Characteristics of Highly Effective Cooperating Teachers: A...

Characteristics of Highly Effective

Cooperating Teachers: A Study of Their

Backgrounds and PreparationJoyce E. KillianSouthern Illinois University-Carbondale

Elizabeth A. WilkinsNorthern Illinois University

ABSTRACT: This study used interviews and other artifacts collected during student teaching asthe basis for rating 13 elementary cooperating teachers on their supervisory effectiveness.Once highly effective cooperating teachers were differentiated from their less effective peers,researchers used ex post facto methods to identify background and intervention factors asso-ciated with their effectiveness levels. Three factors consistent in the highly effective group were(1) being midrange in number of teaching years, (2) having supervised more than five earlierfield experience students, and (3) having closely collaborated with the university supervisor.However, the most powerful association for high effectiveness was the graduate-level prepara-tion in supervision. Four of the five most effective teachers in this study had master's degreesin teacher leadership, and all had taken course work on systematic observation and feedback,as well as conferencing skills. This deep preparation was associated with an ability to articu-late beliefs behind practices and use practices congruent with those beliefs.

A number of studies over the past 3 decadeshave identified the cooperating teacher as themost significant influence on student teachers(Griffin et al., 1983; Karmos & Jacko, 1977;Manning, 1977; McIntyre & Byrd, 1998).Such studies have built the case that becausecooperating teachers have such a profound in-fluence on the professional development ofstudent teachers, cooperating teachers' effec-tiveness should be ensured through careful se-lection and formal training for their role as su-pervisors (Killian & McIntyre, 1987; McIntyre& Byrd, 1998; Wang, 2000; Wilkins-Cahter,1996; Zimpher & Howey, 2005).

Several conditions and interventions havebeen associated with effective supervision dur-

ing clinical experiences. Swetnam and Blocker(1995) recommend that cooperating teachershave ample experience both with teaching andwith the successful supervision of prior studentteachers. Others have recommended selectingcooperating teachers on the basis of practicesthat are collaborative and congruent with theuniversity supervisor (O'Shea, Hoover, & Car-roll, 1988) and consistent with the teacher ed-ucation program's vision of teaching (Koerner,Rust, & Baumgartner, 2002; LaBoskey &Richert, 2002). But by far the most commonadvocacy involves the systematic preparationof cooperating teachers, usually with a focus onthe communication skills that they will needfor conferences, feedback, and written evalua-

Action in Teacher Education VoL 30, No. 4 67

Address correspondence to Joyce E. Killian, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, Department of Curriculum and In-struction, Carbondale, IL 62901-4610. E-mail: [email protected].

68 JOYCE E. KILLIAN AND ELIZABETH A. WILKINS

tions (Colton & Sparks-Langer, 1993;Hauwiller, Abel, Ausel, & Sparapani,1988-1989; McIntyre & Killian, 1986; Thor-lacius, 1980).

Research has not established, however,whether the presence of such conditions andinterventions is related to the supervisory effec-tiveness of cooperating teachers. Experimentalresearch on the efficacy of mentor training israre. In one such study, Evertson and Smithey(2000) compared the influence of trained men-tors with that of untrained mentors on theclassroom practices of beginning teachers andfound advantages for the trained group in con-ferencing skills and the conveyance organiza-tional and management routines. Even so, in a2008 critical review of the literature, Wang,Odell and Schwille report that they found nostudies that clearly identified the type of men-tor training associated with positive effects onbeginning teachers' learning. Although manyauthors have described training and have maderecommendations, there is little systematic re-search on exactly what the most effective su-pervisors do (Darling-Hammond & Hammer-ness, 2005), let alone how they develop thoseskills.

The present study investigated the effec-tiveness of cooperating teachers at four siteswhere several of the factors associated with ef-fective supervision were present. The purposeof this study was threefold: first, to develop atool to measure supervisory effectiveness basedon effective supervisory practices identified inthe research and literature; second, to discrim-inate between the highly effective and less ef-fective cooperating teachers; and, third, toidentify background and intervention vari-ables associated with the effectiveness of thecooperating teachers.

