School Partnerships

Getting Started

When starting up a Field Based Methods experience for teacher candidates consider the school partnerships already established by your teacher education program. Leveraging already established relationships and partnerships helps ease the transition into teaching methods using this approach.

Is there a school that the person leading the field based methods experience already has ties to that fits within the mission of your program?
Does the person leading field based methods have connections with a school or teacher they would be comfortable working with?

After narrowing the school possibilities down to a small handful, consider:

The administration support for hosting a field methods experience at their school

In what ways does the administrator support the mission and goals of your teacher education program?
Does the administrator support new ventures in general at the school? Does the adminstrator see your being at the site for methods as a learning experience for all involved?
Is there an empty room on site that can be used during the time of the experience that is a comfortable learning environment for the teacher candidates and the teacher educator?
Will resources at the school (front office staff, technology assistance, janitorial services, neighborhood parking) be too overburdened by bringing a class of TE students onto campus for an extended period of time each week for a number of weeks?

The already established relationships the teacher educator has with the classroom teachers at that school

Relationships matter and it is easier to coordinate the experience with someone that you know and are currently working with, or have worked with in the recent past. We have partnered with classroom teachers in the early years of their careers and more veteran teachers. Having a positive, collaborative working relationship with the classroom teacher was more important to us than the number of years they had been teaching, but you will have to take your teacher education program’s needs into account.

In considering the relationships with the teacher at the schools you are considering, also think about the following:

the grade level of students you would like to have your teacher candidates work with at the school
the goals of the field methods experience for your teacher candidates
the content the elementary students will be working on during the experience
the content of the methods course you are teaching
the role the classroom teacher will be playing throughout the course

Other Logistics

communicating this university/school partnership with families
the role of videotaping within your course (i.e. the technology your novice teachers will need for this, obtaining permissions for videotaping in the classrooms, etc.)
district guidelines for adults being present and working with students (i.e. TB tests, signing volunteer forms, sign-in/sign-out sheets in the front office, visitor badges, etc).

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