Transcript Mentoring New Teachers - The Association of Independent

Mentoring New Teachers
AISSA Beginning Teachers
Program
Session 1
May 2011
Louise Bywaters
[email protected]
Welcome to the profession…
 Professions
 Professionals
 Professionalism
 Professional standards
 Professional ethics
 Professional protocols
 Professional development
 Professional appraisal
 Professional career development
 Who are you and what do you stand for as an
education professional?
Many Hats…
Buddy, peer, colleague
Supervisor
Mentor
Coach
Friend
Counsellor
Psychologist
Mum and Dad
Mentoring New Teachers
 Mentors work on the meta development of the
teacher
 Long term
 They look after the wellbeing, morale, long term
professional and career development
 Each new teacher should be assigned a mentor for
the induction period
 Mentors will refer teachers to both their line
manager and skills coaches
Mentoring Principles
 Voluntary
 Temporary
 Oriented towards professional life, practice,
relationships
 Career focused and linker to other people and
resources
 Mutually beneficial
 Futures focused
 Professional obligation
 Ethically bound
Who might mentor?
 Experienced and seasoned
 Optimistic and learning
 Working in the same site
 Professionally engaged outside the school
 Links and networks
 Has a big picture of the education industry
 Generous and interested in succession
 Highly skilled in the profession
 Good communicator and listener
 Someone prepared to share their time
 Visibly supportive
Mentorees need to be….
 Keen to learn
 Prepared to listen to others
 Invite advice and think about it carefully
 Prepared to share, disclose
 Confidential, trustworthy
 Responsible with time, committed to setting up
sessions
 Career and classroom focused
 Receptive to feedback
 Conscious of the dependency trap
Mentor’s role
 Deconstructing the school’s politics
 Introducing to norms, cultural mores, ideology and
philosophy of the school
 Linking with skills coaches and assisting with
planning
 Assists with professional portfolio development
 Reflection, review and general feedback
 Career advancement, decision making
 Leadership capacity building
 Succession
 Cautionary tales, words of wisdom and traps for
young players.
Stages of mentor relationship
 Initiation:
 Cultivation:
 Separation:
 Redefinition:
Code of conduct
 What rules, expectations, standards and
imperatives are essential for you and your
mentor/ee to sustain a strong and productive
relationship.
 Work with another two pairs to write a set of
operating principles and a code of conduct for
your group.
 You will use this to review the relationship in the
future and go back to it if things are not working
Code of conduct
 We will expect….
 There fore we will…..
 We will know it is working well when….
 We raise concerns by….
How do you learn?
 What is your learning style?
 How best do you learn?
 What sort of support do you value best?
 What are your strengths and weaknesses under
pressure
 How do you manage stressful times?
 What strategies for facing problems work best
for you?
 Honey and Mumford….LS inventory
How do you help…?
 What are your strengths in developing and
maintaining a helping relationship?
 What are your weaknesses?
 How do you teach others best?
 What pitfalls will you particularly have to be
mindful of in this relationship?
 How do you learn and how does that affect how
you work with others who learn differently?
 Share the inventories and discuss your results
with your commencing teacher.
What bus was that?
 What were the things that you struggled with in
the first term?
 What did you wish you had more help with?
 What is pressing and urgent now?
 What are you facing in the future terms that you
anticipate will cause a steep learning curve?
 Brainstorm on the recording sheets so you can
make a priority list of things that you want to
learn about in the next few months and need to
put in your learning plan?
Brainstorm List
Urgent/important
Not Urgent/Important
Not Important/Urgent
Not important/Not
Urgent
Learning Plan Priorities

List the top three areas that you want to discuss with your mentor

What advice or assistance do you need?

What sort of resources do you need?

Who can coach you on particular skills you feel need polishing?

Use this list to prepare for your discussion later today
Discussion tools
 PNI
 Lotus diagrams
 Fish bone diagrams
 Brainstorms
 Bone diagram
 Y charts
 Mapping
 Covey’s quadrants (time management)
 Graffiti sheets
Communications
Ethics and processes for maintaining safe
and appropriate mentoring records
Do’s and Don’ts
Planning and review before and at the end
of the session (PNI)
Bridge to Success Project
Identify one key area that you would like to
do some long term work on with your
mentor
Write a project plan that assists you do
engage with your mentor on this question
Be prepared to come to the final session
with a 5 slide learning story that shows
your progress and how the mentor worked
with you to get there
Project Plan

Area of challenge

Outcome you want to achieve

Question you want answered?

Collaboration with mentor and others

Actions you are going to take to get there

Evidence you are going to look for that indicates your outcome has been achieved

Storyboard of progress and pictures
Professional Portfolio
 Self Managing professionals
 Keeping it all together over a career
 Private documents
 Respository of critical material
 E-portfolios vs paper
 Elements of a professional portfolio
 Personal Information
 My work this year
 Self assessment and performance appraisal
 Professional learning and development
 Treasures
Just before you go….
 What was particularly useful from today’s
program?
 What else would you like to learn in relation to
mentor/commencing teacher learning?
 How did this fit with the rest of the Beginning
Teacher program you have been involved with
this year?
 What advice would you give the program
organisers that would add value to your learning
as a commencing teacher?