learning from introductory school experience

This article was downloaded by: [University of Auckland Library]On: 07 December 2014, At: 16:20Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Journal of Education for Teaching:International research andpedagogyPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cjet20

Learning from Introductory SchoolExperienceJ. Calderhead aa Department of Educational Research , University ofLancaster , Lancaster LA1 4YL, United KingdomPublished online: 07 Jul 2006.

To cite this article: J. Calderhead (1988) Learning from Introductory School Experience,Journal of Education for Teaching: International research and pedagogy, 14:1, 75-83

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0260747880140106

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information(the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor& Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warrantieswhatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of theContent. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions andviews of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. Theaccuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independentlyverified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liablefor any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages,and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly inconnection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content.

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Anysubstantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing,systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden.

Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions

Journal of Education for Teaching, Vol. 14, No. 1, 1988 75

Learning from IntroductorySchool ExperienceJ. CALDERHEADDepartment of Educational Research, University of Lancaster, Lancaster LA1 4YL,United Kingdom

ABSTRACT A group of student primary teachers, their college tutors and supervising teacherswere observed and interviewed during a structured, two-week, introductory school experienceto investigate what student teachers learned from the experience and how this learning wasfacilitated by teacher and tutor. Despite great efforts to structure and standardise the schoolexperience for all students, it took a variety of forms, offering qualitatively different types ofprofessional learning experience. For some students, it amounted to a modelling exercise, forothers the accumulation of a wide range of practical tips, a critical reflection on their own andothers' practice, a process of self-discovery, or an occasion for the hardening of existingattitudes concerning teachers and teaching. Factors contributing to this variance included theconceptions of student teachers' professional learning and of their own role within it, held bystudents, teachers and tutors, and several organisational features of the school. It is suggestedthat the design of structured school experiences needs careful monitoring and evaluation if theexpectations for them are to be fully realised.

INTRODUCTION

Structured school experiences are increasingly being used to introduce studentteachers to the task of teaching. These typically take the form of a series of school-based assignments involving observation, practice and discussion. It is expected thatthey will familiarise students with the nature of classroom life and the complexitiesof the teacher's work, orientate them to learn from their experience in school andcollege, and provide them with examples of classroom practice to which the later,more theoretical aspects of their training course can be related. As well as equippingstudents with appropriate attitudes and a knowledge base for future learning, it hasalso been suggested that early experiences in schools can serve as a 'weeding out'process in which those who are not committed or temperamentally suited to ateaching career will discover their unsuitability.

In Britain, recent policy on pre-service teacher education has emphasised theimportance of school experience in the preparation of teachers (DES, 1983, 1984)and has highlighted the need to examine the different forms that school experiencemight take and how these can be best utilised to promote students' professionallearning. A recent survey of teacher education practices by Her Majesty's Inspecto-

76 J. Calderhead

rate recommends that structured experiences in school which are followed bytutorial discussion are particularly effective forms of training (HMI, 1987).

However, one might expect the objectives of an introductory school experience(ISE) to be quite difficult to achieve. Lortie (1975) and Book, Byers & Freeman(1983) point out that student teachers frequently begin their professional prepara-tion with the belief that they already know a lot about teaching. Their long'apprenticeship of observation' whilst a pupil at school has led them to viewpedagogy as unproblematic. Attempts to encourage student teachers to adopt ananalytical, reflective and critical approach to the development of their own practicehave sometimes been found to be resisted by those who hold alternative views of theprocess of learning to teach, such as modelling other teachers, or of following one'sown instinct (see, for example, Korthagen, 1988). And several researchers havenoted the difficulties of enabling student teachers to observe and understandclassroom processes. Instructed to observe teachers in classrooms, students canfrequently be left wondering how to make sense of the noise and activity thatsurrounds them—what ought they take note of? what significance should they attachto their observations? (see Copeland, 1981; Calderhead, 1984).

The present study is an exploration of student teachers' learning during astructured school experience in a one year post-graduate course for teaching in the8-12 age range. It aims to address the questions of how an ISE operates in practice,what student teachers learn from the experience, and how it might be mostappropriately structured.

