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5/08 K IProlecc8Pres/CIRC/DaIeDue indd

CO-OPERATING TEACHERS’ AND STUDENT TEACHERS’ EXPECTATIONS
ABOUT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC STUDENT TEACHING IN AN ONTARIO
PLACEMENT
By

Mary Bernadette Berthelotte

A DISSERTATION
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulﬁllment of the requirements
for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
MUSIC EDUCATION

2007

ABSTRACT
CO-OPERATING TEACHERS’ AND STUDENT TEACHERS’ EXPECTATIONS
ABOUT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC STUDENT TEACHING IN AN ONTARIO
PLACEMENT
By
Mary Bernadette Berthelotte
The purpose of this study was to investigate the similarities and differences
between the expectations of selected pairs of co-operating teachers and their student
teachers regarding instrumental music student teaching. Four co-operating music teachers
and four instrumental music student teachers participated in this study. Instrumental
music student teachers and co-operating music teachers experienced two three week
teaching blocks at either a secondary or elementary level. During this time period, data
were collected through one-on-one interviews; two focus group interviews and journaling
while student teaching.
Six themes emerged: (1) Building a school community; (2) The blame game; (3)

It’s overwhelming; (4) DO as I do, not as I say; (5) Assessing versus assisting; and (6)
The co-operating teacher as the sage. Building a school community involved student
teachers and co-operating teachers wanting to be immersed in the school community,
despite co-operating teachers not feeling that they were ready. The Blame game involved
both the student teachers and the co-operating teachers putting the onus of responsibility
on the other party rather than engaging in critical self-reﬂection. Fears, concerns and
many questions were central to the theme “It’s overwhelming.” Student teachers

displayed fears regarding a multitude of issues including classroom management, fear of

their own shortcomings as a music teacher in front of their students and their co-Operating

teacher and getting everything done. CO-Operating teachers were concerned with getting
the student teachers to understand their role as music educators, maintaining the pace of
the curriculum, not wanting their classroom students to get behind, and having time for
their student teachers. “Do as I do, not as I say,” was a result of mixed messages for the
student teachers from the co-operating teachers. Student teachers conformed to the styles
of teaching of their co-operating teachers as a survival technique to get them through
their placements. Student teachers were ﬁ'ustrated that they were not encouraged to
develop their own styles as teachers of music. Co-operating teachers, on the other hand,
identiﬁed a lack of time and unknown teaching methods as a restraint on their being
willing to let the student be creative in the classroom. Assisting versus assessing
described the conﬂict that co-operating teachers faced when evaluating their student
teachers. Co-operating teachers needed to grade and evaluate their student teachers using
generic evaluation sheets provided by the Faculty of Education, while at the same time
assisting the student teachers in becoming better music teachers. Co-operating teachers
who were “sages” thought of themselves as learners. Some co-operating teachers
described as sages by their student teachers saw their co-operating role as a shared
experience between themselves and the student teacher. Implications for practice include
more knowledge and training for co-operating teachers, longer placements for student
teachers, selected instrumental music programs in which to place student teachers,
selection of co-operating teachers who are reﬂective practitioners who can promote
critical thinking and reﬂection in their student teachers and collaborative decision making
between the co-operating teachers and student teachers regarding the amount of teaching

to be done during block teaching placements.

Dedicated to the Ewing Women.
Catherine Theresa Ewing (my Grandmother, 1910-1976)
Catherine Morley Ewing (my incredible mother)
Ann Gertrude Ewing (my Aunt and editor)

Grace Elizabeth Ewing (my Aunt, 1947—2002)

The integrity, grace and courage with which they
have conducted their lives, has provided encouragement and purpose as to how I
conduct mine.

I am grateful.

iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Throughout this journey there are many people to thank for their support,
encouragement and teaching. To my advisor Dr. Cynthia Taggart who changed the way I
teach and think about teaching. You have been a profound role model throughout this
degree. To Dr. Mitchell Robinson who directed my paper on numerous occasions,
offering great insight and encouragement to persevere. To Professor Janine Gaboury who
reminded me of the role that French horn plays in my life, and how much I need to play
it. The participants of this study, you have contributed to necessary research that will
change things for the better.

Thank you to my friends. My best friend Corey Fitzpatrick, whose
encouragement, support and belief in me has never faltered. To my great ﬁiend Dr.
Victoria Oglan, peer reviewer, personal director, partnership in this journey. The phone
calls meant everything to me, and always came at the right time. Maureen Harris, the
visits to the library to make sure I got it done, especially when I did not want to go. To
my life partner Bob Soulliere. You have been along for the ride for all these years, and I
want to thank you for never getting off. I am very grateful to you for your love and
support.

