Summary Paper - New Teacher Induction

3 New Teacher Induction The Foundation for Comprehensive, Coherent,

and Sustained Professional Development

Harry K. Wong

Induction is a comprehensive process of sustained training and supportfor new teachers. The process of induction has been growing success- fully for the past twenty years, and this chapter provides an opportunity to talk about where we are and where are we going with the training and retaining of new teachers. Let’s begin with some startling facts on why new teachers fail.

• Thirty-three percent of new teachers are hired after the school year has already started, and 62 percent are hired within thirty days of when they start teaching (Kardos and Liu, 2003).

• Fifty-six percent of new teachers report that no extra assistance is available to them as new teachers (Kardos and Liu, 2003).

• While 87 percent of the new teachers in a particular state said they had a mentor, only 17 percent said their mentors ever observed them teach (Kardos and Liu, 2003).

• Few teachers began teaching with a clear, operational curriculum in hand and even fewer received curricula that aligned with state stan- dards (Kauffman , Johnson, Kardos, Liu, & Peske, 2002).

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• Only 1% of beginning teachers currently receive the ongoing support that constitutes comprehensive induction when they enter the profession (Alliance for Excellent Education, 2004a).

Now for the good news. There are some exciting state-of-the-art induc- tion programs that are providing the proper training and support for the professional development of effective teachers and that lead to lifelong learning.

• Switzerland, Japan, New Zealand, Shanghai (China), and France have cultures of lifelong learning that begin with induction processes that are comprehensive, coherent, and sustained.

• The Flowing Wells School District of Tucson, Arizona, has a struc- tured eight-year process that develops their new teachers from novices to expert teachers.

• Ninety-nine percent of the teachers in the Lafourche Parish Schools of Louisiana in 2002 successfully completed the performance-based Louisiana Teacher Assistance and Assessment Program required for state teacher certification.

• In the Forsyth County Schools of Georgia, their Induction Academy is focused on the quality of student work, where they “Work on the Work” (WOW).

• In the Carlsbad School District in New Mexico, the induction program is focused on teaching teachers how to teach the required benchmarks and standards.

• The Homewood-Flossmoor High School District in Flossmoor, Illinois, has a lifelong professional development program called Homewood-Flossmoor University.

• The Dallas Public Schools in Texas has a comprehensive new teacher initiative that is comprised of learning opportunities for future teachers in high school, student teachers, and beginning teachers and advanced studies for veteran teachers.

• Connecticut, California, and South Carolina have structured, multi- year induction programs with specific protocols for teacher effec- tiveness and student learning.

• These comprehensive and organized induction programs train and support teachers to focus on student learning.

INDUCTION AND MENTORING ARE NOT SYNONYMOUS

The term mentoring is often misused for induction. It must be clarified that induction and mentoring are not the same. The fact that the two terms are used interchangeably and synonymously does not make it correct.

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• Induction is a noun. It is the name given to a comprehensive, coherent, and sustained professional development process that is orga- nized by a school district to train, support, and retain new teachers, which then seamlessly progresses them into a lifelong learning program.

• Mentoring is most commonly used as a verb or adjective, because it describes what mentors do. A mentor is a single person, whose basic func- tion is to help a new teacher. Mentoring is not induction; it is a component of the induction process.

The terms mentoring and induction cannot be used interchangeably. Mentors are important, but they are only one component of the induction process. Mentors cannot replace or be the only form of induction assis- tance. To do so would be to use a “one-size-fits-all” mentality that says a mentor is all a new teacher needs to become an effective teacher.

In many school districts, mentoring is carried out one-on-one, in iso- lation, with no coherence to any district or school curriculum, plan, goals, or standards, whereas good induction programs are comprehensive, last several years, have clearly articulated goals, and provide a structured and nurturing system of professional development and support. Or, as Johnson and Birkeland (2003a) quote a new teacher in an induction pro- gram, “It was the perfect blend: caring, very structured, and a lot of supervision!”

Mentoring: Some Critical Reviews

Bennetts (2001), Hawk (1986–1987) and Little (1990) report that there is little empirical evidence to support specific mentoring practices.

Sharon Feiman-Nemser writes in her 1996 ERIC Digest article, “Teacher Mentoring: A Critical Review,” that mentoring burst onto the educational scene in the early 1980s, yet a review of twenty years of claims about mentoring reveal that few studies exist that show the context, content, and consequences of mentoring. Thus more direct studies are needed about mentoring and its effects on teaching and teacher retention.

Four significant reports expand on Feiman-Nemser’s contention.

1. A research review written by Richard Ingersoll and Jeffrey Kralik (2004) states, “While current research does not yet provide definitive evidence of the value of mentoring programs in keeping new teachers from leaving the profession, it does reveal that there is enough promise to warrant significant further investigation.”

2. Susan Moore Johnson and The Project on the Next Generation of Teachers (2004) states, “Although a few new teachers in our study said they would have been lost without their mentors, most provided little evidence that one-on-one mentoring offered much support.”

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3. A report from the Public Education Network (2004) on “The Voice of the New Teacher” says, “Although the value of mentoring is indis- putable, the evidence of stand-alone ‘mentoring as induction’ pro- grams has been called into question.”

4. Tapping the Potential: Retaining and Developing High-Quality New Teachers, a report from the Alliance for Excellent Education (2004b) says, “While mentoring is the most widely practiced component of induction, mentoring by itself is not enough to retain and develop teachers. Mentoring programs vary widely and may do little more than ask mentors to check in with new teachers a few times per semester to chat.”

The use of mentoring alone, without the other components of induc- tion, is not supported by research as being a proven strategy.

Mentoring: The Focus Is on Survival

The issue is not mentoring. The issue is when mentoring is used as an isolated event. Studies have shown that mentoring does not teach teacher effectiveness; rather, it is designed to answer questions of survival. Susan Moore Johnson (2003), director of the Harvard Graduate School of Educa- tion’s Project on the Next Generation of Teachers, said at an Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) presentation, “Mentoring is all the rage. There is some sort of deep hope on the part of everyone that if you get the right mentor, your life will be saved and you will be the teacher you remember. But the truth is that mentoring pairs sel- dom are anything but haphazard. They are driven by the schedule. They are often not pairs of people who really know the subjects that the indi- vidual is teaching.”

It is the belief of some people that all a new teacher needs to succeed is a mentor. In a paper for WestEd, Britton, Raizen, Paine, & Huntley (2000; summarized in Wong, Britton, & Ganser, 2005) report that currently in more than thirty states, the universal practice seems remarkably narrow: Mentoring predominates and often there is little more. In many schools, one-on-one mentoring is the dominant or sole strategy for supporting new teachers, often lacking real structure and relying on the willingness of the veteran and new teacher to seek each other out. Many mentors are assig- ned to respond to a new teacher’s day-to-day survival teaching tips, functioning primarily as a safety net for new teachers.

Britton further reports that mentoring, in and of itself, has no purpose, goal, or agenda for student learning. Thus, mentoring fails to provide evi- dence of the connection between well-executed professional development and student learning.

Schmoker (quoted in Breaux & Wong, 2003) writes, “So called ‘men- tors’ are everywhere these days, but they aren’t often given release time or

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a clear, compelling charge.” Mentors may show up after school begins and may not have been trained, compensated, or given direction or goals to attain. Many mentors do not consult with other mentors, and may never even visit the mentee’s classroom.

Head and Thies-Sprinthall (1992) confirm that negative outcomes have been reported and that unstructured buddy mentoring can have harmful results and can actually be worse than no mentoring at all. Hargreaves and Fullan (2000), in describing mentoring in the new millennium, claim that beginning teachers may know more about some current strategies than the mentor.

Induction: Structured, Comprehensive, and Focused on Professional Learning

Mentors are very important, but they must be part of an induction process aligned to the district’s vision, mission, and structure. For a men- tor to be effective, the mentor must be trained and then used in combina- tion with the other components of the induction process.

