Crossing Borders: Developing an Innovative Collaboration to Improve the Preparation of High School English Teachers
Abstract
Broad (1999) observed that “troubled borders crisscross the geography of teacher preparation in English’’(p. 373), calling for collaboration where preparation is a university responsibility (Gregorian, 2001). This research documents a three year complex case study that addressed the question: What happens when English, education, and high school faculty cross borders to prepare secondary English teachers to teach in urban schools? This study looked at faculty mentors and preservice teacher mentees as they collaborated on multi-leveled projects to improve teacher preparation of secondary English teachers. Interventions included collaborative seminars, collaborative mentoring, and individual mentoring of preservice English teachers by English, education, and high school faculty. Results indicate that interventions challenged biases of stakeholders, enhanced the quality of teacher preparation, and revised instructional practices of university English and education faculty and preservice teachers. Results indicate that mentees incorporated suggestions made by mentors that reinforced pedagogical content knowledge. Most mentees regarded content mentors favorably, noting that their focus of observation was different from those of clinical supervisors and cooperating teachers. English and education mentors assimilated changes in personal pedagogy based on observations and discussions with urban high school teachers. Such discussions also challenged personal beliefs about urban students and schools. Content mentors also adjusted syllabi to include materials used in high school curricula. The implication of this study is that “crossing borders’’ improves and alters how university faculty can better prepare preservice teachers.
Reference
Friedman, A. A., & Wallace, E. K. (2006). Crossing borders: Developing an innovative collaboration to improve the preparation of high school English teachers. Equity & Excellence in Education, 39, 15-26. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10665680500478668
Journal
Equity & Excellence in Education
Analysis
Is this article part of a larger project or series of studies?
no
Does this study draw on a large, preexisting data set?
Research Approach
- Case study
- complex case study method (Stake, 2000)
- Qualitiative
Geographic Setting
Institutional Context
Certification Level
Programatic Focus
Research Location Context
- student-teaching seminar
- University
Preservice Participants
- Graduate Students
- Undergraduates (university based program)
Preservice Sample Size
18
Other Participant Data
- Cooperating teachers
- English professors (outside college of education)
- Inservice Teachers
- University Professor
Duration of Data Collection
Data Sources
- Audio recordings
- fieldnotes
- Interviews
- reflective essay
- seminar discussions
Data Analysis Tools
- Content analysis
- text/talk analysis (Silverman, 2000)
Researcher Positionality
- inside (staying their own students)
- Inside (studying their own practices)
- Inside (studying their own programs)
Research Questions
What happens when English, education, and high school faculty cross borders in order to prepare secondary English teachers to teach in urban and suburban high schools?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes
What happens when student teachers are invited into collaborative discussions?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes
Is mentoring by English professors different from mentoring by education faculty, and if so how?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes