Enacting Educative Mentoring "Inside" the Action of Teaching: How Beliefs Shape Actions

• In Event: Moscone Center West Roundtable Session 5
  In Roundtable Session: Mentorship of Preservice and Novice Teachers in Diverse Contexts

Abstract

Mentoring is the predominant form of new teacher support, often focusing on socialization and retention and not on teachers’ learning. To reorient mentoring towards teacher learning, Feiman-Nemser (2001a; 2001b; 2012) coined the term “educative mentoring”—a collaborative, situated, and scaffolded approach to mentoring teachers. Given that scaffolding is widely used, yet frequently under-conceptualized, it is an important concept for better understanding educative mentoring and supporting mentors’ practice. This cross case analysis of two experienced mentors’ enactment of educative mentoring—namely the practices employed while new teachers are teaching—demonstrates the impact of beliefs about scaffolding on actions how those beliefs may have unintended consequences for teacher learning.

Authors

• Wendy L. Gardiner, Pacific Lutheran University

• Nina F. Weisling, Carthage College