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Lead Associate Teachers of Massey University |
Massey College of Education is launching a new pilot project in the Manawatu district to enhance the quality of the work done by associate teachers who support and mentor students doing practicum.
The project which will start in early 2012, has already got 27 seven teachers from seven schools across the range from large to small, rural to inner city and across varying deciles.
Massey hopes that the initiative will be extended to schools outside the Manawatu region, and for associate teachers in the early childhood and secondary sectors.
Dr Sally Hansen, Director of Teacher Education at Massey’s College of Education said she believed it was the first project of its kind in New Zealand, and Massey had already had expressions of interest from schools for involvement in the programme in 2013.
She said the team at Massey had identified a need to provide additional support and professional learning for associate teachers; many of whom were early career educators.
The Lead Associate Teacher project will provide associate teachers with greater support in their role as practica advisors and help them develop new skills through the process; it will also help student teachers have positive learning experiences in their practica, she said.
The programme has been designed to lead in to postgraduate study, a postgraduate diploma or a masters degree. “If teachers complete the programme and provide evidence of their learning, they will gain credit towards a postgraduate paper,” says Allister Smith, Schools’ Liaison and Practicum Adviser.
“The aim is to develop teachers as expert mentors and role models for emerging teachers with a focus on teaching-as-inquiry, and the use of e-portfolios that provide evidence of growth and development for both the associate teachers and the student teachers.
New skills and understanding as a teacher and mentor will be developed and teachers will get formal recognition for their learning. Associate teachers will be formally accredited as Lead Associate Teachers of Massey University College of Education.
They will work in small clusters and support each other face-to-face and on line. There will be three face-to-face workshops covering;
- The inquiry process, teaching as inquiry and the e-portfolio.
- The skills of mentoring the use of evidence/video analysis.
- What developing good practice looks like.
- Developing e-portfolios and sharing evidence.
Involved in teaching and supporting the programme will be staff from Massey’s Centre for Educational Development, staff from Massey University’s College of Education and Corinne Walsh, Deputy Principal College Street Normal School. The 2012 pilot will see associate teachers working with students from the Graduate Diploma of Teaching Primary.
For more information, or if you want to get involved, please contact Allister Smith on a.j.smith1@massey.ac.nz