Finally, to the three most important people in my life, my children; Michelle,
Daniel and Gerry. I’ve been doing this since you were six, seven and nine years old. You
have reminded me that learning is life long and your humour, curiosity and
thoughtfulness when it was difﬁcult, are the things about all of you that I am the most

proud of.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION .................................................................. 1
i) Rude Awakening ................................................................ 1

ii) There’s No Place Like Home .................................................. 2

iii) The Competitor ................................................................ 3

Statement of the Problem ..................................................................... 6
Purpose of the Study ........................................................................ 8
Framing the Problem ....................................................................... 10
The Co-operating teacher ........................................................ 10

The Student teacher ........ ‘ ....................................................... 13

The University supervisor ........................................................ 15

Summary ........................................................................... 16

Deﬁnition of terms ................................................................ 17

CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF THE RELATED LITERATURE .............................. 19
Student teacher and co-Operating teacher experiences ................................ 20
General education ................................................................ 20

Music education .................................................................. 32

. Teacher as expert ................................................................. 37

Bridging the co-operating teacher and student teacher gap .......................... 45
Summary .................................................................................... 51
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ................................................................ 55
Participants: Co-operating Teacher and Student Teacher Selection ........ 55
Methodology Frame ....................................................................... 63
Theoretical Framework ................................................................... 65
Turning to the nature of the lived experience .......................................... 66

Role of the Researcher .................................................................... 67

Data Collection ............................................................................ 72
Trustworthiness ............................................................................ 74

CHAPTER4: VOICES OF THE PARTICIPANTS AND IDENTIFICATION OF

THEMES .................................................................................... 76
Creating codes and themes ................................................................ 77
Developing coding categories ............................................................ 79
Theme Results .............................................................................. 81
Building a Music Learning Community ....................................... 81

The Blame Game ................................................................. 93

i) It’s the co-ops fault! ................................................. 95

ii) It’s the student teachers fault! ...................................... 97

iii) It’s the university’s fault! .......................................... 99

It’s Overwhelming! ............................................................. 102

Do As I Do, Not As I Say! ..................................................... 117

Assessing vs. Assisting ......................................................... 127

The Co-operating Teacher as the Sage ....................................... 146

Summary ......................................................................... 1 56

CHAPTER 5: SUGGESTIONS FOR THE PROFESSION ......................... 166
Conclusions ............................................................................... 166
Recommendations for Practice ......................................................... 180
Recommendations for Future Research ............................................... 184
APPENDICES................. ................................................................... 189
REFERENCES .................................................................................... 207

vii

INTRODUCTION
Rude Awakenirg

Early on a Monday morning in October 1984, I reported to the secondary school
for my ﬁrst instrumental music student teaching placement. I would be there for 3 weeks.
My co-operating teacher, whom I had never met, arrived 5 minutes before the bell for
ﬁrst period. He introduced himself to me, showed me the music Ofﬁce, gave me a copy of
his schedule with his attendance lists for his classes, and informed me that he was taking
his concert choir to sing at a Mass. He asked me to meet him the next morning at 8:15
a.m., and he left me to teach the rest of his classes alone.

Period one was a grade ten instrumental music class of about 25 students.
Because I had no opportunity to observe ﬁrst, I had no knowledge of his classroom
routine, no knowledge of where any equipment or music was, and no idea what this
particular class was studying. Most important, because I did not know that I would be
teaching the class, I was not prepared to teach.

I did the logical things. I took attendance, I wrote my name on the board, I did not
tell them that I was a student teacher, and I began to warm them up. There were two
profound realizations that morning. The ﬁrst was that 75 minutes is a long time when you
are not prepared. The second I must preface with what I believed I felt when I was a
grade ten student in high school. Music for me was what I looked forward to the most
each school day. All the way through high school, music was my favourite class. I “hung
out” with band kids, and a lot of our conversations surrounded band issues, such as the
particular pieces we were playing, the ones we liked and did not like, and so forth. I do

1

not recall spending time with students in high school who did not feel the same way
about music. With that and only that perspective, I was haunted when I stepped up to the
podium for this grade ten class. It was immediately apparent to me that these students did
not feel the same way about music that I had felt in grade ten. This revelation was
stunning, and an immediate feeling of failure set in. I had no idea that this attitude toward
music class could happen.

There’s No Place Like Home

In my second student teaching placement in November, 1984, I was assigned to
an itinerant music teacher who covered ten grade schools. I would be with her for the
next three weeks. Her enrolment in music classes varied from one student to as many as
35. She covered grades seven and eight music classes in each of her ten schools and saw
just under 400 students per week. Her music rooms varied, depending on the school. She
taught in the library, the gym, a custodial supply room, the staff room, and, in one school,
the hallway at the back of the school. The environment did not allow for posters, charts,
or anything that signiﬁed the viability of music as a subject in a school setting.

