Excelsior: Leadership in Teaching and Learning is published by
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Editor’s address:
Cynthia A. Lassonde
Editor, Excelsior
SUNY College at Oneonta
501 Fitzelle Hall
Oneonta, NY 13820
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Excelsior
Leadership in Teaching and Learning
Volume 6, Number 2 Spring/Summer 2012
Message from the President by Kate DaBoll-Lavoie
Page X
Notes from the Editor by Cindy Lassonde
Page X
Reports of Research
Making In-Roads: Connecting Preservice and In-service Teachers
in a School-University Partnership Centered on Inquiry
Cornelis de Groot and Aaron D. Isabelle
Page XX
Using “Strange Texts” in a Content Area Literacy Course
Cheryl A. Kreutter
Page XX
Student Teachers: A Case for Cultural Competence
in Teacher Preparation
Darra Pace
Elfreda Blue
Page XX
Urban Secondary Science Teacher Career Satisfaction and Retention in an Alternative Certification Program
Angela M. Kelly
Christina Gonzalez
Page XX
Preservice Teachers’Personal Reading Histories:
Implications for Future Instruction
Lisa Anne Vacca-Rizopoulos
Gabrielle Occhiogrosso
Page XX
Call for Manuscripts
Page XX
Subscription Form
Page XX
LEAVE A BLANK PAGE BEHIND TABLE OF CONTENTS HERE.
NYACTE Executive Board 2011-2012
President Vice President/President Elect
Kate DaBoll-Lavoie Paul Vermette
Nazareth College Niagara University
Past President Secretary
Lois Fisch Craig Hill
Utica College Nazareth College
Treasurer
Annjanet Woodburn
Pace University
Board of Directors
Joanne M. Curran Nancy Low-Hogan
SUNY College at Oneonta Long Island University
Christine Givner Lori V. Quigley
SUNY Fredonia The Sage Colleges
Mark LaCelle-Peterson Jerrold Ross
Houghton College St. John’s University
Journal Editor Webmaster
Cynthia A. Lassonde Ed Teall
SUNY College at Oneonta Mount Saint Mary College
National Editorial Board
Dominic Belmonte, Golden Apple Foundation Helene Napolitano, Marymount Manhattan
Mary E. Diez, Alverno College College, Emeritus
Laura Dorow, Utica College Robert J. Nistler, University of St. Thomas
Joanne Kilgour Dowdy, Kent State University Susan Polirstok, Kean University
Lois Fisch, Utica College Sandra Stacki, Hofstra University
Althier M. Lazar, St. Joseph’s University Robert J. Starratt, Boston College
Carol Merz-Frankel, University of Puget Sound
Editorial Review Board
Sarah Abitbol Avtzon, Daemen College
Brian D. Beitzel, SUNY College at Oneonta
Fred J. Brandt, Lesley University
Melissa Jarvis Cedeno, Brighter Choice Charter School
Cynthia C. Choi, Le Moyne College
Carolyn F. Chryst, SUNY College at Oneonta
Marie Cianca, St. John Fisher College
Jennifer Cuddapah, Hood College
Joanne M. Curran, SUNY College at Oneonta
Margo DelliCarpini, Lehman College, CUNY
Krislynn Dengler, SUNY College at Oneonta
Janet R. DeSimone, Lehman College, CUNY
Bernadette Donovan, Molloy College
Patricia A. Dunn, Stony Brook
Brian Evans, Pace University
Joanne M. Falinski, Editorial Consultant
Minaz B. Fazal, New York Institute of Technology
JoAnne Ferrara, Manhattanville College
Barbara Garii, SUNY College at Oswego
René Garrison, St. Bonaventure University
Vicky Giouroukakis, Molloy College
David Gorlewski, D’Youville College
Jean Hallagan, SUNY College at Oswego
Patrice W. Hallock, Utica College
Don Halquist, SUNY College at Brockport
Charles F. Howlett, Molloy College
Barbara Ann Iannarelli, Niagara University
Roberto Joseph, Hofstra University
Laurence Krute, Manhattanville College
Jennifer Lauria, Wagner College
Elaine Lawrence, SUNY College at Oneonta
Anita C. Levine, SUNY College at Oneonta
Kenneth Lindblom, Stony Brook University
JoAnn M. Looney, Nyack College
Lawrence J. Maheady, SUNY College at Fredonia
Jill G. Marshall, SUNY College at Fredonia
The New York Association of Colleges
for Teacher Education
and
the New York State Association of Teacher Education
invite you to participate in our
FALL 2012
NYACTE/ NYSATE CONFERENCE.