Research Design

The study used a pragmatic sequential mixed-methods design. Mertens (2005) describes theconditions when this type of study is desirable:

One type of data provides a basis for thecollection of another type of data. It an-

swers one type of question by collectingand analyzing two types of data. Infer-ences are based on the analysis of bothtypes of data. A sequential mixed-modelsdesign is one in which the conclusionsthat are made on the basis of the firststrand lead to formulation of questions,data collection, and data analysis for thenext strand. The final inferences are basedon the results of both strands of the study.(p. 298)

In the first stage of the research, informa-tion was gathered through interviews and arti-fact collection about cooperating teachers' su-pervisory preparation, practices, andperceptions. Data from each teacher were thenqualitatively analyzed for evidence regardingthe indicators of effectiveness identified in theliterature. Teachers whose practices evidenceda high usage of the recommended practiceswere classified as highly effective; those whosepractices evidenced sparse use of recom-mended practices were classified as less effec-tive. Three characteristics differentiated thehighly effective group in the qualitative data,as described and illustrated later. In the secondstage of the research, researchers used ex postfacto methods to investigate whether one ormore preexisting conditions could have causedsubsequent differences in the group of partici-pants (McMillan & Schumacher, 2006).Specifically, researchers looked at whethervariables, as identified in the literature as pro-moting effective supervisory practices, were infact more prevalent in the backgrounds andpreparation of the highly effective teachers.

Sample

Table 1 displays characteristics of the sitessampled. Three factors were common to allfour sites. All were located near a large mid-western university and had more than 3decades of teacher education partnershipswith the university. All sites had a long-termcenter coordinator for field experiences-thatis, a university faculty member who coordi-nated all placements and supervision. All co-operating teachers were tenured, and most had

Characteristics of Highly Effective Cooperating Teachers 69

Table 1. Characteristics of Sites Sampled

Site Pairs (n) Miles to University Workshop

1 3 <2 Yes2 5 <6 Yes3 2 <7 Yes4 3 <15 No

Note. Sites 1-3 had the same coordinator, who had held the position for 12 years atthe time of the study. Site 4 had a different coordinator, who had had the position for8 years.

worked with multiple field-experience stu-dents. At three of the four sites, a mentoringworkshop for cooperating teachers had beenoffered for the past four summers.

For three semesters, all cooperating teach-ers who were assigned full-semester elemen-tary education student teachers at threeschools near the university were asked to par-ticipate in the study. Their student teacherswere also asked to participate. Ten of the 11eligible pairs agreed. The researchers also so-licited the participation of all elementary co-operating teachers at an additional site. Thissite was added for comparison because it hada different university supervisor and was lo-cated in a school district more rural than theother three. Three of four eligible pairs at thefourth site chose to participate. The totalsample included 87% of the elementary educa-tion placements at four schools-that is, 13cooperating-teacher-student-teacher pairs.

Data Collection and Analysis

The primary data source for the study com-prised interviews with the 13 pairs of cooper-ating teachers and student teachers. Atmidterm and the end of semester, the re-searcher went to the schools and used a struc-tured interview protocol to inquire about thefollowing: the feedback and conferencingpractices that these teachers used in their day-to-day supervision of student teachers, as wellas their rationales for these practices; theteachers' and student teachers' perceptionsabout the efficacy of the selected supervisorypractices; the experiences and preparationthat cooperating teachers characterized as be-

ing influential in their mentoring practices;and the preparation and support that cooper-ating teachers believed were important fortheir roles as mentors. The interview protocolfor cooperating teachers is included as Appen-dix A; the protocol for student teachers askedsimilar questions about feedback and confer-encing but did not include the backgroundand preparation questions found in the coop-erating teachers' version.

Length of the interviews ranged from 25to 65 minutes (M = 40 minutes, cooperatingteacher; M = 25 minutes, student teacher).Research interviews were transcribed and thenmailed to participants for verification and theopportunity to add comments. Student teach-ers' weekly journals and time logs were used asa method of corroborating the information ob-tained during interviews. Journals included re-sponses to open-ended questions about the fol-lowing: activities that student teachersparticipated in, directed, or assisted with; theirinteractions with K-8 students and with coop-erating teachers; and the extent to which co-operating teachers observed them, as well asthe type of feedback provided to them. Timelogs were grids, with a list of the cooperatingteachers' major teaching responsibilities onthe left and with spaces under each week to in-dicate whether the student teacher had ob-served, assisted with, team-taught, or inde-pendently taught that subject. Appendix B is asample time log. Data were also triangulatedthrough informal conversations with the cen-ter coordinators.