Every company, every nonprofit organization, every locally run store or restaurant has a continuous training program. Teachers are no different. They want training; they want to fit in; and they want their students to learn and achieve. For the most part, education has failed to recognize what industries have always recognized—training matters. Formalized sustained training matters.

Even the best educated of new employees need on-the-job training. Despite completing college and medical school, doctors spend years work- ing as hospital residents before entering private practice. Newly elected judges, armed with law degrees and years of experience, attend judicial college before assuming the bench. It stands to reason, then, that teachers, who have earned college degrees and teaching credentials, have much to gain from on-the-job training.

Demonstration Classrooms and Networking: Other Induction Components

As important and as appreciated as mentors may be, Wong has dis- covered in communicating with hundreds of new teachers via the website www.teachers.net that they want two other components that induction programs provide: (1) demonstration classes where they can see other teachers model good teaching, a component that is central to the five for- eign induction processes reported by Britton et al. (2003) and (2) collabo- ration; it has been found that teachers remain with a district when they feel strong bonds of connection to a professional learning community that has, at its heart, high-quality interpersonal relationships founded on trust and respect (Wong & Asquith, 2002).

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In the United States, Breaux and Wong (2003c) report that teachers are typically viewed as independent operators, encouraged to be creative, and expected to do a good job behind closed doors. Collaboration is rare. Worse yet, new teachers seldom see another classroom. “I never sat in any- one else’s classroom even once,” laments first-year teacher Gail A. Saborio of Wakefield, Rhode Island. “Mine is the only teaching style I know. I felt that sometimes I was reinventing the wheel.” Loneliness and lack of sup- port further exacerbate the problems of beginning teachers.

Kardos and Liu (2003), at Harvard’s Project on the Next Generation of Teachers, found that of 110 new teachers in New Jersey, 87 percent said they had a mentor, but only 17 percent of the new teachers said that their mentors ever actually watched them teach in the classroom.

Wong (2003a) writes that what keeps good teachers are structured, sustained, intensive professional development programs that allow new teachers to observe others, to be observed by others, and to be part of net- works or study groups where all teachers share together, grow together, and learn to respect each other’s work.

Shields (2003) reports that only 6 percent of new teachers received in-class mentoring or coaching at least monthly. In addition, new teachers were more likely to receive superficial support (e.g., their mentors prepared or sent materials) than support that might help improve their skills and knowledge of instructional techniques and classroom management, such as observing their mentors or having their mentors demonstrate a lesson.

Johnson and Birkeland (2003b), reporting on their study of fifty teachers in Massachusetts, conclude, “Our work suggests that schools would do better to rely less on one-on-one mentoring and, instead, develop school- wide structures that promote the frequent exchange of information and ideas among novice and veteran teachers.” Induction builds a community of teachers, bringing together beginning teachers, experienced teachers, and school leaders in a collaborative setting where they can observe each other teach and engage in a culture of cooperation and continuous learning (Wong, 2004a).

On Sustained Professional Development

Induction programs can run for two or more years and then seamlessly flow into a comprehensive and sustained professional development process. Christopher Cross (Cross & Rigden, 2002) writes that a study of seven urban districts reported that the only reform effort that clearly resulted in student achievement gains had clear instructional expectations, supported by extensive (sustained) professional development, over a period of several years.

Caroline Hendrie (2002) writes that after several urban school districts spent half a billion dollars of Annenberg Challenge funds, the money that delivered the best return was the money invested in giving teachers sus- tained opportunities to improve their classroom skills.

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Hiebert, Gallimore, and Stigler (2002) state that professional development yields the best results when it is long-term, school-based, collaborative, focused on students’ learning, and linked to curricula. Thus, the induction process must be systematic and sustained.

In a paper presented to the American Educational Research Association, Garet, Porter, Desmoine, Birman, and Kwang (2001) report that after work- ing with 1,027 teachers, they found that teachers learned more in teacher networks and study groups than with mentoring and that longer, sustained, and intensive professional development programs make a greater impact than shorter ones.

