EVALUATION OF QUALITY AND QUANTITY OF THREE-WAY CONFERENCES IN CLINICAL SUPERVISION

FIELD PRACTICE

Mızrap BULUNUZ* , Barbara MEYERS **, Carla TANGUAY **,

Nermin BULUNUZ *,

Şehnaz BALTACI GÖKTALAY *, Esim GÜRSOY *, Serhat AZAP*

* Uludağ Üniversitesi, Eğitim Fakültesi

* * Georgia State University, Early Childhood Education Department

Transitions in Teacher Education and Professional Indentities

ATEE Annual Conference 2014, Braga/ Portugal

25-27 August 2014

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

• Duration of the post observation conferences is very short.• Amount of feedback given by both cooperating teacher and university

supervisor to preservice teacher’s lesson is limited. • Type of feedback by both stakeholders is mostly «direct»• Quality of feedback by both stakeholders is not effective.

TUBITAK PROJECT(The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey)

«Best practices for classroom teacher training programs: Clinical Supervision Model»

• Standardized program is developed within the scope of the project developed in cooperation with HEC, National Ministry of Education and the World Bank and called “Developing National Education” (Faculty-School Cooperation Booklet, 1998). • However, the research indicated that neither university supervisors

nor the cooperating teachers provided the feedback that is found essential for the teacher trainee (Eraslan, 2009; Sağ, 2008).

THE NEED FOR THIS PROJECTTherefore: • This TUBITAK project aimed at developing, implementing,

and evaluating a “Clinical Supervision Model” (CSM) with a program that targets continuous, systematic and constructive feedback to teacher trainees at classroom teacher training departments of education faculties. • Collaboration between Uludag and Georgia State

Universities (GSU) • Clinical Supervision Model(CSM) was adapted from the

GSU

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

Blumberg’s Model (1970)

High DirectHigh Indirect (Telling, Asking) – Promotes Some Resistance

High DirectLow Indirect (Telling, Some Asking)

Low DirectHigh Indirect (Asking, Listening) – Promotes Most Independent Critical Reflection

Low IndirectLow Direct (Low Asking, Low Listening)

LITERATURE REVIEW

▪ Clinical Supervision Model (CSM) (Goldhammer, 1969 & Cogan, 1973) ▪ The effectiveness of CSM (Reavis, 1977; Symth,1991; Rodgers & Keil, 2007) ▪ Preservice teachers valued feedback from all sources (supervisor, teacher, peer) (Anderson & Radencich, 2001) ▪ A supervisor & cooperating teachers need to serve his/her preservice teacher by responding to individual needs instead of using a single, uniform approach (Glickman, 1980; Wilkins-Canter, 1997)

CONTEXT OF RESEARCH STUDY• Uludag University, Faculty of Education: 4 year long teacher education

program• 6th semester: School Experience (4 hours/ 1 day a week) • 7th & 8th semesters: Teaching Practice (6 hours/ 1 day a week) • Faculty members, instructors, and lecturers can be university supervisor;

they are paid.• Cooperating teachers are selected by school principles ; they are paid by

universities.• No formal training for both university supervisors & cooperating teachers •

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1) To what extent do pre-service teachers, cooperating teachers, and supervisors participate during three-way conferences?

2) What type of feedback, direct or indirect is given to pre-service teachers by cooperating teachers and supervisors during three-way conferences?

METHOD Participant Schools:• Nine (5 experimental, 4 control group) elementary schools in the city

of Bursa, Turkey. Duration of Data Collection: • Data were collected throughout 4 semesters in 2 years. Participants:• 48 preservice teachers received feedback via CSM (in each year) • 30 cooperating teachers implemented CSM (in each year) • 8 supervisors implemented CSM (in each year)

METHOD Data Sources:• Three-way conferences: 1. Preservice teacher (last year students at the Faculty of Education ), 2. Cooperating teacher (between 5-20 years of teaching experience) 3. University supervisors (faculty, instructor, or teachers with master degree).Data Collection Procedures:• Three-way conferences were recorded by video cameras and transcripted verbatim.• Four three-way conferences were selected as A CASE STUDY for this research. Data Analysis Strategies:• The supervisors of two preservice teachers in this research are: The PI of the project (Assistant proffesor who pursued her Ph.D. at the GSU, at least 10 years of supervising experience) One of the researchers of the project (Associate proffesor who pursued his Ph.D. at the GSU, at least 10 years of supervising experience)

METHODNote: Abbreviations were used instead of the real names of the

stakeholders

Supervisor Cooperating Teacher Preservice Teacher Three-way conferences analyzed

MB AÖ NP

1st Three-Way Conference

3rd Three-Way Conference

NB MŞE MS

1st Three-Way Conference

3rd Three-Way Conference

DATA ANALYSIS

Gazİantep

For Research Question 1 Each three-way conference video tape was watched and a transcript of the verbal interactions was created. It was possible to determine the amount of time each stakeholder spoke in both the 1st and 3rd three-way conferences.For example: a. How many minutes did the supervisor speak in the 1st conference of the 1st preservice teacher? b. How many minutes did the cooperating teacher speak in the 1st conference of the 1st preservice teacher? c. How many minutes did the preservice teacher speak in the 1st conference of the 1st preservice teacher?