Interviews, weekly journals, time logs, andconversational notes for each student-teacher-cooperating-teacher pair were placed into anindividual folder. After the final interview, the


primary researcher read all the contents ofeach folder (i.e., holistically), looking for indi-cators of supervisory effectiveness that werecorroborated by more than one data source. Forexample, if a cooperating teacher reported atmidterm that she was regularly providing writ-ten and oral feedback, that information waschecked against the student teacher's midterminterview, as well as the student teacher'sweekly journal responses to the question aboutobservation and feedback.

Measuring CooperatingTeachers' Level ofSupervisory Effectiveness

To rate each cooperating teacher's supervisoryeffectiveness, researchers developed the Su-pervisory Effectiveness Continuum (Appen-dix Q) based on a review of the literature oncooperating teachers' traits associated with aquality field experience. That review revealedseveral common themes, most of them relatedto feedback. The researchers then developed acontinuum of characteristics derived fromthose themes that could be assessed by a qual-itative examination of the evidence. The finalformat of the continuum comprised six feed-back characteristics and one growth and inde-pendence characteristic.

Content Validity

The importance of effective feedback is evi-dent in the frequency of its advocacy in teachereducation literature. Development of positivesupportive communication skills is the mostcommonly recommended component of coop-erating teacher preparation programs (Ganzer,2002; Garland & Shippy, 1991; Ramanathan& Wilkins-Canter, 2000; Woolley, 1997). Re-search studies have indicated that cooperatingteachers trained in supervisory skills providesignificantly more feedback and promote morepositive and collaborative internships than docooperating teachers who have not receivedtraining (Berg, 1986; Giebelhaus & Bowman,

2000; Jin & Cox, 2000; Killian & McIntyre,1987).

The components of quality feedback arewell established. Feedback, both written andoral, needs to be frequent, and it needs to bedelivered when practice and opportunity forimprovement become available (Enz & Cook,1992; Lowenhaupt & Stephanik, 1999;Wilkins-Canter, 1996,1997). Such conditionspromote clarity and specificity in communica-tion (Barnes & Edwards, 1984). Abundance offeedback increases the student teacher's in-structional effectiveness (Birrell & Bullough,2005). Advocates for feedback point out thatto be most effective, feedback should be rele-vant to the student teacher's needs, and itshould be based on objective data (Acheson &Gall, 2003; Dever, Hager, & Klein, 2003;Neide, 1996).

Research has also shown the value of coop-erating teachers' feedback in promoting reflec-tion and goal setting when conferencing withstudent teachers about data collected duringobservation (Kiraz, 2004). In contrast with thisreflective model is what all too frequently oc-

curs during student teaching-namely, anabundance of feedback focused on lesson deliv-ery (specifically, the strengths and weaknessestherein), at the sacrifice of attention to studentlearning and the development of the intern'sself-reflection (Badger, 2008). The typical re-sult is the movement of student teachers to-ward their unconsidered adoption and duplica-tion of the cooperating teacher's practices(Price, 1961; Seperson & Joyce, 1973; Wool-ley, Woolley, & Hosey, 1999; Zevin, 1974).

There is one final important characteristicof effective feedback: Such feedback is bal-ariced. To optimize the student teacher's pro-fessional development, the cooperatingteacher must be able to communicate feed-back both positive and negative. Althoughthe university supervisor is the one who typi-cally provides feedback to student teachers ona regular basis, it is the cooperating teacherwhom they view as the most significant otherin their development (Karmos & Jacko,1977)-and it is the cooperating teacher whois most available on a daily basis to see prob-


lems as they emerge and to provide feedbackthat is formal and informal, as well as forma-tive and summative (Melser, 2000; Morris,Nunnery, Taylor, Knight, & Brooks, 2000).However, despite how central they are duringstudent teaching, cooperating teachers aretypically unwilling to share negative criticismwith their student teachers (Gal, 2006;Richardson-Koehler, 1988; Zimpher, deVoss,& Nott, 1980).

Reliability

To assess the extent to which coders could ratecooperating teachers' effectiveness with con-sistency, three coders independently read thecontents of each pair's folder and rated the co-operating teacher. All coders had taken exten-sive course work in instructional supervisionand teacher education in their doctoral degreeprograms; two have taught graduate-level su-pervision courses for cooperating teachers.Two also have multiple publications in teachereducation journals and texts on the supervi-sion of field experiences; all three have pre-sented numerous papers on the topic at na-tional teacher education conferences.

