BEYOND PROFESSIONAL FOLKLORE: INTEGRATING THE FIELD COMPONENT IN TEACHER EDUCATION

W. Robert Houston and Allen R. Warner

An element of conventional wisdom implies that the more practical the experiences in a teacher education program, the better that program is. It is assumed that the quality of a teacher education program increases in direct proportion to the time aspirants spend working in real elementary and secondary schools with real children and real teachers. While other requirements for obtaining a license to practice the profession of teaching vary from state to state, every state requires some form of student teaching or internship.

Most program have increased the amount of time prospective teachers spend in schools prior to student teaching. Effective September 1, 1979, the Illinois State Board of Education requires one hundred clock hours of clinical experience for admission to student teaching. At the same time, Ohio implemented new standards requiring the equivalent of one quarter of field-based experi­ences "in a variety of urban and suburban or rural setting" 1 for each teacher education student prior to student teaching.

Few efforts to increase the clinical component in teacher education, however, are undertaken systematically with a thorough grasp of perti­nent research, consideration of the functions of a professional preparation program, and a careful analysis of the varying modes of instruction available. Unless the process of program design is pursued systematically, the end result often reflects only the conventional wisdom that more is l1etter. The point made by Andrews is still valid today:" ... there is no comprehensive theoretical rationale for the contributions of student teaching and related direct experiences to the development of a professional teacher:'2 Because of the lack of a theoretical base from which to operate, research in student teaching has been criticized as being highly randomized. La Crone was led to conclude, "we do not know what we want to happen, but

surely it will happen if we give the teacher edu­cation student enough exposure:'3

A misnomer in teacher education is the term "field experiences" to refer to that aspect of professional preparation occuring in schools. The dichotomy between university-based and school­based education is artificial and detrimental to the integration of an educational program. Some ob­jectives of a program are most effectively achieved in one setting, others in another setting, and some objectives appropriately achieved in a combination of settings. The choice of settings is determined by a number of factors, including available resources, efficiency of instruction, feasibility, program sequence, and the assumptions of those involved in the program.

Functions of Teacher Education Related to School Experiences Several functions are particularly appropriate for school-based learning experiences. These are outlined briefly in the following paragraphs, and form one basis for conceptualizing a teacher education program's school-based efforts.

Occupatio11al clroice. While the preponderance of professions support reasoned choice of a vocation, too many teachers make that decision on casual. non-data-based bases, with little reflection on the demands and rewards of teaching as a career. Some cognitive data on teaching can be learned through information sources in a university setting (e.g., salary ranges, benefits, working conditions). The more important and relevant information and affective reactions can be sorted out only after having had experiences in schools working with children and youth. Some programs have delayed this phase until student teaching, leaving no viable alternatives to the prospective teachers with second thoughts on their vocational choice.

Increasingly, students are provided experiences

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as teacher aides during their first year of college to explore their feelings about schools. These experiences are supported by seminars in which open and frank discussions are encouraged, by formal tests administered that provide feedback on aptitudes and attitudes, and by vocational counselors who help prospective teachers sort out their feelings and make valid decisions.

Acquisitio11 of Professio11al K11awledge a11d Skills. Professional knowledge and skills range from managerial routines (e.g. , handling lunch money) to integrated use of teaching models (e.g., be­havioral modification, synectics, non-directive teaching). Managerial routines may be idiosyn­cratic to the specific school and situation, but the processes employed are more generalizable. Teaching tactics such as set induction, higher­order questioning skills, stimulus variation, and cognitive closure can be observed in context as they are used by skillful teachers.

The key to acquiring professional skills from the program's perspective is designed experiences; from the preservice teacher's perspective, it is obseroatio11. An exchange between Sherlock Holmes and his trusted aide Watson may clarify what is meant by observation. Holmes asked Watson how many steps led to their second-floor flat. "I don't know;' replied Watson. "There are seventeen;' explained Holmes. "And this explains a fundamental difference since both of us have walked up and down those stairs for years. You only smv them while I obseroed them:' It is precisely this distinction that must be emphasized with those learning about teaching while in schools. Simply spending a specified length of time in a school does not assure the most effective use of that time. Preparation programs are responsible for organizing experiences in such a way that their students become observant, not just visual.