Our theme is
“Using Research, Practice, and Policy
to Meet the Education Challenges of the 21st Century.”
October 20-21, 2012
Gideon Putnam Resort and Spa
Saratoga Springs, NY
(www.gideonputnam.com)
Visit www.NYACTE.org and www.NYS-ATE.org
for more information.
Call for Nominations for NYACTE’s Annual
CHARLES C. MACKEY, JR.
EXCELLENCE IN SERVICE LEADERSHIP AWARD
Complete nominations must be postmarked by September 1, 2012.
The Charles C. Mackey, Jr. Excellence in Service Leadership Award honors an educator in New York State who has demonstrated personal and professional qualities that exemplify the highest standards of service leadership in teacher education. An excellent servant leader is one who through personal knowledge, wisdom, ethical practice, and courage models effective practice and thus enables others to reach individual, institutional, and communal goals.
The Charles C. Mackey, Jr. Excellence in Service Leadership Award recognizes an individual who represents Teacher Education in his or her respective institution of higher education in New York State. The individual exemplifies service leadership within his or her institutional setting and within the broader New York professional community through engagement, initiative and personal qualities that reflect relevant High Standards for Teacher Education Accountability as defined by the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education:
- Serve first and foremost as an advocate for P-12 students, especially for promoting the growth and development of all students;
- Promote diversity in teacher education faculty, preservice teachers, curriculum, and programs;
- Be accountable to prospective teachers for their preparation to meet state licensure expectations (including knowledge of subject matter and of the students to whom those subjects are taught);
- Be informed by the best practice and most current research on teaching and learning theory and practice, including the commitment to active scholarship by teacher education faculty;
- Operate in collaboration with professional agencies responsible for quality assurance in the teaching profession.
Past recipients of the award:
Charles C. Mackey, Jr., Doris T. Garner,
James Shuman, Linda Beimer,
Jan McDonald, Suzanne Miller, Joseph P. Frye,
Sister Miriam Honora Corr, and Madeline Berry
For more information on requirements and to access the
nomination form, go to www.NYACTE.org
or contact Joanne Curran at .
Message from the President
Leave a full page for this.
Kate DaBoll-Lavoie
President, NYACTE
Nazareth College
Notes from the Editor
Cindy Lassonde
Editor
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Reports of Research
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Making In-Roads: Connecting Preservice and Inservice Teachers
in a School-University Partnership Centered on Inquiry
Cornelis de Groot
University of Rhode Island
Aaron D. Isabelle
State University of New York at New Paltz
Abstract
In this qualitative study the authors explored the experiences of preservice and inservice teachers involved in a second iteration of a university-school partnership. The purpose of the study was to gain insight into how the design and characteristics of the second partnership improved the experiences of the participants. We discuss the relationships among stakeholders and the usefulness of linking with existing professional development practices in the partnership school to join the learning of inservice and preservice teachers in an inquiry-based environment. A design with a limited set of tasks facilitated all involved to enter into a powerful community of practice.
About the Authors
Cornelis (Kees) de Groot, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Secondary Mathematics Education at the University of Rhode Island, Kingston, Rhode Island. His research interests include realistic teacher education, cognitive transitions in the learning of mathematics, and fundamental structures in elementary and secondary mathematics. Email:
Aaron D. Isabelle, Ph.D., is Associate Professor in the Department of Elementary Education at the State University of New York at New Paltz. He teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in science education and is active in professional development and school-university partnerships. His research interests include history-of-science-inspired stories, preservice teachers’ alternate conceptions, and inquiry-based methods for improving science teaching. Email:
Excelsior: Leadership in Teaching and Learning
Volume 6, Number 2 Spring/Summer 2012 3
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de Groot and Isabelle
In this study the authors explored the experiences of preservice and inservice (cooperating) teachers involved in a school-university partnership. This partnership was a second iteration, which focused on inquiry in science, while the first partnership focused on connections between mathematics, science, and technology. Both partnerships involved elementary teachers from grade three to five from the same school and took place during one semester, coinciding with a six-credit mathematics, science, and technology methods course for 20 preservice teachers. The preservice teachers spent one full day per week at the school in an on-site methods course for a portion of the day and in class with the inservice teachers for the remainder, simultaneously fulfilling their pre-student teaching practicum requirement. For a full discussion of the first partnership, see de Groot & Isabelle (2009). The second iteration aimed more explicitly at connecting the learning of preservice and inservice teachers in existing professional development practices in the partnership school (Bahr, Ewing Monroe, Balzotti, & Eggett, 2009).