DATA ANALYSIS

For Research Question 2Each feedback comment given by both supervisor and cooperating teacher was color coded as either “direct” (telling/asking) or “indirect” (listening/asking) in both the 1st & 3rd post conference transcriptions for each preservice teacher. The number of “direct” and “indirect” feedback comments given by both supervisor and cooperating teacher were counted for each preservice teacher.

FINDINGS

GazİantepResearch Question 1

The stakeholder Duration in 1st Conference (minutes)

Duration in 3rd Conference (minutes)

NP (Preservice teacher)

7 6

AÖ (Cooperating Teacher)

10 6

MB(University supervisor)

23 12

TOTAL 40 24

FINDINGS

Gazİantep

Research Question 1

The stakeholder Duration in 1st Conference (minutes)

Duration in 3rd Conference (minutes)

MS(Preservice teacher)

2 5

MŞE(Cooperating teacher)

18 26

NB(University supervisor)

16 7

TOTAL 36 38

FINDINGS

GazİantepResearch Question 2 Nejat’s 1st Three-Way Conference

Type of Feedback

The Supervisor The Cooperating Teacher

MB AÖ

Direct 12 12

Indirect 17 0

FINDINGS

GazİantepResearch Question 2 Nejat’s 3rd Three-Way Conference

Type of Feedback

The Supervisor The Cooperating Teacher

MB AÖ

Direct 12 8

Indirect 9 0

FINDINGS

GazİantepResearch Question 2 Meltem’s 1st Three-Way Conference

Type of Feedback

The Supervisor The Cooperating Teacher

NB MŞE

Direct 13 29

Indirect 12 5

FINDINGS

GazİantepResearch Question 2 Meltem’s 3rd Three-Way Conference

Type of Feedback

The Supervisor The Cooperating Teacher

NB MŞE

Direct 5 22

Indirect 8 19

FINDINGS: Direct FeedbackDialogue Example 1Cooperating Teacher: “You did not touch your students at all during your lesson.” Supervisor: “They are 1st graders. They would love to touch their teachers.” Preservice Teacher: “I never thought about that.”Dialogue Example 2Cooperating Teacher: “A student gave meteorite as an example of a natural disaster. But, you ignored him.” Preservice Teacher: “Oh Yes, I agree with you. I remembered.”

FINDINGS: Indirect FeedbackDialogue Example 1Supervisor: «At the introduction part, you said to your students: First of all, today we will remember the previous concepts that we already learned. How would you evaluate your sentence in here?»Preservice Teacher: «I thought they already knew some terminoloy about subtraction such as minuend, subtrahend, and difference.» Dialogue Example 2Cooperating Teacher: « O.K. Let me put it to you this way. In addition to working on individually, how else would you work on this activity? Preservice Teacher: «They could have played the card game as a group in the form of clusters.»

According to Blumberg’s ModelPreservice Teacher 1: Nejat PeynirciThe supervisor changed her style of supervision moving from style C to style B. The preservice teachers needed more direction in his second conference.

However, the cooperating teacher’s supervisory style remained stable (style B) as she gave directive feedback to

the student teacher at both conferences.

Supervisory Style AHigh DirectHigh Indirect (Telling, Asking) – Promotes some resistance

Supervisory Style B

High DirectLow Indirect (Telling, Some Asking)

Supervisory Style C

Low DirectHigh Indirect (Asking, Listening) – Promotes Most Independent Critical Reflection

Supervisory Style D

Low IndirectLow Direct (Low Asking, Low Listening) – Tea Party Conference

According to Blumberg’s ModelPreservice Teacher 2: Meltem SaltıkThe supervisor: Passed from style B to style C (the number of indirect feedback increased from 5 to 19.) Compared to the 1st conference, the supervisor asked more questions in order to understand her unclear actions in her lesson & tried to encourage her to get the answers from her.The Cooperating Teacher: In style B in both conferences.

Supervisory Style AHigh DirectHigh Indirect (Telling, Asking) – Promotes some resistance

Supervisory Style B

High DirectLow Indirect (Telling, Some Asking)

Supervisory Style C

Low DirectHigh Indirect (Asking, Listening) – Promotes Most Independent Critical Reflection

Supervisory Style D

Low IndirectLow Direct (Low Asking, Low Listening) – Tea Party Conference

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

• about amount of talk?• nature of supervisory comments?• It is very important for supervisors & cooperating teachers to alter

their supervisory style to best meet the needs of each preservice teacher (Glickman, 1980; Wilkins-Canter, 1997).

LIMITATIONS

• This research was only limited for four preservice teachers’ three-way conferences were selected and analyzed.

SUGGESTIONS• CSM should be implemented in other departments of Faculty of Education at

Uludag University & also another teacher education programs in Turkey. • The amount of CSM training given to both stakeholders need to be increased. • How to give indirect /objective/data based feedback to preservice teachers

during the three-way conferences need to be taught.• The importance of giving indirect feedback in order to help preservice teachers’

professional development needs to be specifically highighted.

IN OUT

• Indirect Feedback • Asking more questions to preservice

teacher & Listening his/her answer.• Objective /data based feedback

• Direct Feedback• Only speaking, speaking & telling

what is good or not without listening.• Tea party type conference