The itinerant teacher virtually carried her ofﬁce in the trunk of her car. Upon
arrival at each school, she unloaded a box of wire stands, a box of reeds, mouthpiece
sanitizer, tool box, and a box of music scores that the particular group was learning. Her
travel time between schools was her lunchtime, and she usually arrived just in time to set
up her equipment in order for class to begin. There was no time for her to really act as a
co-operating teacher. There was no time for an orientation with her. Feedback consisted
of a conversation about what we would do in the afternoon schools. The feedback lasted a
short time, as we were traveling to different schools and we traveled in separate cars.

2

This type of job did not allow for extra-musical activities. The majority of the students
were bussed between school and home. Because my co—operating teacher had no home
school to speak of, she did not know many of the staff or administrators of the schools at
which she taught. She did not really “belong” anywhere.

Music participation was voluntary, and students who forgot their instruments at
home on instrumental music day simply sat in music class, during which they were often
disruptive. Further, students who were enrolled in music at these schools were taken out
of their regular classroom for 60 minutes per week to attend music class. Those students
had to make up the work that was missed. In one particular school in which music took
place in the gym, there was an assembly each of the three weeks I was there. Although
music was scheduled as part of the school activities, it was also cancelled because of the
school activities, usually with no prior notice to the teacher. The biggest “light-bulb”
moments I had during this practice teaching block were that the administration did not
value music in their schools and that the job of an itinerant music teacher was almost
impossible to do well. The co-operating teacher did not like her job. She was surviving
until she was able to secure a position at a “real” school. I began to believe that it would
be nearly impossible to experience success under these circumstances. Again, I felt as if I
had failed.

The Competitor

My ﬁnal placement for the year at Teachers’ College took place in a secondary
school. It was in an afﬂuent area of town. I met my co-operating teacher the week before
I was to begin my student teaching. He showed me around the school, introduced me to
administration and other staff in our wing of the school, and supplied me with a schedule

3

of classes as well as scores and information on other things they were doing. From my
ﬁrst ofﬁcial day, I was expected to teach 100% of the teaching load, conduct extra
curricular rehearsals, teach theory, and help prepare for both the year-end concert and the
musical “Fiddler on the Ro'of.”

Although I was not particularly excited about teaching, I was elated that, after this
experience, I would have completed my year as a student teacher. I was, however, hoping
for a good student teaching experience and was eager to work with this organized co-
operating teacher.

Upon arrival the ﬁrst day of this placement, I began the class with what I had
prepared, a warm-up targeting certain portions of pieces on which the students were
working. The behaviour of this grade 11 music class was appalling. I knew it would be
hard to replace the regular teacher, but I was shocked that the level of maturity of these
students would be so low, given the grade that they were in. I tried to accelerate the pace
of the lesson, kept all sections involved, limited sectional work to a minute, started and
stopped with a purpose when conducting, and followed my lesson plan. What I came to
realize was that the students did not know what the co-operating teacher told me they
knew. I felt as if I had been set up to fail. Further, for the entire ﬁrst day and subsequent
days, my co-operating teacher was never in the room when I taught, so I never received
meaningful feedback on how to improve.

For the next three weeks, I began to re-teach the music in the students’ folders. I
addressed fundamentals, such as rhythms, phrasing, dynamics, intonation, posture, and
ﬁngerings with the students. They began to respond to me. They played better, and they
looked forward to playing. They began to use appropriate musical terminology, and I had

4

some fun. But, I was exhausted and frustrated. I felt completely alone, and the stress of
constantly taking risks with lessons made me feel inadequate. With no appropriate
feedback from the co—operating teacher, I never knew what I should do next. I would
simply take chances and try something. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes it did not.
The end of each school day was the only time I spoke with my co-Operating
teacher. He would present me with a piece of paper that had two columns. One column
used the heading “strengths” and the other “weaknesses.” The weaknesses column was
always full, and the strengths had little or nothing in it. I could not understand how he
was identifying my weaknesses without having seen me teach. I felt angry and defeated. I
felt as if I had to work harder for two reasons. First, I was the only female secondary
instrumental music major enrolled at the Teacher’s College that year. All of my
professors of music education courses as well as my co-operating teachers in secondary
practicurns had been male up to this point, and, while part of it may have been that I had
something to prove as a female, I also felt taken advantage of as a student teacher. There
were no female secondary instrumental music teachers in the school board in which I was
assigned to teach. The second reason was that these students deserved to learn to play
correctly. I believed that, when taught well, they could respond more positively. These
students were responding to me as a result of re-teaching things I believed they already
knew initially. They were feeling better about themselves as musicians. My co-operating
teacher appeared to be upset by the fact that students were responding and were
performing better than before I had arrived. He seemed jealous. The co-operating teacher
spent a great deal of time telling me about his accomplishments. He knew that I had a
Master’s degree in French horn performance and that I was a professional performer in

5

the symphony and free-lanced.