Components of Successful Induction Programs

Induction is a comprehensive, multiyear process designed to train and acculturate new teachers in the academic standards and vision of the dis- trict. It is worth repeating that all effective induction programs have three basic parts (Wong, 2002a):

1. Comprehensive. There is an organization or structure to the program consisting of many activities and many people who are involved. There is a group that oversees the program and rigorously monitors it to be sure that it stays the course toward student learning.

2. Coherent. The various activities and people are logically connected to each other.

3. Sustained. The comprehensive and coherent program continues for many years.

According to the Public Education Network (2004), researchers have iden- tified the following components of effective induction program practices:

• Long-term planning for improving teaching and learning, aligned with the instructional philosophy of the school

• Practices aligned with professional standards as well as state and local student learning standards

• A strong sense of institutional commitment incorporating with strong administrator support and involvement

• Participation by all new teachers, whether entering the profession from traditional or alternative pathways

• Input from beginning and veteran teachers on program design and structure

• A time frame that begins prior to, extends throughout, and contin- ues beyond the new teacher’s first year of teaching

• Opportunities for inductees to visit demonstration classrooms • Study groups in which new teachers can network and build support,

commitment, and leadership in a learning community

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• Adequate time and resources for implementation • Reduced workloads, release time, and placement in classes with less,

rather than more, demanding students • Quality mentoring, with careful selection, training, and ongoing

support for mentors • Ongoing assessment to determine whether the program is having its

desired impact

STRATEGIES USED BY EXEMPLARY INDUCTION PROGRAMS

Effective induction programs have all or many of the following strategies incorporated into a comprehensive, formalized process to train, support, and retain new teachers.

Administrative Support

In each of the induction programs of the five countries reported by Britton, Paine, Raizen, & Pimm (2003) there is an administrative group that oversees, coordinates, sets policy, provides goals, and rigorously monitors the induction program to ensure effective teacher performance.

Welcome Center

The Dallas Independent School District in Texas and the Clark County Schools in Nevada have a “welcome center” for their new teachers. The centers help new teachers find housing and set up utilities, provide maps, recommend banking facilities, and assist with all the other practical needs of teachers who are new in town.

Script

In Oklahoma, the El Reno School District’s two-year induction pro- gram teaches new teachers how to script their first day of school so teachers can begin with a plan of action. A sample of one of these scripts can be found at www.teachers.net/wong, June 2000 and March 2003.

Pre-School Workshop

Four staff developers in the Lafourche Parish Schools of Thibodaux, Louisiana, conduct four days of instruction, immersing new teachers in the district’s culture and uniting them with everyone in the district to form a cohesive, supportive instructional team.

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Bus Tour

The superintendent acts as a tour guide on a chartered bus trip through- out the Flowing Wells School District of Tucson, Arizona, providing a rite of passage into the culture of the community.

Demonstration Classrooms

In the Mesa, Arizona, schools, there are monthly scheduled demon- stration classes across a variety of grade levels and subjects.

Networking

The induction program of the Islip Public Schools of New York fea- tures collaborative study group activities, led by the Director of Human Resources, who facilitates the program, and enhanced by veteran teachers and curriculum leaders. Study groups focus on skill-building strategies such as conducting parent conferences, managing classrooms, crafting lesson plans, and implementing cooperative discipline. The groups con- stantly work on team-building and problem-solving techniques. They use model lessons and hold sharing sessions in which teachers learn from each other and build respect for one another (Wong, 2004b).

Cooperative Education

Workshops and college classes are held in the Blue Valley School District 229 of Overland Park, Kansas, as a cooperative effort between the school dis- trict, the local teachers’ union, and the University of Kansas. This approach won them the NEA-AFT Saturn/UAW Partnership Award in 2001.

Mentor Training

Effective mentors are not only trained, but have a district vision toward which they mentor. In the Forsyth County Schools of Georgia, mentors receive 100 hours of training. The mentors in Prince George’s County, Maryland, receive forty hours of training in peer coaching skills when they initially join the mentor teacher cohort. In addition, they receive monthly training on topics such as presenting effective professional devel- opment, coaching on instructional strategies, and analyzing assessment data. They are also encouraged to attend districtwide professional devel- opment, especially regarding changes in curriculum and instruction or data management.