THE ISE

The Introductory School Experience was designed by a group of college tutors andschool teachers to provide students with a structured introduction to the work of theprimary teacher. It spanned the first two weeks of the PGCE year. For the firstweek, students spent each morning in school, the afternoons being free for them toconsult their tutor, write up notes and prepare any work for the following day. Inweek 2, the students spent each afternoon in school, with the mornings free forpreparatory work and tutor discussions.

The 27 students on course were assigned to schools in groups of four to eightto each of five teachers. The teachers were specially selected for this task by collegetutors and headteachers on the basis of two criteria: they were regarded asexceptionally good practitioners, and they were also considered to be sympathetic tothe difficulties of beginning teachers.

Each student, teacher and tutor was issued with a guide to the ISE, indicatingthe intended structure of the two week period. Each session in school was associatedwith a specific task, starting with the observation of children, noting the work theydid, how they related to the teacher, what kinds of activities interested them in theclassroom and in the playground. Later sessions focused on the observation of howthe teacher structured lessons, how they organised the class, marked the children'swork, how they coped with 'high organisation' lessons such as practical science orart and craft, and how the teacher dealt with a crowd control situation such as a visit

Learning from Introductory School Experience 77

to the swimming pool or a field trip. At the beginning of the second week, it wasintended that each student should plan and carry out a lesson for a small group ofchildren, and thereafter students would become a little more involved in theinstruction of individual children and the marking of their work, with the assistanceand supervision of the class teacher.

Three of the five teachers had themselves been involved in the planning of theISE, and all of the teachers and college tutors had lengthy discussions about theobjectives and form of the experience before the beginning of term. Because oftimetabling constraints within individual schools, however, the ISE programmecould not always be strictly adhered to, and it was recognised by teachers and tutorsthat minor adaptations would be needed to suit individual circumstances.

A college tutor was assigned to each group of students. The tutor visited thestudents in school twice a week, discussing the ISE tasks with them and the classteacher. The students and tutor also met in college approximately twice per week todiscuss what the students were extracting from their experience in school and whatthey were planning to do in the classroom themselves.

THE INVESTIGATION

Several types of data were collected about the students' experiences in the ISE. Firstof all, two of the student groups were observed in school towards the end of the firstweek, and each was interviewed as a group about what they were learning from theirschool placement. The tutors and class teachers associated with these groups werealso interviewed about how they perceived the ISE and how they viewed their ownrole in the management of the experience. The remaining tutors and teachersinvolved in the ISE were interviewed at the end of the two week period, and all ofthe students on the course were collectively involved in a discussion about the ISElater in the term. Immediately after the ISE, all students on the course were askedto complete a questionnaire consisting of 8 open-ended questions, soliciting theirviews about the value of the ISE in general, and also of the particular tasks itinvolved, the contribution of the teacher and tutor to the experience, and thechanges that occurred in their conceptions of teaching or their conceptions ofthemselves as teachers as a result of the ISE. The return rate for the questionnairewas 63%.

FINDINGS

The Students' Experience of ISE

During their attachment to school, the students generally spent about half of thetime observing the class teacher, and the remainder in supervision and individualgroup teaching, with small amounts of time spent in discussion with the teacher,tutor or with other students. However, the allocation of time amongst theseactivities seemed to vary considerably from one class to another. Some teachers

78 J. Calderhead

were particularly adept at structuring lessons so that students took an active part,supervising a group of children, for instance, or correcting work. Others appeared toengage in their usual routine, and students would spend substantial periods of timesitting at the side of the classroom watching the teacher perform or wandering,sometimes rather aimlessly, about the classroom while the children were working.

However, it was an active involvement in class work and purposeful observa-tion of teacher and children that were the aspects of the ISE most valued by thestudents. For many of them, giving their own lesson was especially revealing. Itmade them aware (often suddenly, and for the first time) of classroom life from ateacher's point of view. It drew their attention to particular problems of practiceand also made them reflect about their relationships with children and how thepupils were responding to them. As one student expressed it:

Doing our mini-lessons showed to me that teaching involves more thanjust getting the children to do a piece of work—a lesson needs to beplanned, you need to gather resources, need to think about the abilities ofthe children, how they will react and how to approach them, discipline,etc.