Contents of the folders included interviewtranscripts of student teachers and cooperatingteachers, as well as the student teachers' jour-nals and time logs. Raters were asked to care-fully read the interviews and to corroboratetheir content by looking at the journals andtime logs. They were then asked to give eachteacher a rating on the scale of 1 (ineffective)to 5 (highly effective) using the continuum(Appendix C). If a teacher fell between cate-gories, the ground rule for scoring was to roundup if the teacher met 50% of more of the cri-teria in a numerical category. The mean effec-tiveness rating for the 13 teachers was 3.7,with a standard deviation of 1.1.

To calculate interrater reliability, re-searchers used an online calculator (availableat http://www.med-ed-online.org/rating/reliability.html). As quoted from the website,this program estimates the reliability of a set ofratings or other scores based on a formula pre-sented by Robert Ebel (1951): "The formula

approximates an intraclass correlation and isvery flexible in that it requires no assumptionsabout the number of judges rating each personor object rated nor which judges rate each per-son or object." Using this program, researchersestablished that the interrater reliability coef-ficient across the four coders was .92.

Findings

Practices of Highly EffectiveCooperating Teachers

For the purpose of comparing and contrastingthe most effective cooperating teachers withthose who were less effective, cut points wereestablished. The five teachers whose ratingswere above 4.7 were categorized as highly effec-tive. The eight teachers who averaged ratingsof 3.7 or below were categorized as less effec-tive. No ratings fell between 3.7 and 4.7 andno ratings fell below 2.0.

A separate follow-up review of transcripts,journal entries, and weekly time logs madethree characteristics stand out that were com-mon to all the highly effective teachers in thisstudy. Two of the three characteristics wereidentical to the literature-derived feedbackcharacteristics on the Supervisory Effective-ness Continuum: emphasis on student teachergrowth and independence and direct commu-nication with the student teacher when prob-lems arose. The third reflected their amountof teaching time.

The first characteristic was apparent inthe interview transcripts of cooperating teach-ers and student teachers, as well as in studentteachers' journal entries. Although all the co-operating teachers in this study used strategiesto keep their student teachers focused on stu-dent achievement, highly effective cooperat-ing teachers were less concerned than otherswith having their student teachers duplicatetheir practices. They rarely provided solutionsfor their mentees, opting instead to nudgethem toward independent problem solving.Interviews and journal entries from studentteachers provided evidence that they were not


always comfortable with, what they perceivedearly on, as a lack of direction, although suchconcerns diminished as the student teachersgrew to appreciate their autonomy.

A second distinguishing characteristicemerged from the feedback portion of the in-terviews. Highly effective cooperating teach-ers were adept at providing corrective objec-tive feedback before problems escalated, asituation that proved the most challengingand unresolvable for the less successful pairs inthis study. The highly effective teachers re-solved difficult issues at early stages, whereasthe less effective preferred to avoid them,which meant that for the former there werefew surprises at midterm and final, even whenstudent teachers' ratings were low. The highlyeffective teachers did not find giving negativecomments easy, but they had learned to do soand so used those skills when they needed to.

A third common characteristic among thehighly effective teachers was suggested in thestudent teachers' time logs and illuminated byinterview data. Weekly teaching logs revealedthat student teachers with highly effective co-operating teachers had higher percentages ofteaching time. Much of this seems attributableto the fact that the effective pairs worked asteams rather than as turn takers. A side bene-fit of this teaming was that on those occasionswhere the student teacher made a serious con-tent error or struggled with a management is-sue, the cooperating teacher could inconspic-uously intervene. Reflecting later on suchinterventions, the student teachers expressedrelief, rather than a sense of having been un-dermined.

The following examples illustrate the dif-ference between a highly effective cooperatingteacher and a minimally effective one, com-paring their ways of dealing with feedback.

When asked near the end of the semesterabout content and frequency of feedback,fourth-grade teacher Ginny first gave somebackground about her student teacher: In ad-dition to student teaching, she had three jobsand a class. She was also going through a di-vorce and frequently came to school sleep de-prived, which affected her performance. Onone occasion, she did not show up for science

fair and had given no notice. Then, Ginnytalked about feedback:

When she started to slip a little, I had toincrease the frequency. Normally, it wouldget shorter. Ours became more awkward.When she was in her takeover, it seemedto be too much. She was not as independ-ent as she should have been and would askme at the last minute what to do.... Prob-lems with a student teacher's performancecreate a dilemma about the grade. Youknow you're affecting someone's life, butyou need to be honest.