Long-Term Learning

In the Community Consolidated School District 15 of Palatine, Illinois, the new teacher induction program is a mandatory four-year professional

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development program that helps prepare new teachers for national board certification. In the Medford, Oregon, school district’s professional devel- opment program, there is a catalog showing an array of activities that are offered every year on a regularly scheduled basis, beginning with induc- tion components.

Multiple Support

Each new teacher in the Hopewell, Virginia, school district gets three support providers: a mentor, a coach, and a lead teacher. In the Lafourche Parish Schools of Louisiana, the new teacher gets a mentor and a curriculum facilitator. And, in the Dallas Independent School District, new teachers have access to a mentor and an instructional coach.

Campus Coordinator

On each campus of the Flowing Wells schools, the new teachers meet every week or biweekly for informal meetings, chaired typically by the assistant principal.

Formative Assessment

In the two-year induction process of the California Beginning Teachers Support and Assessment (BTSA) program, new teachers are given over ten hours of orientation and classroom management training before the school year, followed by workshops throughout the first two years. They are guided by an ongoing formative assessment process which includes (1) developing an individual learning plan (ILP); (2) being monitored as they progress through the California Formative Assessment and Support System for Teachers (CFASST), which is a series of twelve “events” aligned with the California Standards for the Teaching Profession; (3) being assessed in relation to a Developmental Continuum of Teacher Ability rubrics; (4) keeping a collaborative assessment log; (5) participating in for- mal and information observations; (6) analyzing student work according to content standards; and (7) presenting their portfolios to colleagues at a colloquium.

Graduation

Many districts, like the Lafourche Parish Schools of Louisiana, have formalized graduation ceremonies for new teachers at the end of induction. These ceremonies include multimedia presentations, stirring speeches, and the awarding of diplomas that signify entry into a family of collaborative learners.

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THE FOCUS IS ON STUDENT LEARNING

The Dallas Independent School District’s New Teacher Initiative is an induction program that provides support and development for new teachers and leads them into lifelong advanced studies that focus on student learning (Wong, 2004c). They have activities for future teachers in high school, student teachers, and beginning teachers. There is help pro- vided by a district Web site, mentors, coaches, workshops, institutes, and advanced studies, all monitored by a support team that focuses on teacher effectiveness and student learning.

The Flowing Wells School District of Tucson, Arizona, has had an induc- tion program for eighteen years. So many people write to or visit the school system that they hold an annual workshop to share their induction model with others. A staff developer, after attending one of their workshops, said, “I have never visited a school district where there is a culture of everyone sharing the same attitude of ‘What is it we need to do to enhance student learning?’”

Student learning is the focus in both the Forsyth County Schools of Georgia and the Carlsbad Municipal Schools in New Mexico. In the Forsyth County schools they have an Induction Academy with a goal of “Quality learning and superior performance for all.” To achieve this they work on the work (WOW). Throughout the school district, there is a clear focus on students and the quality of the work provided to students—work that students find interesting, challenging, and satisfying and that results in their learning what is expected by schools, parents, and the community.

51New Teacher Induction

Albion (NY) Central School District’s Comprehensive Induction Program

• Seven-day new teacher induction prior to the beginning of school • Comprehensive three-year professional and staff development plan

with follow up into year 5 using Danielson’s Framework for Enhancing Professional Practice

• Mentoring component • Release time for classroom peer visitations, group work, mini-workshops,

out-of-district confefrences and workshops, peer coaching, and study teams

• Extensive training over three years (for all stakeholders) on best practices, effective instructional strategies, cooperative learning, multiple intelli- gences, design, and assessment

• Off-campus opportunities for socialization and connecting • Administrative involvement in and support of program components at all

levels • Full-time program coordinator who works with all stakeholders to provide

ongoing support (during the summer as well)

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In the Carlsbad Municipal schools, Charlotte Neill, superintendent, says, “We teach our teachers how to teach the required benchmarks and standards, manage the classroom environment, set appropriate proce- dures, and maximize instructional time. We are a very cohesive district and we want new staff to feel wanted, valued, and respected by the way we support them through the induction process. We want them to be com- fortable in taking risks of trying new things and in learning from their peers and their coaches.”