Professional Socialization. Cultures, whether defined by racial, language, regional, or vocational characteristics, have acquired processes by which they induct novices into the fold. And so it is with the teaching profession. Dress codes, performance, even language are parts of the teacher socialization process. The university student whose dress or hair style is different, whose mannerisms are considered improper, whose language is not considered adequate receives quick feedback-either verbally or through non-verbal cues-of his impropriety.

Beginning the process of professional socialization in a purposeful, deliberate and planned manner rather than as incidental learning or as part of the

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"hidden curriculum" of student teaching is an important aspect of a preparation program. Forty years of research on student teaching and studies in preparation of other professionals4 leave no doubt that the socialization impact of the work climate in clinically-oriented preparation programs is pervasive and enduring. Without closely-coordinated linkage between the clinical aspect of teacher education and the on-campus, didactic component, the weltgeist (world-view) of the school will dominate. Con­comitantly, the conventional wisdom that theory and practice are separate entities is reinforced; that the "book-learning" on campus is to be discarded if the novice is to succeed in the real world of the elementary or secondary school.

Demo11stratio11 of Professional Knowledge and Skills. Schools are the sites in which prospective teachers try out and demonstrate their teaching competence. Intricately related to demonstration is feedback. Few propositions are so universally-accepted as is the necessity of feedback in improving teaching skills.

In early phases of school experiences, prospective teachers may demonstrate individual teaching tactics, limit their instruction to a few minutes or to a small group of pupils, or confine their interaction to management tasks. Later, these are extended and integrated. Finally, prospective teachers have the opportunity to test out their individualized teaching styles. In these situations, both school and uni­versity personnel must be careful in their feedback to provide positive support to these fledgling ef­forts, to employ clinical supervision processes, and to consider the teaching efforts from the preservice teacher's view rather than their own values and teaching styles.

Evaluation for E11tra11ce into lite Professio11. Previously considered functions of the school setting are designed to enhance the knowledge, skills, and attitudes of the prospective teacher. This function is based on the responsibility of the profession to society. School-based and university-based teacher educators, representing the profession, are responsible for assessing the competence of an individual as a teacher and signifying such assurance. Given the present life-space allotted to the professional preparation aspect of teacher education, this assessment must be viewed as a "safe-to-begin" checkpoint rather than one which results in licensure for life. Modes of Instruction

Several modes of instruction are useful with respect to performing these functions. The first three are

appropriately used in university settings although school sites are not precluded. The next two are equally used in both settings while the last two are restricted to school sites.

Lectures, Discussions, and Individualized Cognitive Leaming Experiences. Formal classes and seminars, small group discussions, and individual work in learning carrels (viewing slide tapes, films, or listening to lectures) are designed primarily to transmit cognitive information related to pro­fessional practice. These typically are limited to university sites.

Simulation. Within the past decade a number of simulated activities have been developed to complement teacher preparation, many of them commercially available. Simulations offer a "safe" environment in which the prospective teacher may develop and practice decision-making skills, purposely simplifying the dynamics of the teach­ing act by removing the source of most dynamics: the teacher's clients, the students.

Microteachi11g. First developed at Stanford Uni­versity, microteaching scales down the teaching act in as many dimensions as possible while providing feedback and opportunities for additional practice of discrete skills. Thus, the novice teacher may teach a five-minute episode concentrating on the skill of set induction, have an opportunity to view and critique a videotape of that episode, and revise and reteach the lesson within a short time period.

Microteaching in contemporary teacher education programs includes using both other trainees and elementary or secondary school students as audiences.

