Mentors And Researchers In Conversation: Unveiling Some Cultural Dimensions Of The Process
Author(s):
Aline Reali (presenting / submitting) Regina Tancredi Maria da Graça Mizukami
Conference:
ECER 2015
Network:
10. Teacher Education Research
Format:
Paper

Session Information

10 SES 06 C,

Paper Session

Time:
2015-09-09
15:30-17:00
Room:
209.Oktatóterem [C]
Chair:
Christoph Schneider

Contribution

This paper examines cultural variables present in the construction and development of a professional learning community in an online school/university mentoring program for novice teachers in Brazil. These cultural variables are important in understanding the collective processes of learning, teaching, professional development, the school/university collaboration involved in the program being examined and for proposition and conduction of teacher education programs. The research examines mentors´ learning process as well the collaboration of experienced teachers with university teachers’ educators conducting an educational research related to the effects of diverse culture members in conversations. Its theoretical framework includes literature on teacher learning and professional development (Shulman 1987; Ball & Borko 2004), mentoring processes (Carrol, 2010;  Wang, Odell & Schwille, 2008; Weiss & Weiss 1999), school/university relationship (Jurasaite-Harbison & Rex, 2010; Slater,2010; Bullough et al , 2004;  Zeichner & Noffke, 2002; Cole & Knowles, 1993) and its  cultural aspects (Caria, 2007, 2008). The learning community was established in a research with focus on the organization, implementation and analysis of the Online Mentoring Program (OMP), aimed to assist novice elementary schoolteachers.  It was carried out by ten mentors  (teachers with more than 15 years of  classroom experience) coaching 42 novice teachers during 6 to 28 months. 

Method

Thi adopted methodology should provide the means for the apprehension, interpretation and description of actions, feelings; difficulties; patterns; hypotheses etc indicated by the mentors and their professional development processes when constructing viable solutions to problems. To this end, a constructive-collaborative research approach was adopted because it makes it possible to apprehend knowledge and monitor its constructing process. This investigation proposal adopted theoretical perspectives that seek to understand – by means of methods involving learning and reflection – the complexity of processes natural to school life and the participants’ unique specificities. These research and intervention models implied getting to know the reality of teachers’ work, what they think, what they fell, what they do and why they do so to reflect on lived situations collaboratively and, whenever necessary, build strategies to deal with them considering their schools’ and communities’ and our country particularities . In order to achieve this goal, it was necessary to establish a work process of a two-way nature with teachers, avoiding seeing them as mere suppliers of research data. This article examines the mentoring program from a process standpoint considering the contents dealt with by mentors and researchers and their communications, such as the reflexive journals; interviews; written accounts and conversations registered during the the weekly meetings between them along the four years of the project. The process of data collection required the adoption of tools that allowed for collection, interpretation and description of the followings: the decision processes taken by the participants and the actions taken; the reported difficulties in their work as mentors; the process of professional development as it occurred in the light of actions taken to assist the novice teachers in tackling identified problems as well as difficulties in accomplishing this task; their knowledge and how the course of formation of the role of novice teacher mentor occurs. With this approach, it was possible to examine and understand educational processes that occurred with the different partners, especially the mentors. With the adoption of a qualitative research approach, it was thus possible to do close monitoring of the process setting and its intervening variables, for it was a descriptive-analytic study.

Expected Outcomes

Considering the four years of the Online Mentoring Program development, mentors and researches became a professional learning community based on a reflexive teaching collaborative culture. In this process some cultural variables related to the following aspects were apprehended: • organizational (definition of the roles of mentors and researchers and the group identity; establishment of shared norms and values of the OMP; the limits of their actions; the respect of the diversity of mentors´ backgrounds and their professional experiences); • patterns of interaction (the way the dialogs were established; the sharing ideas processes; the requests and the collaboration from others); • themes and subjects worked (the influence of personal and professional experiences); • roles and practices performed (the construction of a distributed or collective mentoring knowledge base); • professional identity (development of an identity of teacher educator). These cases highlight the importance of respecting individual cultures, contextual variables and intervening variables in this kind of initiative. Take into account the collective cultures is vitally important once provide a pathway work with open plans despite of goals being well defined.

References

Borko, H. Professional development and teacher learning: Mapping the terrain. Educational Researcher, 33(8), 3-15, 2004 Bullough Jr, R.V., Draper, R.J., Smith, L., Birrell, J.R. (2004) . Moving beyond collusion: clinical faculty and university/public school partnership. Teaching and Teacher Education, 20, 505–521. Caria, T. H. (2007). A Cultura Profissional do professor de ensino básico em Portugal: uma linha de investigação em desenvolvimento. Sisifo. Revista de Ciências da Educação, 3, 125‑138. Caria, T. H. (2008). O uso do conceito de cultura na investigação sobre profissões. Análise Social, 43,749-77. Carrol, D. (2005). Learning Through Interactive Talk: a school-based mentor teacher study group as a context for professional learning. Teaching and Teacher Education, 21, 457-473. Clark, C., Moss, P. A., Goering, S., Hener, R. J., Lamar, B., Leonard, D., Rot Russell, M., Templin, M., & Wascha, K. (1996).Collaboration as dialogue: Teacher and researchers engaged in conversation and professional development. American Educational Research Journal, 33, 193-232. Clark, C., Herter, R. & Moss, P. A. (1998). Continuing the dialogue on collaboration. American Educational Research Journal, 37, 785-791, 1998. Cole, L.; Knowles, J.G. (1993). Teacher Development partnership research: a focus on methods and issues. American Educational Research Journal, 30, 473-495. Jurasaite-Harbison, E. & Rex, L. A. (2010) School cultures as contexts for informal teacher learning. Teaching and Teacher Education, 26, 267-277. Slater, J. Conclusion.(2010) In:Judith Slater & Ruth Ravid (Eds.). Collaboration in Education. New York: Routledge, 215-225. Shulman, L.S. (1987). Knowledge and teaching: foundations of the new reform. Harvard Educational Review, 57 (1), 1-22. Sundli, L. (2007). Mentoring: a new mantra for education? Teaching and Teacher Education, 23, 201-214. Wang,J; Odell, O.J.; S. A. Schwille (2008) Effects of Teacher Induction on Beginning Teachers' Teaching: A Critical Review of the Literature Journal of Teacher Education March/April 59: 132 Wasser, J.D., Bressler, L. (1996) Working in the interpretative zone: conceptualizing collaboration in qualitative research teams. Educational Research, 25, 5-15. Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of practice, learning, meaning and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University. Zeichner, K. M. & Noffke, S. E. (2002) Practioner Research. In: V. Richardson, V. (Ed.) Handbook of Research on Teaching, Washington: AERA, 298-330.

Author Information

Aline Reali (presenting / submitting)
Federal University of São Carlos
São Carlos, SP
Regina Tancredi
Presbyterian University Mackenzie, Brazil
Maria da Graça Mizukami
Presbyterian University Mackenzie, Brazil

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