Observing the teacher and talking to him/her and to other staff were activities fromwhich students noted a great variety of skills and strategies, most often concerningclassroom management, but they were frequently only aware of these when alertedto them by their teacher, tutor, or the ISE booklet. One of the ISE activities, forinstance, was to observe how teachers start off lessons, and one student noted:

Watching the teacher start off lessons and get the children motivated towork was particularly useful. As well as just seeing how detailed instruc-tions to children had to be in order to keep control—it was very useful tosee just what level everything had to be geared at without being patronis-ing towards the children.

The opportunities to observe children were valued for the knowledge they providedabout classroom behaviour, how children responded to classroom events, and theirattitudes to different types of classroom activities. Again, the teacher, tutor or ISEguide tended to steer students' observations, though students did seem to discover alot simply through the opportunity to talk to children:

Being able to talk to children about their work, the lessons they enjoy/hatee t c . . . allowed me to get to grips with the work level of 10 year olds.

A few other aspects of the ISE were mentioned by individual students—forinstance, one commented on the value of the crowd control exercise, another on thevalue of watching other students, noting one another's approaches and mistakes.Overall, however, their comments tended to focus on active participation in theteaching process, or active guided analysis of teachers' and pupils' behaviour, ordiscussion with them about their actions.

In describing what they had learned as a result of ISE, the students focused agreat deal on classroom management. How children were seated, classroom organi-

sation and the rules governing classroom behaviour were mentioned by 71% of thequestionnaire respondents. This may to some extent reflect the direction in the ISEguide book, though it also reflects the typical concerns of beginning teachers (e.g.Fuller & Brown, 1975). As a result of the ISE, students seemed to be well attunedto managerial strategies, despite their subtlety:

The way in which the teacher controls the children often by simply a stareor a facial expression, the way in which she answered the children, alwaysgiving positive feedback. There seemed to be a great deal of understandingwhich had been communicated to the children about the unwritten rules inthis class.

The students also commonly reported learning about the pupils, noting particularlythe range and variety of their abilities, and the problems that arise as a result oftheir short concentration span. Some students mentioned learning about curricularmaterials and how they were used and these were sometimes accompanied by abrief, personal evaluation of them. Three students mentioned learning about theteacher-pupil relationship, and seemed to place particular emphasis on maintainingdistance, a feature emphasised by their class teacher.

I learned not to be too friendly with the children. The teacher is theleader, not a friend or mother.

In commenting about what they extracted from the ISE, occasional mention wasalso made of aspects of the working environment and their impact on the teacher—the influence of the headteacher on the curriculum, the school policy on maintain-ing a record of work, and the required close and systematic monitoring of pupils'performance.

There were several features of the ISE about which the students were critical.First of all, six or more students in one classroom was felt to be too many. Thestudents got in each other's way, and in their frequent attempts to talk to thechildren about school work they felt they were holding the children back. A fewstudents also reported that having so many students in the class made the teachingof a lesson more competitive and stressful.

The lesson taught to a group of children which was scheduled in the ISEprogram tended to take various forms in different schools. All students took at leastone lesson, some as many as three. In some cases it took the form of each studenttaking a small group of children at the same time, with the class teacher circulatingaround the groups and later speaking to the students about their teaching. In othercases, the students each performed a class lesson, and in one school this wasobserved not only by the other students and the class teacher, but by the collegetutor, headteacher and deputy head as well! Not surprisingly, students in the formersituation tended to report that teaching a lesson had been very valuable and theywelcomed more experience of a similar kind. Those whose situation approached thelatter reported high levels of anxiety—"the mini-lesson clouded by ISE from dayone"—and frequently regarded the experience as confidence-shattering.

Most students found their tutors and class teachers very supportive and

80 J. Calderhead

helpful, but a few were critical of their tutors and, to a lesser extent, their teachers.Aspects that they were particularly dissatisfied with were tutors who recounted listsof dos and don'ts, who were 'too serious' and made them anxious and self-conscious.A few students were critical of their teachers, because they thought their style ofteaching was dull, routine and unimaginative, although all of the students praisedthe willingness of the teachers to help and to give up time to talk about teaching.

Other critical comments from the students concerned the narrowness of theexperience, observing only one teacher and one class. Several felt they would like tohave observed a variety of teachers at work. Students also reported that they hadlittle opportunity to discuss their experiences with students in other schools who hadobserved different types of teaching. One other point which was repeatedly raisedby the students concerned the disadvantages of being introduced to the children as'students'. They felt that this resulted in children "treating us more like equals thanteachers".