In the Homewood-Flossmoor High School District, they use the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL) model (Hassel, 2002) to structure their induction and professional development program. The model answers the question, “What do we need to do to improve student learning?” To formulate a clear plan of what kind of instructional practice they want to promote, they design an induction and professional develop- ment structure with the following plan for improving student learning:

What are our student − What are our actual = What are our student educational goals? student performances? learning gaps?

What staff skills are − What are our actual = Our professional needed to close staff skills? development needs student gaps?

When schools and school districts have an organized, coherent, and sustained induction and professional development process, they will most likely demonstrate improved teaching and student learning.

With an organized, coherent, and sustained induction and professional development process, the Islip Schools on Long Island in New York, for example, saw a concomitant improvement in student learning, which they view as resulting from improved teacher performance.

The issue today is not new teacher retention. The issue is student learning, and the research on student learning is unequivocal. Over 200 studies have shown that the only way to improve student learning is with a knowledgeable and skillful teacher (Breaux & Wong, 2003; Wong, 2003b). Student learning is directly linked to teacher effectiveness; the better the teacher is able to manage the classroom and deliver the instruction, the more students will learn. Just as it is an indisputable fact that students learn best from teachers who are effective, it is also an indisputable fact that effective teachers are produced from comprehensive, coherent, and sustained professional development programs (Wong, 2002b). It is note- worthy that as a teacher improves in effectiveness through training, the first groups of students to profit from improved learning are the lower ability students (Breaux & Wong, 2003). Principals and teacher leaders have the largest roles to play in fostering such experiences.

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Include the Principal and the Entire Community of Learners in the Process

To go beyond current state-of-the-art programs, effective induction programs are now moving to the inclusion of principals in the induction process. Breaux and Wong (2003) report on the existence of induction pro- grams for administrators, mainly for principals and staff developers, the two most important people in the leadership role of preparing effective teachers. These induction programs help administrators develop the skills of organizing a sustained professional development program and a learn- ing community.

State-of-the-art research on the value of principals was released in the spring of 2004 by the Mid-Continent Research on Education and Learning (MCREL). Reporting on 30 years of research, Waters, Marzano, and McNulty (2004) tell us that effective principals can increase a school’s test scores between 10 and 19 percent if their leadership does two things: (1) it directs, provides for, and monitors a professional development program that cre- ates effective teachers, and (2) it provides for a learning community where there is a culture of collegiality. Good teachers do not choose to remain at schools where administrators perform poorly. Effective leadership means involving teachers in key instructional decisions and providing opportuni- ties for teachers to learn from each other within a coherent overall improve- ment plan for the staff. Good teachers know that they must have colleagues who have similar standards and expectations. Accomplished teachers are more likely to choose to work in schools when there will be a “critical mass” of like-minded colleagues who share their commitment to student achievement and where the principal is the key to establishing this com- mitment to teacher improvement and student achievement.

There is no research to show that teachers become more effective by working in isolation. Johnson and The Project on the Next Generation of Teachers (2004) have found that, paradoxically, the presence of a men- toring program may actually reduce the scope of assistance and support that new teachers receive, because when everyone assumes that a new teacher’s needs will be met by an assigned mentor, other experienced

53New Teacher Induction

Islip, New York Public Schools

1998–1999 2001–2002

Before Induction Program After Induction Program

40% Regents diploma rate 70% Regents diploma rate 80 students enrolled in advanced 120 students enrolled in advanced placement classes, with 50% placement classes, with 73% achieving 3 achieving 3 or higher or higher

Figure 3.1

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teachers are less likely to interfere when they see a novice in need. However, a novice teacher is far less likely to be left confused when there is shared responsibility by all experienced teachers in the school for the induction of all new teachers. A novice need not depend on a single rela- tionship to learn when the school has a web of professional support, as in a school with an integrated professional culture.