Ginny's score on the Supervisory EffectivenessContinuum was a 4.7.

By contrast, Martha, a kindergarten teacher,struggled with the need to provide feedback:

Other than the midterm, nothing waswritten down. Around the midterm, weused the form recommended by the uni-versity supervisory, but we did it orally.Later I thought I should have filled in theform. [The researcher asks why.] She hasbecome so familiar with me. Our relation-ship is so collegial. Sometimes when youget into that kind of relationship, doing aformal evaluation doesn't feel comfort-able. [Researcher asks her if she meant ajudgmental kind of evaluation.] Yes. Maybe Ishouldn't get so close that I can't give thatkind of feedback.

Later, when asked what kind of questions herstudent teacher raises, Martha said, "She reallydoesn't ask questions a lot. She set her goalsearly on and she has achieved them." The re-searcher's impression, from interviews withthe student teacher and from a review of herweekly logs, was that she had learned the co-operating teacher's routines early on and per-formed them competently but without reflec-tion. Martha's score on the SupervisoryEffectiveness Continuum was a 2.0.

Background and Preparation of

Highly Effective CooperatingTeachers

Being able to distinguish between highly effec-tive cooperating teachers and their less effec-


tive peers paved the way to answer the finalquestion of the present study: What experi-ences, preparation, and influences were preva-lent in the backgrounds of the highly effectivecooperating teachers? Table 2 includes factorsthat earlier researchers have connected withthe efficacy of cooperating teachers' practices:years of teaching experience, experience withfield experience students, working closely witha university supervisor, and formal preparationfor mentoring roles. For the purposes of thisstudy, the last factor was broken down intothree types of preparation: a workshop, a grad-uate course, or a graduate degree program.

Years of teaching experience. According tothe averages, the number of years of teachingwas not related to effectiveness. On average,the highly effective teachers had taught 17.0years; the less effective teachers, 19.5. But allthree teachers who had more than 30 years'experience were in the less effective group, aswas the one teacher who had taught fewerthan 5 years.

Experience with field experience students.Teachers were asked to estimate the number offield experienqe students whom they had su-pervised, including early field experience stu-dents, student teachers, and teaching fellows.Those with 20-plus field experience studentsseem equally split across the highly effectiveand less effective groups. Inexperience, how-ever, does seem to be associated with the lesseffective group. All three cooperating teacherswho had had fewer than 5 early field experi-ence students were in the less effective group.

University supervisor influence. Much ofthe literature on positive field experiencesstresses the need for close coordination ofcourse work and field experiences, as well asshared responsibility between campus- andschool-based teacher educators for the prepa-ration of student teachers. More than 30 yearsago, the university in this study had adopted aschool-based supervision model and had en-tered into formal partnerships with 12 publicschools to form centers for field experienceplacements. As such, each center is assigned acenter coordinator-that is, a university fac-ulty member who places and supervises fieldexperience students at all levels at that site.

This model has helped to provide supervisorycontinuity and ensure that districts haveready access to an individual whom they asso-ciate with the university and who is availablewhen problems arise. At many sites, centercoordinators have offered short site-basedmentoring-skills training for teachers. Theyalso informally model effective supervisorypractices as they observe and conference withfield experience students.

When asked who had a major influenceon their supervisory practices, all but oneteacher cited the district's center coordinator.Note that the three least effective cooperatingteachers were those who had had the least ex-perience with field experience students, whichsuggests that they had also had the least expo-sure to the center coordinator, a factor perhapsrelated to their less effective supervisory prac-tices.

Mentoring workshop. For the past 8 years, atits four closest centers to campus, the univer-sity has offered a summer mentoring workshopfor teachers who are involved in the supervi-sion of field experience students. The work-shop is based on a model developed and imple-mented at Ohio University (Murray &Hillkirk, 1998), and it includes training in theuse of three major tools: a consultancy proto-col, which provides a timed framework for acritical discussion of a lesson plan, unit, orclassroom dilemma; reflective observationalcoaching, which develops skills of conferenc-ing objective data collection; and collabora-tive action research, which provides a simplestructure for teachers to follow as they plan aproject together.

Four of the five highly effective teachershad participated in the summer mentoringworkshop; the fifth was not in a district wherethe workshops were offered. Five of the eightless effective teachers had participated in thementoring workshop. Thus, there does notseem to be a strong relationship between thisform of mentoring training and the effective-ness of cooperating teachers.