The purpose of the study was to gain insight into how the design and characteristics of the second partnership improved the experiences of the inservice and preservice teachers. While the first iteration appeared to be well suited to the needs of the preservice teachers, it seemed overwhelming to the inservice teachers. Our initial goal was to shift aspects of teacher education to our colleagues in the school hoping to add a greater level of realism to what we teach preservice teachers (Feiman-Nemser, Parker, & Zeichner, 1992). For example, we hoped that inservice teachers could model, in their classrooms, inquiry methods that we promoted and gradually allow preservice teachers to take on teaching responsibilities, culminating in teaching a three-lesson mini unit. We also hoped that they could promote peer discourse and reflection by asking them to work with two preservice teachers. Our design was based on a framework that we adapted from principles of Realistic Teacher Education (Korthagen, Kessels, Koster, Lagerwerf & Wubbels, 2001). We realized, after the first iteration, that too many of the inquiry methods were new to the inservice teachers and thus we put them on very uncertain ground with the added responsibility for a pair of preservice teachers. We also learned that the design and conceptual underpinnings for the partnership were almost entirely ours. We needed a different approach, one that was based in the concerns of the inservice teachers and was more closely connected to their existing professional development experiences. Many elements of the first iteration of the partnership remained the same. Twenty preservice teachers and the second author spent one day per week for 11 weeks during the semester in the school. In the morning the preservice teachers received science methods instruction from the second author. After that, they were given targeted assignments for participation in the classrooms that fit the gradual model identified above: from observing and reflecting on how a teacher launches a lesson in an inquiry method to trying out and reflecting on a discrepant event with a group of children to teaching a three lesson mini-unit. Almost all preservice teachers were assigned in pairs to an inservice teacher. They kept logs with specific writing prompts. At the end of the school day, preservice teachers met again with the methods instructor to debrief their experiences.
The major change consisted of a study group format. During three consecutive weeks, in the middle of the semester, pairs of preservice teachers met as a team with their inservice teacher in the after school study groups. Another change was that we worked closely with a Teacher Liaison who planned the structure and activities with us. In this article we discuss how we changed our approach to the partnership and what we learned about collaboratively creating a community of practice between preservice and inservice teachers. We will conclude with implications of our findings for future partnerships.
Linking with Existing Professional Development Practices
Research is emerging about the value of linking the learning of preservice and inservice teachers for their benefit as well as the achievement of their students (Bahr et al., 2009). We add that linking with existing professional development practices in the partnership school is a key element to fostering the intended learning. This idea did not come from us. We initially started a discussion with the school district administration to continue the partnership with some minor adjustments. We were focused more on science and inquiry teaching because the inservice teachers demonstrated a deep concern for that in their work after the first partnership experience. However, recruitment of inservice teachers proved problematic. The Teacher Liaison took the initiative, with the encouragement of the school’s principal, to suggest a different approach. This national board certified teacher with more than 15 years experience in the classroom took on this role due to her very positive experiences in the first iteration.
The Teacher Liaison proved to be crucial in a variety of partnership aspects that are otherwise very difficult to influence for teacher educators. This teacher suggested linking the partnership with an existing professional development practice: study groups. She was instrumental in recruiting inservice colleagues and became involved in co-facilitating the study group sessions with Aaron Isabelle, the second author. Her inside knowledge of what is possible within the school proved very valuable to us and put the inservice teachers in the driver’s seat. Shifting this locus of control was essential for moving the partnership forward.
The school district allows teachers to design self-directed study groups as a professional development activity. Often the design is centered on a single issue or concern and is supported by a resource, usually a professional book, to help hone their practice. In close collaboration with the Teacher Liaison, we developed a three-phased design that represents a gradual inquiry-based approach and incorporates a study group in the second phase (Figure 1).