to be the case with several of the residents who were paired with MTs who either provided academic support in more than one content area or provided support in a content area that did not match residents’ undergraduate majors. Nation-wide shortages of special education and ESL teachers mean that these specialists provide academic support to students in many grade levels and subjects and thus are often compelled to teach outside their content comfort zone. It also means that teacher preparation programs do not have a large pool of MTs with whom to partner, a phenomenon exacerbated in high-need urban schools where there may only be one or two ESL or special education teachers. Preservice programs may have to rethink the mentor–mentee dyad in student teaching placements and perhaps consider mentor–mentee teams where gaps in subject matter knowledge might be filled collectively by a team that includes the general education teacher. Programs may also want to help MTs develop strategies for supporting student teachers/residents as they stretch into unfamiliar subjects, as well as provide content-based workshops that will supplement residents’ knowledge and inform their instruction.

Support from urban preservice programs or university partners must also take into consideration setting and context (Matsko & Hammerness, 2014). The current U.S. context in which teachers—both experienced and learning—find themselves, is structured to ensure compliant, conveyor belt delivery of content, alongside the continuous juggling of multiple mandates and imperatives, all of which are layered on top of perennially challenging, labor-intensive, emotionally draining teaching work. As explained earlier, this description is particularly salient in terms of the city/state/district in which our study participants teach. Challenging and shifting contextual factors now require preservice programs and university partners to consider how support for MTs might be integrated to enable them to enact mentoring that is both educative and substantive. Negotiations with school administrators could focus attention to and problem solving around release time, flexible scheduling, provision of substitute teachers, co-teaching, and so on. Essentially, university preservice programs should expand the scope and substance of their partnerships, and rethink their roles as partners.

University faculty are also in a position to provide alternate points of view to their school-based colleagues, to use evidence from research and from practice that counters the dominant U.S. narrative about what constitutes “highly qualified” schools and teachers. One salient example is what we know about how teachers’ work and time are structured in high performing jurisdictions such as Finland or Shanghai, China. In these cases, a portion of teachers’ “office” time is dedicated to planning, reflecting, and professional talking about teaching. Another is the fact that U.S. teachers spend significantly more hours in the classroom than teachers in countries we seek to emulate, such as Singapore, contrary to the prevailing tropes about U.S. students not spending enough time in school. There are many places in the world where teachers are respected, given the time they need to think, and supported to be professionals. We can share those examples and learn from them.

Epilogue

The MTs in our study exemplify professional commitment and dedication, for which they receive little recognition or compensation from their school leaders, the district, policy makers, or the general public. Their generosity cannot be minimized, nor their willingness to learn and be vulnerable to the gaze of outsiders. They cannot be faulted for focusing on the expedient, the technical, the present, and the pressing—they need, after all, to meet too many responsibilities on a daily basis, with very little support of any kind. Without question, they are doing the best they can by their students and by their student teachers, working with generosity and grace under untenable conditions.