When asked about the effects of the ISE on their views about teaching and onthemselves as teachers, several points were repeatedly raised. Three students feltthat the experience had aroused some anxiety.

I find myself worrying about (1) how I will cope with the class manage-ment aspect of teaching more so than what I will teach; (2) although nowthe course has started I still feel a little left in the air about where all theseideas for lessons are going to come from. I'm half afraid that I won't beinventive enough.

In contrast, however, two felt the experience to be confidence boosting:

ISE was a reassuring experience, especially as it was an opportunity to bein school without the pressure of taking lessons.

Four reported being somewhat stunned by the realisation of how much there is tolearn in becoming a teacher.

Without prior knowledge one cannot possibly understand or comprehendthe amount of preparation and organisation required even for one lesson.

A further two, as a result of the ISE, started to question their own competence andsuitability for the profession, though perhaps unjustifiably.

During ISE I began to question my capabilities and whether or not Iwould be suited to the profession—mainly due to the fact that when Istood up in front of the whole class to talk for a few minutes and to leadthem into discussion I eventually dried up and was quite bothered by this.

Two students suggested that they learned most from their own trial and error andthat advice from tutor and teacher had been 'dreadful' or 'obvious'. Three studentsreported some disillusionment with the constraints under which teachers work, andvoiced disapproval of accepted teaching practices.

I was unprepared for such a rigid division of the day . . . I feel I'm being

trained as a manager and controller of children, rather than someone whocan make the process of learning meaningful and exciting for children.

Another four students, however, reported that their commitment to teach was muchstronger now, as a result of the ISE, and that their experience in school awakened achallenge.

There is much more to teaching than I ever imagined—it is a challengethat I can't wait to take up!

It opened my eyes to the future. I'm rather nervous/apprehensive now,but determined.

This combination of anxiety/apprehension and determination to take up a newlyperceived challenge seemed to characterise a substantial proportion of the students'concluding comments.

The Teachers' and Tutors'Accounts of ISE

Interviews with teachers and tutors suggested that there was a variety of ways ofperceiving the ISE and of their own role within it. One teacher, for instance,emphasised the importance of providing student teachers with a model to copy andviewed his own role as one of providing the students with a good example of how toteach. Another believed that students learned most by doing the job themselves andthought it important for them to start teaching as soon as possible; the role of theteacher was seen as providing practical tips and feedback on how the students weredoing. Another teacher viewed the ISE as an opportunity to provide the studentswith as broad an experience as possible in the time available; from this, they couldstart to select the practices that suited their own style of teaching.

Tutors similarly varied in their perceptions of the ISE. One emphasised theimportance of students coming to appreciate the complexity of teaching and thematrix of costs and benefits that are associated with each teaching decision. Heviewed his own role in terms of helping students appreciate this complexity,pointing out, for instance, the various ways in which SMP maths might be organisedand the advantages and disadvantages accompanying each. Another tutor viewed theISE as an occasion for students to acquire a repertoire of classroom problems andsituations which could be related to the coming term's work and which would makethe students' professional training more meaningful and relevant. He thereforeviewed it as important for students to keep a record of their experiences in school towhich they could later refer.

CONCLUSIONS

Whilst for many students, the experience effectively provided them with anintroduction to classroom life, an appreciation of the complexity of teaching and anorientation to learn and to promote and evaluate their own developing practice, for

82 J. Calderhead

others it was a different type of experience altogether. In some cases, it hardenedattitudes of resistance and dislike of existing patterns of teaching. In others itheightened anxieties and self-doubts. And for one or two, it seems to haveconfirmed their suspicions that teachers and tutors have little constructive advice tooffer them.

In general, what students typically valued in the experience was an activeinvolvement in the classroom (teaching small groups or helping individual children),variety in lessons, teachers and children with whom they were involved, someguidance early on in what to take note of in their observation of teachers andchildren, and reassuring teachers and tutors who would allay their anxieties aboutteaching and with whom they could freely and frankly converse about the practicali-ties of the work.

