From Medicine to Teaching: The Evolution of the Simulated Interaction Model

Abstract

Medical education institutions frequently simulate interactions between future health professionals and standardized patients. This manuscript describes a partnership between a teacher preparation institution and a nearby medical institution, outlining specific procedures associated with the use of standardized parents, students, and paraprofessionals in helping future teachers and school leaders navigate common problems of practice. Implications center on the potential of this pedagogy to help bridge the gap between teacher preparation and practice as well as the applicability of this pedagogical approach to other higher education professional preparation programs.

Using Simulated Parent-Teacher Talks to Assess and Improve Prospective Teachers’ Counseling Competence

“…One of the first approaches of applying simulated parent-teacher talks in the field of teacher education was established by Dotger and colleagues (Dotger, Dotger, & Maher, 2010;Dotger, Harris, & Hansel, 2008). In the Simulated Interaction Model (SIM), prospective teachers participate in a series of one-on-one interactions with standardized parents within the framework of a teacher training course.…”

“…Even though Dotger et al (2008Dotger et al ( , 2010 as well as Wiesbeck et al (2013) already developed behavior-based simulation approaches to the assessment of teachers' communication skills, there are still no instruments for the behavior-based assessment of teachers' counseling competence in parent-teacher talks on the support of students' learning processes. Therefore, the superior aim of the current study was to develop and validate a behavior-based instrument based on the four-dimensional model of teachers' counseling competence (Gerich et al, 2015) involving counseling talk simulations with standardized parents in the same style of the SIM approach by Dotger et al (2008Dotger et al ( , 2010 as well as the assessment approach by Wiesbeck et al (2013).…”

“…Therefore, the superior aim of the current study was to develop and validate a behavior-based instrument based on the four-dimensional model of teachers' counseling competence (Gerich et al, 2015) involving counseling talk simulations with standardized parents in the same style of the SIM approach by Dotger et al (2008Dotger et al ( , 2010 as well as the assessment approach by Wiesbeck et al (2013). Here, in order to particularly utilize the instrument for the evaluation of specific teacher training programs on counseling, we strove for an instrument for the longitudinal assessment of changes in teachers' counseling competence due to specific interventions.…”

“…In the studies carried out by Dotger et al (2008Dotger et al ( , 2010, participation in simulated parent-teacher talks provided prospective teachers an opportunity to practice their abilities to effectively partner with parents and, subsequently, led to an enhancement of participants' communication skills. The beneficial effects of practicing professional skills in concrete case-based application situations on the development of competences have also been demonstrated in other studies on teacher education (e.g., Grossmann, 2005).…”

“…In contrast to the student's profile presented to the participating teachers, the profile given to the simulated parents provides home-based background context as well as a detailed interaction protocol for the simulated parent-teacher talk. By means of this interaction protocol, the standardized parents are instructed to present exact predetermined questions, information, and statements-according to the verbal triggers in the studies by Dotger et al (2008Dotger et al ( , 2010-at specified times during the course of the parent-teacher talk. For instance, after the teacher addresses the hypothetical student's unsatisfactory homework completion, the simulated parent is instructed to signalize a certain helplessness concerning the corresponding causes by stating "I am completely at a loss as to what could be the problem with his/her homework completion".…”