Tutoring Individuals. A number of schools, college!! and departments of education have established public service facilities to not only train prospective teachers to use the diagnostic/prescriptive method with individuals, but also to provide a community service for those persons needing specialized instruction.

Early Field Expcrimccs. Early in many preparation programs, students are oriented to the roles of teachers. Schools provide a major site for these experiences, but not the sole site. Some programs require their students to work in community cen­ters, YMCAs or Dad's Clubs, Social Security or Unemployment offices, juvenile sections of police stations, hospitals, or recreation centers. Others are expected to make anthropological studies of a small section of a community, use Piagetian interview techniques with several children, or interview children and their parents. All of these early field experiences are designed to promote contact with children and youth so as to extend an understand­ing of their lives beyond the school site. Teachers who think of children only in terms of their school behavior, problems, and accomplishments are sterile.

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Student Teaclling. As the common thread among most preparation programs, student teaching remains the most researched, the most divergent, and the most highly-rated part of teacher pre­paration. Typically defined by state statutes or regulations, student teaching may range from a few weeks of half-time experience to several months full-time. It may precede the bachelor's degree or follow it and may be called an internship. But the essence of the experience is in its provision for integrated demonstration of teaching strategies and assessment for certification purposes.

Research on student teaching and related direct experience with the realities of the natural setting of the professional teacher suggests once more that unless the socialization effects of the work environment are carefully anticipated in program design, the influence of the workplace will dominate toward maintenance of the status quo of teaching as a craft that operates by professional folklore and conventional wisdom (Don't smile until Christ-mas; be fair, firm, and friendly) rather than as a profession grounded in empirically-tested procedures generally agreed upon by other members of the profession. As Lortie has forcefully stated, "The value of practice teaching is attested to by many who have participated in it, but there is little indication that it is a powerful force away from traditonalism and individualism. It may be earthy and realistic when compared with education courses; but it is also short and parochial."5

Integration of Functions and Modes

The relationship between functions of teacher education and modes of instruction provides a useful matrix for analyzing and organizing preparation programs. This is summarized in the matrix on page 7.

One cell in the matrix will be used to illustrate the range of field-based experiences and how they contribute to the development of a professional educator: the interaction of the instructional mode, "Tutoring Individuals;' and the function, "Acquisition of Professional Knowledge and Skills."

A number of colleges of education have developed diagnostic learning centers (e.g., Oklahoma State University, Indiana University, Columbia Uni­versity) which provide individual tutoring to children and youth with learning problems. These children are referred to the DLC where extensive diagnostic processes are carried out, then remedi-

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al instruction undertaken. Both diagnosis and remediation are completed by graduate and under­graduate students specializing in a particular area of concern who are supervised by experts in the field. Usually limited to reading or mathematics, some DLCs also include counseling skills and psychological testing. A nominal charge is made for such services which not only provide needed services to learners but support the development of special teaching skills.

The second illustration is drawn from the elementary mathematics methods course for prospective teachers at the University of Houston. Students are expected to demonstrate their competence in tutoring one or two elementary pupils as part of their training. In a typical semester, three university faculty are assigned to teach about sixty elementary education majors in three con­current sections of the mathematics methods experience. During a six-week period, the sixty prospective teachers work with about eighty elementary pupils from three classrooms. The three elementary teachers and the three university faculty supervise this tutoring experience in six locations in the school. In each location, a teacher or faculty member supervises ten prospective teachers who are individually tutoring twelve­to-fifteen elementary pupils. Prospective teachers demonstrate their ability to use diagnostic pro­cesses to identify mathematics areas tha t are weak and to provide instruction which improves achieve­ment in those areas. The organization of the experience is financially and practically feasible but, more importantly, it provides an opportunity for preservice teachers to work directly and indi­vidually with a single child, not just with groups of children where individual needs are subdued in mass responses.