But these features were not available to all students on ISE, nor were theyvalued by every student even when they were available. Some teachers, for instance,had difficulty organising their classes in such a way as to create student teacherinvolvement. Tutors sometimes appeared to lack the appropriate language fortalking about classroom practice in a way that was meaningful to their students. Inaddition, students seemed to approach their professional training course withdifferent conceptions of the nature of teaching and of how they would developteaching competence. Some wished to observe a variety of practices and assembletheir own style of teaching from these experiences. Some expected a high level ofguidance and structuring from teachers and tutors. Others intended to learn fromtheir own trial and error.

Teachers and tutors also had different conceptions of how students learn toteach and of their own role in fostering this process. Some teachers, for instance,clearly believed that students learn best by being 'thrown in at the deep end' andreadily associated their supervisory role with the 'crit lesson' of their own teachertraining. Students' own eagerness to be involved in the teaching task was sometimesinterpreted as confirmation of the appropriateness of this approach. Others, how-ever, viewed the ISE as a guided sampling of classroom experience on which thestudents would later reflect and from which they would learn.

Circumstances in individual schools also influenced the experiences of thestudents on ISE and the impressions that they developed or had confirmed aboutthe nature of teaching. The extent to which school policy required teachers tofollow the textbook, for example, as opposed to providing freedom to construct oramend the curriculum, or the extent to which other classrooms in the school wereaccessible, or the level of collegiality and discussion that was evident amongstteachers affected the nature of the learning experience for students.

The study demonstrates that an ISE can be transformed into radically differentlearning experiences, or even 'non-learning' experiences, for students, and that thetask of designing and managing structured experiences in school is rather morecomplex than originally imagined. Various factors can result in the same ISE beingexperienced as a conservative modelling exercise, involving the copying of the classteacher's routines, a wide-ranging accumulation of tips for teachers, a process ofcritical reflection on one's own and others' practice, a process of self-questioning

and self-discovery, or an occasion for the hardening of existing attitudes concerningteachers and teaching. This raises several questions concerning how student teacherslearn to teach, how we might wish them to learn, and the impediments to beovercome in fostering preferred modes of learning. As new B.Ed and PGCE coursesdevelop various forms of structured experiences in school, there is potential throughtheir close monitoring and evaluation, to gain valuable insights into the processes atwork and how they might be modified to promote profitable professional learningexperiences for student teachers in schools.

REFERENCES

BOOK, C., BYERS, J. & FREEMAN, D. (1983) Student expectations and teacher education traditions withwhich we can and cannot live, Journal of Teacher Education, 34, pp. 9-13.

CALDERHEAD, J. (1984) Teachers' Classroom Decision-making (London, Holt, Rinehart & Winston).COPELAND, W.D. (1981) Clinical experiences in the education of teachers, Journal of Education for

Teaching, 7, pp. 3-17.DES (1983) Teaching Quality (London, HMSO).DES (1984) Initial Teacher Training: approval of courses, circular 3/84 (London, HMSO).FULLER, F.F. & BROWN, O.H. (1975) Becoming a teacher, in: K. RYAN (Ed.) Teacher Education, 74th

Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education (Chicago, University of ChicagoPress).

HMI (1987) Quality in Schools: the pre-service education of teachers (London, HMSO).KORTHAGEN, F.A.J. (1988) The influence of learning orientations on the development of reflective

teaching, in: J. CALDERHEAD (Ed.) Teachers' Professional Learning (Lewes, Falmer Press).LORTIE, D.C. (1975) School Teacher (Chicago, University of Chicago Press).

learning from introductory school experience

Documents

pha5941 community introductory pharmacy practice...

introductory psychology rapid learning series course...

the lai lean academy experience: introductory … lai lean...

appropriate technology in an introductory engineering design...

introductory pharmacy practice experience (ippe) course...

introductory community pharmacy experience student syllabus

pharm 454 introductory pharmacy practice experience part 2

introductory pharmacy practice experience€¦ ·...

introductory research -based learning in linguistics class

flipping an introductory science course using emerging...

introductory psychology: learning part ii (operant)

behaviour for learning - introductory presentation

machine learning for materials scientists: an introductory

introductory pharmacy practice experience i phrd 410

promoting experiential learning in an introductory...

learning 2.0 introductory workshop presentation

introductory to customer experience design

institutional introductory pharmacy practice experience...

making computing skills part of learning introductory...

introductory community pharmacy experience preceptor's guide