Journal of the Effective Schools Project, Volume 1, 1994 Page: 11
39 p. : ill. ; 28 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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composed of several teachers and one administrator inter-
view applicants and make the final selection. Each applicant
is then notified by letter of the decision.
Participating in a formal interview is certainly a
benefit to these undergraduates who will soon be seeking
jobs. The entire application and selection process also mani-
fests a sense of professionalism. In this site-based selection
process, teachers choose the interns they want, often match-
ing teaching styles and philosophies. This teacher involve-
ment appears to hasten interaction and increase commitment
toward ensuring a successful experience.
Longer Internship
Interns at Glen Rose Elemen-
tary School student teach for 17 or 18
weeks, depending on the semester.
The traditional student teaching ex-
perience is ten weeks. Obviously, the
extended time allows for additional
classroom experiences with children,
and most student teachers will testify
that this is where much of the real
learning takes place. Because of the
length of this experience, interns at
Glen Rose become part of the school
culture and are viewed as colleagues.
Student teaching is understood to be
a two-way street where both cooper-
ating teacher and student teacher are learning from each
other.The longer field experience also provides the school
with some opportunities to use the interns' time creatively in
order to support school initiatives. For example, interns
release teachers wanting to hold parent-teacher conferences
during the day. In addition, teachers are given time to visitother classrooms, an important form of staff development
which is reflected in curriculum planning.
Fall semester interns gain extra benefits from the
longer internship as they are able to begin the school year.
They actually start their assignments before the children
arrive, helping the teachers get the classrooms ready. Coop-
erating teachers report that while they initially were uncer-
tain about having a student teacher at the beginning of the
year, now they want to have a student teacher every fall. The
extra adult in the classroom supports them in a variety of
ways.
Seeing the first days of school is
invaluable for the interns. They learn
how to prepare classrooms, greet chil-
dren and parents, establish rules and
routines, and begin instruction. These
u strategies remain unseen in a tradi-
tional student teaching program. The
children also benefit because they have
two caring teachers right from the first
day of school. A final advantage of the
longer experience is that student in-
tems are better able to build a variety
of teaching experiences, in contrast to
the ten-week assignment in one class-
room.Variety of Teaching Assignments
In most elementary student teaching programs,
university students experience one grade level, or perhaps
two if they are seeking early childhood certification. In the
Glen Rose Project, student teachers have the opportunity to
teach at a variety of grade levels. In some cases, this
experimentation helps the intern discover an interest in a
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Tarleton State University. Effective Schools Project. Journal of the Effective Schools Project, Volume 1, 1994, periodical, 1994; Stephenville, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth201678/m1/11/: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Tarleton State University.