The Value of Feedback in an Early Field Experience: Peer, Teacher, and Supervisor Coaching

Coaching the coaches : supporting university supervisors in the supervision of elementary mathematics instruction.

“…University supervisors are ultimately coaches in the field (Slick, 1997). Anderson and Radencich (2001) found that university supervisors who filled the role as a coach were more effective than those who were in the supervisory role. Coaches observe, provide feedback, facilitate in lesson and unit planning, and locate resources.…”

“…Borko and Mayfield (1995) identified areas in which university supervisors found to be detrimental to building relationships with their teacher candidates; they are time, institutional requirements, and inadequate conferences with the teacher candidates. Overall, university supervisors felt that there was not enough time to do more than the necessary requirements of the pre-observation conference, observation, and post-observation conference (Anderson & Radencich, 2001;Borko & Mayfield, 1995). Many had teacher candidates in more than one school which required driving time and then led to scheduling problems.…”

“…This would call for the university supervisor to be adaptable in his/ her methods. This role identifies the university supervisor as an instructional coach in contrast to the evaluator in the supervisory model (Anderson & Radencich, 2001). By being "mediators of action" university supervisors provide the opportunity of teachers to think about their thinking (Wertsch, 1998).…”

“…Teacher candidates find the feedback and guidance from university supervisors to be beneficial (Anderson & Radencich, 2001). Some teacher candidates even claim that the university supervisor was the most important component of their program (Smith & Souviney, 1997).…”

“…Teacher candidates need opportunities to reflect and converse about their development and growth (Fernandez & Erbilgin, 2009). In fact they value the discussions, feedback and opportunities to reflect (Anderson & Radencich, 2001). The university supervisor and cooperating teacher provide a community where the teacher candidates can collaborate and have dialog about their teaching practice and progress (Blanton, et aI., 2001 ;Frykholm, 1998).…”