There were, however, some factors thatmay have minimized the effects of the train-ing. When the data collector asked trainedteachers about their use of the individual tools

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Characteristics of Highly Effective Cooperating Teachers

they had learned in those workshops, they re-ported that they were not using them-at leastnot as they had been taught. As such, trainingwithout sustained follow-up was associatedwith low levels of implementation. The ques-tion remains whether trained teachers wouldbe highly effective mentors even with sus-tained postworkshop support.

Advanced degrees. Every teacher in thehighly effective group had completed a mas-ter's degree, whereas five of the eight less effec-tive teachers had done so. All degrees hadcome from the nearby public university, ex-cept that of the one less effective teacher whohad completed an online degree from a differ-ent institution. One strong theme thatemerged was that the teachers in the highly ef-fective group were disproportionately likely tohave specialized in teacher leadership in theirmaster's degree program.

The teacher leadership specialty attractsmany local teachers who want to be preparedfor leadership roles in mentoring, curriculumdevelopment, and school improvement. In ad-dition to taking the core courses of curriculum,instruction, and research (required for themaster's degree in curriculum and instruction),they take courses that prepare them for leader-ship roles. When asked about influences ontheir development as cooperating teachers, allfive highly effective teachers mentioned onecourse in the teacher leadership sequence: Sys-tematic Observation and Analysis of Instruc-tion. Some of the resources used in that courseare Acheson and Gall's Clinical Supervision andTeacher Development (2003) and the Associa-tion for Supervision and Curriculum Develop-ment's videos and facilitator resources for An-other Set of Eyes (1987) and ImprovingInstruction Through Observation and Feedback(2002). Teachers learn ways to collect and dis-play data from classroom observations, includ-ing qualitative and quantitative techniques.They practice these techniques via scripts, onvideotapes, and in classrooms. Participantsalso practice conducting pre- and postconfer-ences and providing nonjudgmental, develop-mentally appropriate feedback using activitiesfrom Boyan and Copeland's Instructional Su-pervision Training Program (1978) and the

workshop materials from two programs of theAssociation for Supervision and CurriculumDevelopment (2002): "Different Models ofProviding Classroom-Based Assistance" and"Approaches to Working Closely With Teach-ers." They also spend several hours improvingtheir skills by videotaping their classroomteaching and analyzing the video recordings,using guidelines from the National Staff De-velopment Council (Richardson, 2007).

Additional factors. Teachers cited addi-tional factors related to their supervisory prac-tices. All cooperating teachers but one notedthat one or more peers had been important inshaping their practices. Another influence wasthat of participation in the National Board forProfessional Teaching Standards. The onlytwo teachers in the study who had participatedin the process were rated as being highly effec-tive, and they cited the process as being influ-ential in changing the way that they super-vised and provided feedback.

Implications forTeacher Educators

Supervision of clinical experiences has too of-ten been haphazard, loosely structured, andmarginally connected to university coursework (Darling-Hammond, 2006). Whether thecourse work they took was causal or relationalto their strong skills, these highly effective co-operating teachers are clearly capable of pro-viding the kind of successful clinical trainingexperiences called for in teacher education re-form (Darling-Hammond & Baratz-Snowden,2005). Strong examples of successful practicecame from interviews with student teachers.When asked how they felt when their cooper-ating teachers intervened to rescue them froma serious problem, student teachers who wereplaced with the highly effective teachers feltrelieved rather than undermined. Because theywere so used to team-teaching with their coop-erating teachers, they were accustomed to shar-ing leadership in front of children and casuallybeing corrected or reminded. Their responsessuggest that cooperating teachers can shapenovice teachers' dispositions about receiving

75


constructive criticism aimed at improvingteaching effectiveness. Such an ability is ofgreat interest to teacher educators because ofincreased emphasis on operationalizing and as-sessing preservice teacher dispositions, espe-cially during field experiences.

Once highly effective cooperating teach-ers were differentiated from their less effectivepeers, it was possible to look at backgroundand intervention factors that may have beenassociated with the effectiveness levels. Threefactors consistent in the highly effectivegroup were (1) having taught for 10 to 29years, (2) having supervised more than fivefield experience students, and (3) having hadsustained influence from the university super-visor. All these variables fall into the categoryof experience-a finding that suggests thatwhen making decisions about student teach-ing placements, teacher educators should ei-ther select cooperating teachers with ampleteaching and supervisory experience or pro-vide them with extra support for their devel-opment as mentors.

