Cooperating Teachers' Perceptions of the Collaborative, Standards-Based Professional Block of the Secondary Education Program at Georgia Southern University
type: CreativeWork
description: Twentieth-century teaching will not adequately serve students of the twenty-first century. The redesign of teacher education programs to meet the needs of twenty-first century schools is taking shape throughout colleges of education across the nation and is supported by many in teacher education. At Georgia Southern University, the Secondary Education program has undergone revision to create a collaborative, standards-based Secondary Professional Block incorporating extensive field experiences prior to student teaching. This study examines the perspectives of cooperating classroom teachers regarding the Secondary Professional Block of the Secondary Education Program. A multi-step research design incorporated a survey instrument to ascertain cooperating teachers' perceptions of the importance of the Secondary Education Program standards, and semi-structured oral interviews were conducted to determine the strengths and weaknesses of the program as well as to obtain cooperating teachers descriptions of the collaborative aspects of the program. The review of summative assessment documents provided additional data regarding the cooperating teachers' perceptions of individual student accomplishment of the Secondary Education Program standards. The National Commission on Teaching and America's Future (1996) encouraged the creation of clearly articulated standards for teaching to be viewed as the transforming factor in the current system of teacher preparation. In this study, cooperating teachers concur that the collaboratively written, INTASC-informed Secondary Professional Block standards are important and appropriate in the preparation of teachers. They suggest the addition of content specific program standards to clarify areas of ambiguity. Cooperating teachers rank highly the ability of Secondary Professional Block students to demonstrate program standards. Specifically, cooperating teachers praise students' abilities to design lessons which utilize varied pedagogical …
abstract: Twentieth-century teaching will not adequately serve students of the twenty-first century. The redesign of teacher education programs to meet the needs of twenty-first century schools is taking shape throughout colleges of education across the nation and is supported by many in teacher education. At Georgia Southern University, the Secondary Education program has undergone revision to create a collaborative, standards-based Secondary Professional Block incorporating extensive field experiences prior to student teaching. This study examines the perspectives of cooperating classroom teachers regarding the Secondary Professional Block of the Secondary Education Program. A multi-step research design incorporated a survey instrument to ascertain cooperating teachers' perceptions of the importance of the Secondary Education Program standards, and semi-structured oral interviews were conducted to determine the strengths and weaknesses of the program as well as to obtain cooperating teachers descriptions of the collaborative aspects of the program. The review of summative assessment documents provided additional data regarding the cooperating teachers' perceptions of individual student accomplishment of the Secondary Education Program standards. The National Commission on Teaching and America's Future (1996) encouraged the creation of clearly articulated standards for teaching to be viewed as the transforming factor in the current system of teacher preparation. In this study, cooperating teachers concur that the collaboratively written, INTASC-informed Secondary Professional Block standards are important and appropriate in the preparation of teachers. They suggest the addition of content specific program standards to clarify areas of ambiguity. Cooperating teachers rank highly the ability of Secondary Professional Block students to demonstrate program standards. Specifically, cooperating teachers praise students' abilities to design lessons which utilize varied pedagogical …
author: Bennett, Mary Theresa Mallard
keywords: ETD, Teacher education programs, Secondary Professional Block of the Secondary Education, Curriculum and Instruction, Curriculum and Social Inquiry, Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research, Educational Methods
date published: 2001-01-01T08:00:00Z
date modified: 2026-07-24T02:28:00Z
provider: Georgia Southern University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Georgia Southern University