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Roles and responsibilities: the place of the school mentor in ITT Trainees have always learnt to teach in schools. But the old model which regarded schools simply as the arena in which to practise what had been learnt in the university has thankfully gone. In its place is a model of partnership between the two and an understanding that the kinds of learning which go on in each are both distinctive and overlapping. This unit is addressed primarily to teacher educators in higher education institutions who are working in partnership with school-based mentors. However, much of what it has to say about the characteristics, selection and training of good mentors is equally applicable to those working in SCITT schemes with little or no input from higher education. In universities, trainee teachers explore a wider range of ideas, strategies and rationales than they could ever hope to gain from two school placements, in an environment that actively encourages analysis and critique. The experience in schools is naturally more contextualised and the emphasis more heavily practical, requiring trainees to select from a range of strategies those most appropriate to very particular contexts. But just as the ‘theory’ that trainees learn in universities should be heavily practical, so their practical experience in schools should be highly theoretical. Ensuring this is one of the subject mentor’s key functions. The role of the mentor In 1992, the emphasis of initial teacher training shifted to schools. Schools and universities work in partnership and share responsibility for training and assessing trainee teachers. The key person in school for any trainee is their subject mentor. This is the person who oversees everything to do with their subject training in school and who is the primary source of advice and support. The roles of a subject mentor fall primarily into three categories:
These roles can sometimes be in tension with one another. The provision of quality training depends on developing a relationship of trust and encouragement, but a mentor also has the primary responsibility to assess a trainee against the Standards for QTS. If a trainee is failing, this tension can become acute. It is therefore important to ensure that the relationship is a fully professional one, in which support is balanced by careful regard for the trainees’ learning and the standards to be met. Distinctive but complementary experiences It is helpful to clarify in your own mind how the training in university and school settings might be distinctive but complementary. One of the biggest challenges facing any teacher trainer – and one that OFSTED is always keen to monitor – is to develop a relationship between university-based and school-based training so that one builds on the other. In practice, this can be difficult. School-based mentors may have relatively little direct contact with the university in a typical year and it takes time for university tutors to build relationships with mentors, especially new ones. Schools are busy places and however important your trainees are to their mentors, they will be only one demand competing against many. You will find other references to this important issue in unit 1 (see, especially, activities 1.2.1 and 1.2.2) and unit 3. Building a team One of the ways in which you can build a successful working relationship with mentors is to regard them – and yourself – as part of a team. This means, crucially, that mentors should feel a sense of ownership of the course. This is not ‘your’ course, of which the mentors deliver a part. Their role is much more important than that. How you go about creating this sense of a team is up to you, but here are some initial suggestions:
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