Mentoring in a Cohort Model of Practicum: Mentors and Preservice Teachers’ Experiences in a Rural South African School

Abstract

Little is known about mentoring student cohorts from largely urban backgrounds doing practicum at one school, living alongside the community, and sharing residential facilities with teacher educators in a rural context. This article reports Bachelor of Education students' and mentors' school-based mentoring experiences during a 4-week residential practicum in a rural setting. Data generated through in-depth group discussions with students and mentors were analyzed using content analysis. Experiences revolved around professional support, lesson observations and feedback, collaboration, and modeling. Notwithstanding that mentors were a source of wisdom in practical knowledge for students, they gained valuable professional knowledge around teaching styles and learner engagement from students. Collaborations rejuvenated mentor practices and stimulated their reflection, enthusiasm, and passion for work. Nondevelopmental experiences related to poor mentor communication, lack of modeling lessons, and objectivity in feedback. Although the overall impression from participants was positive, there is evidence of unequal mentor-mentee relationships and failure to construct the mentoring process as a journey of initiation into the preservice teacher's life role. I illustrate that in-school mentoring in the South African education context may be enhanced, if school-based teacher educators are exposed to mentoring practices and school-based supports through comprehensive ongoing training to better prepare them for supporting not only preservice teachers but also novice teachers.

Inside Mentor-Mentee Meetings in Pre-Service Teacher School-based Teaching Practice in Zimbabwe

“…The selected mentors are expected to support, guide and assist students during TP (Manwa, Mukeredzi & Manwa, 2016). Mentors are expected to hold prelesson and post lesson observation conferences with their mentees for student lessons observed by the mentor, and also for mentor lessons observed by student, to evaluate, reflect on and discuss the lessons so that the student can learn from both the mentor's and their own teaching (Mukeredzi, 2017). As well, mentors are also expected to hold formal mentor-mentee meetings outside lesson observations.…”

“…The supportive roles that these mentors played seemingly positively influenced students' TP. The issue of respect raised is often driven by students' concern for "acceptance" as colleagues (Mukeredzi, 2017). Student teachers appreciate being respected, accepted, regarded as colleagues, and made to feel welcome in the school.…”

“…ST13 mentioned that joint planning created space for discussion and exchanging ideas which helped to build co-operation and trust. In this regard, mentors may know more about classroom procedures and operations, while students may have new teaching pedagogies which can offer mentors deeper insights into their own teaching from joint planning, teaching and reflection (Mukeredzi, 2017).…”

“…Other students indicated that they learnt curriculum knowledge through mentor-mentee joint lesson planning meetings. Lesson planning generally involves laying out a design, showing how the teacher intends to achieve objectives, and indicating the procedures to follow (Mukeredzi, 2017). Through these joint activities, students became aware of the content and demands of the national and school syllabi for use in their teaching.…”

“…Thus, the mentoring meetings among others, require formal, unhurried discussions between the mentor and mentee. Hence the process has a lot to do with dialogical mentor-mentee engagement, where both parties should display commitment to the dialogue (Mukeredzi, 2017). Hill (2012) asserts that often mentors generously volunteer their time and effort to share their career/field experiences of professional practice, expertise, and knowledge.…”