Enactment of Coteaching in Primary Schools: Moving Towards a Shared Responsibility

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter considers coteaching in primary schools across Northern Ireland. It examines the different roles undertaken by student and class teachers during the enactment of coteaching and the ways in which coteaching challenged more ‘traditional’ teacher–student roles in the classroom. My interest in coteaching first came about through my involvement at the start of the first coteaching project in Northern Ireland. The projects were implemented principally to evaluate the contribution of primary science-specialist student teachers to the enhancement of science classes for teachers and children (see Murphy and Beggs 2005; Murphy et al. 2004). Through my role as researcher observing coteaching lessons, I became increasingly interested in the student teachers’ experiences of coteaching and any impact it might have on their initial teacher education. When I observed student teachers coteaching with the class teacher, I felt there was something different in how they worked together. Informal chats with the student teachers during coteaching supported the notion that they were doing something new and I was intrigued to find out the different ways student teachers and class teachers were working together and how this could contribute to their professional development. My interests were further ignited during the student teacher interviews after the placement when they talked about how coteaching differed from their solo teaching practice as there was more shared responsibility for all aspects of the lessons. It was then that I began my journey into studying coteaching within the context of student teachers’ experiences of initial teacher education.KeywordsStudent TeacherActivity TheoryClassroom ManagementShared ResponsibilityScience LessonThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.