Induction, because it is a group activity, immediately fosters and con- tinues an integrated professional culture. New teachers want to learn; they are eager to contribute; they are anxious to help make a difference. Most importantly, they want to belong to a community of learners.

What motivates and creates leadership is a structured, sustained, intensive professional development program that allows new teachers to observe others, to be observed by others, and to be part of networks or study groups where all teachers share together, grow together, learn to respect each other’s work, and collaboratively become leaders together (Wong, 2004d).

INDUCTION: FOUNDATION FOR SUCCESS

The teachers we hire today will become the teachers for the next genera- tion. Their success will determine the success of an entire generation of students. We can no longer condone the shortsighted practice of giving a new teacher a mentor and instructing them to reflect, one-on-one in isola- tion, with no coherence to or collaboration with any state, district, or school curriculum, plan, goals, or standards.

We know that student learning is directly linked to teacher effective- ness, which begins with an organized and structured process called induc- tion. Induction programs have clearly articulated goals, administrative supervision, long-term objectives, networks that allow for structural and nurturing collaboration, demonstration classes where teachers can observe and be observed, portfolio assessments to assess pedagogical knowledge and skills, and effective mentoring. The entire process is rigorously moni- tored and evaluated and it flows seamlessly into a sustained lifelong professional development process. That is why comprehensive induction is the foundation of a coherent and sustained professional development process from which we can go beyond.

REFLECTIONS AND APPLICATIONS

This chapter lists and discusses strategies used by exemplary induction programs. Exercise 3.1 asks you to assess how your program currently pro- vides some of these critical issues, and, based on material in the chapter, to project how your program’s provision of each strategy might be improved.

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55New Teacher Induction

Strategies How Applied Potential Enhancement

Administrative support

Welcome center

Pre-school workshop

Demonstration classrooms

Mentor training

Long-term learning

Multiple support

Exercise 3.1 Seven Induction Strategies

Directions: Below are some of the strategies used by exemplary induction pro- grams. In the box to the right of each strategy, describe how it takes place in your teacher induction program and reflect on its effectiveness. In the next box, specu- late how, by applying material from this chapter, you might enhance the strategy’s effectiveness.

Copyright © 2005 by Corwin Press. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Teacher Mentoring and Induction: The State of the Art and Beyond, by Hal Portner. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, www.corwinpress.com. Reproduction authorized only for the local school site or nonprofit organization that has purchased this book.

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REFERENCES

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Alliance for Excellent Education. (2004b). Tapping the Potential: Retaining and Devel- oping High-Quality New Teachers. Washington, DC: Author, p. 12. Available at www.NewTeacher.com

Bennetts, C. (2001). Lifelong learners: In their own words. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 20(4), 272–288.

Breaux, A., & Wong, H. (2003). New teacher induction: How to train, support, and retain new teachers. Mountain View, CA: Harry K. Wong, p. 23.

Britton, E., Paine, L., Raizen, S., & Pimm, D. (2003). Comprehensive teacher induction: Systems for early career learning. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers. Available from www.WestEd.org.

Britton, E., Raizen, S., Paine, L., & Huntley, M. (2000). More swimming, less sinking: Perspectives from abroad on U. S. teacher induction. Paper presented at the National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching in the 21st Century, San Francisco.

Cross, C., & Rigden, D. (2002, April). Improving teacher quality. American School Board Journal, 189,(4) 24–27.

Danielson, C. (2002). Enhancing student achievement: A framework for school improvement. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Feiman-Nemser, S. (1996). Teacher mentoring: A critical review. Washington, DC: ERIC Clearinghouse on Teaching and Teacher Education (ED 397 060).

Garet, M., Porter, M., Desmoine, L., Birman, B., & Kwang, S. (2001, Winter). What makes professional development effective? American Educational Research Journal, pp. 915–946.

Hargreaves, A., & Fullan, M. (2000). Mentoring in the new millennium. Theory into Practice, 39(1), 50–55.

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