After reviewing much recent research and theory, the article outlines the current status of developmental stage concepts as a basis for the teacher as an adult learner. There is substantial evidence to support the view that adults who process experience at higher and more complex levels of development perform more adequately in complex human helping roles. Using a developmental model, a system is then outlined for training both mentor teachers and educators of mentor teachers. Such new roles have substantial potential for revitalizing experienced teachers, promoting their developmental growth, and improving the quality of supervision for beginning teachers.
Sprinthall provides a critique of current teacher induction programs and suggests a framework for a comprehen sive response to improve inservice teacher preparation, with veteran teachers assuming new roles as trainers for neophyte teachers. Such roles legiti mate an explicit shift for teacher induc tion from the university to the school. The author's model enables local educa tion agency (LEA) teachers to act as clin ical faculty and provides an opportunity for university professors to serve as ex tension agents.
Is supervision a reluctant profession?The study reported here represents an attempt to distinguish elements differentiating educative from miseducative supervision. Certainly the current state of the art vis-a-vis supervision raises at least as many questions as it answers. For example, Blumberg (1974) suggests that inservice teachers report the process either as a non-event or as negative-hence his provocative title, Supervisors and Teachers ; A Private Cold War.In the case of preservice the picture is equally problematic. Studies by Osman (1959), Iannocone (1963), Matthews (1967), andGerwinner (1968) found that student teachers in general became more authoritarian, less flexible, less responsive to pupils, and more rigid in their classroom behavior during their student teaching experiences. As a result Mosher and Purpel (1972) have called supervision a reluctant profession. The process itself, at least as currently practiced, may in fact be iatrogenic, designed to promote growth yet producing the opposite. In any case, as Zeichner (1978) noted there is a dearth of research on the interaction between student teachers and supervisors. The reported outcome studies noted do indicate, however, that serious problems exist, especially in terms of negative consequences. In this context the present study was developed.
PurposeThe main purpose was to examine the possible relationship between student teachers and their classroom supervisors within a specific theoretical framework. The goal was to examine aspects of supervision which may relate to effective versus ineffective role performance. A related consideration was to investigate the impact of supervision upon the student teachers. Theoretical Considerations Without belaboring the point, at least part of the difficulty in research in teacher education has been a serious lack of coherent theory. Shutes (1975) clearly commented on the largely atheoretical nature of work which leaves us without a substantive basis to guide practice. Research in teacher education is not the same as research in teaching or in learning. Turner (1975) carefully points out this distinction and supports Shutes in the call for new theory and needed research in the process and outcome of teacher education programs. Turner concludes:Thies-Sprinthall is an associate professor, School of Education, St. Cloud State University, Minn.The amount of dependable information available compared to the amount needed to formulate more effective policies and practices of teacher education is miniscule. (Turner, p. 107)The current study has been derived from two related theoretical frameworks, one pioneered by Hunt (1971) and his associates at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education; the other provided by Kohlberg (1975) and Rest (1974). Hunt has demonstrated rather consistently the importance of the interaction between the Conceptual Level (CL) of the classroom teacher and the impact on pupil performance. Kohlberg has demonstrated the significance of moral judgment stage (the ability to process ethi...
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