The third illustration concerns prospective se­condary teachers who work with college freshmen who are having problems learning particular content. The university or community college is organized so that students with problems may seek assistance from a learning center. Prospective secondary teachers are assigned to work in the center on a regular basis, typically tutoring one or two people in a semester on a regular basis. University faculty encourage students to participate and often refer a student to the center.

The purpose for these three experiences is to assist prospective teachers in learning skills related to tutoring and individualizing instruction. While the context and methods vary, the intents are similar.

Table 1 RELATION BETWEEN

TEACHER EDUCATION FUNCTIONS AND INSTRUCTIONAL MODES

Instructional Modes

University-based

School.:based

Functions

Occupational Choice 5 p

Acquisition or Professional p p p p 5 Knowledge and Skills

Professional 5 s s Socialization p p

Demonstration of Professional Knowledge and p p p s Skills

Summative Evaluation for Entrance into the Profession

P• Primary emphasis

5 .. Secondary emphasis

Conclusion

Experiences of prospective teachers in non­university settings often are unplanned except

p

p

p

p

for a time dimension. The purpose of this article has been to stress the importance of systematic planning for such experiences. Further, these experiences can be varied in ways that enhance their effectiveness and model multidimensional instructional practices. The matrix and illustrations suggest one approach to improving the practice of non-university-based instruction. You are encouraged to formulate others or use this one. Through such conceptionally­oriented practice the entire profession will benefit.

Our central point is that the field component must be carefully integrated and systematically articulated in teacher education programs to lessen

the tendency toward the parochialism inevitably brought about by the socialization influence of the workplace. Professional socialization must be emphasized in all aspects of the program, but in the sense of acquiring and demonstrating professional knowledge and skills rather than, "We do things differently at this school.''

That design process, finally, cannot be ac­complished effectively by college or university faculty working with students in a cloistered campus classroom. The pervasive effects of socialization by professional folklore must be actively addressed by Hie practitioners in whose elementary and secondary schools and classrooms prospective teachers will experience the most powerful effects of induction to the values and mores of the teaching profession. Unless the practitioner becomes a major source of the solution, the practicing profession will remain a major source of the problem.

Footnotes 10hio Stale Board of Education. Stamiards for college or u11iversities

prepari11g teac/1ers, Columbus, Ohio: Ohio Department or Education. 1975.

2L.0. Andrews. St11dent teacl1i11g, New York: Center for Applied Research in Education, 1964, p. 30.

1H.F. La Crone. "Teaching- Craft or Intellectual Process?", in Tlieoretical bases for professio11al laboratory e.rprrier1ces i11 lt•ac/ier t•ducation, C. J. Lauby, 11d, 44th Yearbook. Cedar Falls, Iowa: Association for student teaching, 1965, p. 97.

~R. Branch & L. Platt. Tiie effecls of early clinic e.rpcric11ce upori dc11tal stude11ts: A study of role adoption. Paper presented to the Southern Sociological Society, April, 1972. E. Lohrmann. A study of some factors iri supervisio11 iri clinical pastoral training-witl1 special refere11ce to St . Elizabelli's Hospila/. Wasl1irigtorr, D.C., unpublished doctoral dissertation, Catholic University, 1966. R. Olson. Trai11i11g e11viro11111er1t and cmiceptual /roe/ in Lutl1enm tlieological i11temsl1ip. unpublished doctoral dissertation, Columbia University, 1970. G. Clayton. Arr a11alysis of c/imcal pastoral training usi11g a syslcms approacli. unpublished doctoral dissertation, Graduate Theological Union, 1971. V. Bradshaw. S11pervi$ed co11curre11t field educalion at Cliristian Theological Seminary, unpublished doctoral dissertation, Boston University, 1972.

5Dan C. Lortie. Scl1oolleacl1er: A socwlogical study, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975, p. 71.

W. Robert Houslo11 is Associale Dean a11d Al/e11 R. Warner is Direc1or of Field £.rperiences, College of £d11catio11, University of Houston. Houslcm. Texas.

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