The most powerful association evident inthis study was with graduate-level preparationin supervision. Four of the five most effectiveteachers in this study had master's degrees inteacher leadership, and all five had taken agraduate course focusing on systematic observa-tion and feedback, as well as conferencingskills. Current data do not necessarily supportcausality: It may be that the teachers who weremost interested in and capable of good supervi-sion just naturally gravitated toward teacherleadership. But it is equally plausible that thegraduate course work gave these teachers thedeep preparation that they needed to articulatethe beliefs behind their practices and, likewise,use practices congruent with those beliefs.Teacher educators may promote this supervi-sory proficiency by making course work con-venient and affordable for teachers, with strate-gies such as tuition waivers and off-campusprogram delivery. These trained teachers canthen be part of a mentoring system for cooper-ating teachers who need extra support-especially, those new to their roles.

Teachers value short-format mentoringworkshops delivered at school sites, although

such workshops do not appear to have long-lasting effects without sustained follow-up.One implication is that if we want to see con-tinuing effects of mentoring initiatives on thepractices of cooperating teachers, we need tomaintain the priority of those initiatives withthe time and resources. Beyond that, therewere hints that the level of implementationmay have been underestimated in this study.There was little evidence that teachers wereusing the tools that they had learned in a men-toring workshop (i.e., in their original form);in fact, the teachers' comments suggested thatthey had simplified or modified those toolsand were using them in other ways. For exam-ple, one tool was a consultancy protocol, agroup lesson critique. With no assigned timeto meet as groups, teachers did not continuewith the group protocols, but many describedusing the questions from the protocol as theyindividually worked with their student teach-ers on lesson and unit planning. An implica-tion for teacher educators is that, at siteswhere mentoring training has been delivered,facilitators should learn, through follow-up,what is and is not being implemented andwhether some techniques may have beenmodified so that they better fit teachers'schedules and classrooms.

Another implication from this study de-rives from the strong theme in the interviewdata that the university supervisory plays apowerful role in shaping effective supervision.Although the full-time center coordinatormodel described in this study is expensive,these findings suggest that the continuity, ac-cessibility, and professional modeling of a site-based university supervisor make it well worththe price in terms of the quality of the field ex-periences. It also suggests that the supervisoryload of these professionals needs to be kept ata level where they can attend to the develop-ment of teacher mentors.

Suggestions for FutureResearch

More research is needed to determine whetherthe findings in the present study are valid or


whether they are compromised by attitudinaland personal characteristic threats. Onestrong finding was that the cooperating teach-ers with graduate preparation in teacher lead-ership were disproportionately represented inthe highly effective group. As such, an experi-mental design should be used to test whetherit is the influence of that graduate preparationthat caused them to excel, rather than theirown predispositions to be good mentors.Whereas random assignment of participants totreatment and control would prove difficult inpublic school settings, a pre- and posttestmodel or a matched-pairs assignment would befeasible, and the Supervisory EffectivenessContinuum could be used as a dependent vari-able.

Additional research is also needed to ex-plore a contradictory finding-namely, thatalthough cooperating teachers who had partic-ipated in a mentoring workshop were not im-plementing the skills learned in that workshopat a high level, they valued what they hadlearned and almost unanimously thought thatthe workshop should be required of future co-operating teachers. Deeper questioning aboutwhat current cooperating teachers found mostbeneficial about the workshop could provideinsight into the skills that they are most moti-vated to sustain and how levels of implemen-tation might be increased. The Supervisory Ef-fectiveness Continuum could also be revisedto match the skills that they decided to focuson, and it could be used to assess implementa-tion near the end of the student teaching se-mester.

One final research direction was sug-gested by the findings for the National BoardCertified Teachers in the study. Althoughonly two of the cooperating teachers hadcompleted the National Board for Profes-sional Teaching Standards process, they wereboth highly effective and cited the positiveinfluence of that process on their develop-ment as supervisors. Future research in dis-tricts with higher numbers of National BoardCertified Teachers might well examine the re-lationship between participation in the certi-fication process and effective supervisorypractices. M

Appendix A: Interview Protocolfor the Cooperating Teachers

Midpoint Conference

1. When you think of providing "feed-back," what comes to mind?

2. (a) When are the most desirable timesto talk with your student teacherabout his/her teaching performance?(b) Why?

