Strengthening the Role of Cooperating Teachers

Abstract

tudent teaching continues to be a key, culminating experience in preservice teacher education. It is an opportunity for future teachers to join theory with practice and an opportunity for them to practice under watchful eye of expert classroom teachers. Student teachers judge experience pivotal, and their cooperating teachers extremely influential (Karmos and Jacko 1977; Manning 1977). Yet cooperating teachers traditionally learn little about how to be teacher educators, about how to work with adults rather than with children, or about what preservice programs expect of them, other than provision of opportunities for student teachers to practice. Colleges are too often more attentive to logistics of student teaching placements than to explication of form, content, and goals of experience. As a result, although student teaching may well be pivotal, it is not consistently beneficial. Research suggests that student teaching does not always lead future teachers to develop positive attitudes toward schools and students, or high quality pedagogical skills. Instead, future teachers may develop negative attitudes during student teaching, becoming more concerned about keeping order than encouraging learning. Too many get scant feedback on their instructional skills (Copas 1984; Feiman-Nemser and Buchman 1983; Zeichner 1981). Both attitude and skill of cooperating teacher are presumed to have a significant influence on outcome of experience. If student teaching remains a vital part of teacher education programs, and if the value of direct learning experience in schools seems to depend on quality of