3. (a) How frequently do you meet andhow long does a typical feedback ses-sion last between you and your stu-dent teacher? (b) What kinds ofthings affect the length of the ses-sion?

4. What are the advantages and disad-vantages of oral feedback?

5. What are the advantages and disad-vantages of written feedback?

6. What are two specific things that yourecently told your student teacherthat he/she did well?

7. What are two specific things that yourecently told your student teacherthat he/she needed to improve?

8. (a) What are the questions your stu-dent teacher asks repeatedly abouthis/her teaching performance? (b)How do you usually respond?

9. Did you have your student teachercollect any data based on observationof your teaching or students in theclassroom? If so, please describe thecircumstances and outcome.

10. Did you have your student teacherobserve other teachers in the build-ing? If so, please describe the circum-stances and outcome. Did you (orothers) use any of the following prac-tices with your student teacher? If so,please describe the circumstances andoutcome.* Consultancy Protocol, or some

other form of shared lesson plancritique

"o Collaborative Action Research, orsome other systematic collection ofdata for classroom improvement

77


"* Reflective Observational Coachingor another form of clinical supervi-sion (explain)

"* written reflections or a journal tobe shared in some form

• audio or videotaping11. Do you and your student teacher reg-

ularly discuss student achievement? Ifso, please describe the circumstancesand frequency.

12. What else do you think is importantabout feedback that I have notasked?

Final Conference

1. Approximately how many other fieldexperience students/student teachers/fellows have you worked with in thepast? Would you describe your experi-ence with this student teacher as typi-cal? If not, what was different?

2. Was this student teacher a 316 field ex-perience student with you? Is there adifference when you have a student asa 316 prior to student teaching?

3. In what form do you usually providefeedback-oral, written, or a combina-tion of both? Do you ever write yourselfnotes that help you to remember whatyou want to tell an ST even if you don'tshare those notes directly withher/him? Provide examples.

4. (a) How long does a typical feedbacksession last? Include "on the fly" feed-back, like that which occurs on the wayto recess or in the hallway. (b) Did thelength of the feedback sessions changeduring the last eight weeks of the se-mester? If so, in what way did the ses-sions change and why?

5. (a) What are the questions your stu-dent teacher asks repeatedly abouthis/her teaching performance? (b) Howdo you usually respond? (c) In whatway did these questions change overthe semester and why?

6. (a) What are the topics you and yourstudent teacher frequently talked

about during a feedback session? (b)In what way did these topics changeover the semester and why? (c) Didthe midterm conference with thecenter coordinator or any of her ob-servations have any effect on yourlater feedback? (c) What topicswould you like to discuss that younever have time for?

7. If a lesson that your student teacheris teaching is going from bad toworse and it is highly desirable thathe/she can change direction, whatwould you do-intervene or allowthe lesson to proceed? Explain howyou would handle the situation andwhy.

8. What was the most significant thingyou learned about feedback practicesthis semester? What would you keep?What would you change?

9. Did you have your student teachercollect any data based on observationof your teaching or students in theclassroom? If so, please describe thecircumstances and outcome.

10. Did you have your student teacher ob-serve other teachers in the building? Ifso, please describe the circumstancesand outcome.

11. [For teachers who were in the men-toring workshop] Did you (or others)use any of the mentoring tools withyour student teacher? If so, please de-scribe the circumstances and out-come.

If not, why are you not using thesetools? Do you use them in any othersituations? What conditions wouldpromote their use? Should we beteaching something else in the men-toring workshop?

12. Should cooperating teachers havepreparation for their mentoring roles?If so, what should the content be?Should it be required or optional?

13. What else do you think is importantabout feedback that I have notasked?

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oe. 4. .*.

Joyce E. Killian is a professor at Southern Illi-nois University at Carbondale in the Depart-ment of Curriculum and Instruction. Her re-search interests include teachers' professionaldevelopment and instructional supervision.

Elizabeth A. Wilkins is an associate professorin the Department of Teaching and Learningat Northern Illinois University. Her researchinterests include early clinical experiences,feedback practices, and new-teacher induction.

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TITLE: Characteristics of Highly Effective Cooperating Teachers:A Study of Their Backgrounds and Preparation

SOURCE: Action Teach Educ 30 no4 Wint 2009

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