At the end of this practice teaching block, my co-operating teacher and I sat
down to discuss my ﬁnal evaluation. I was puzzled at how he would arrive at a grade for
me. He had not seen me teach once in my four weeks in this setting. He never saw me
pick myself up and brush myself off when a lesson plan failed. As an evaluation tool, my
co-operating teacher asked what grade I thought I deserved. I told him that I deserved an
A+ because he had no reason, without seeing me teach or directing me in any way, to
give me anything else. My co-operating teacher then told me that he used his students to
evaluate me, because he believed that their response to a teacher was indicative of the
success of that teacher. My sense was that he was unaware of his role as a co-operating
teacher; I was a convenience for him, allowing him to take a break. He was not taking
responsibility for helping me develop as a future music educator. I knew that I would not
get a meaningﬁrl evaluation from him, but I did get an A+. For what? I will never know.

Statement of the Problem
Before and as I began my year as a student teacher at Teachers’ College, I had

many expectations. Most of these expectations were beliefs and perspectives that I had
formed through my experiences as a high school band student. I recalled the power that
music had on my life during those years, and I believed, to some extent, that I could re-
create that power for my own students. I believed that, at Teacher’s College, I would be
shown how to do that and offered opportunities that would provide me with positive
teaching experiences. I expected that my co-operating teacher would be impressed by my
musicianship, and I, in turn, would be in awe of his expertise as a classroom teacher.
These expectations were shattered by the experience in the “real world” of the classroom.

6

On the other hand, and without completely blaming the co-operating teacher, I had no
expectations for myself. I did not know how to take ownership of the experience I was
about to have and subsequently experienced. I believe now that, had I been more aware
of my own expectations and had the ability to voice those to my co-operating teachers,
the experiences may have been different. Rather, I gave all the power to my co-Operating _
teachers without realizing that they, too, did not know what to expect from the
experiences.

Even though student teaching is often seen by students as being the most valuable
part of their preservice education (Blakey, Everett-Turner, Massing, & Scott, 1988;
Fallin, J. & Royse, D. 2000;), literature suggests that not only are the results of this
experience questionable in terms of effectiveness in preparing teachers, but some of the
experiences are less than positive and can be misleading (Holt-Reynolds, 1992; Schmidt
& Kennedy, 1990). According to Schmidt & Kennedy (1990), students enter teacher
training with well-developed beliefs and preconceptions about teaching that are based
primarily on their experiences as students themselves. As a result they often have
unrealistic views about their teaching abilities, their need for teacher education, and their
own abilities as future teachers (Richards & Killen, 1993).

The dilemmas and difﬁculties that I experienced during my student teaching were
unanticipated and left me feeling a like a failure, as well as unprepared to teach music.
While at the time I believed that the role of the co—operating teacher had not been fulﬁlled
appropriately, I now realize that my attitude regarding classroom teaching, my lack of
preparation in methods courses, my lack of classroom management skills, the lack of a
realistic philosophy of music education, and a ﬂawed desire to teach also contributed to

7

my feeling like a failure. However, my co-operating teachers also were partly responsible
because they were not aware of their roles and did not understand what was expected of
me. The lack of feedback, poor supervision, difﬁcult working relationships, and my fear
of approaching the co-operating teachers were indicative of their inability to act as co-
operating teachers because, I believe, they did not know how to do so. The short vignettes
at the beginning of this chapter are representative of memories that remain the most vivid
of my student teaching experiences. These experiences have led to the current research
study as well as to my belief in the importance of a quality student teaching experience
and co-operating teaching experience.

Much has been written about the triangle of participants involved in the success or
failure of student teaching (Grifﬁn, 1989; Kagan, 1987; Richards & Killen, 1994;
Richardson-Koehler, 1988;). However, literature regarding the expectations of co-
operating teachers and the expectations of student teachers during their placements in
general, and in instrumental music teaching in particular, is limited. The ability to
identify these expectations from the perspective of both the co-operating teachers and the
student teachers could improve the overall quality of the ﬁeld experience for both parties,
resulting in a richer, more meaningful learning experience.

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to investigate the similarities and differences between
the expectations of selected pairs of co-operating teachers and their student teachers
regarding the student teaching experience during instrumental music teaching bIOCks. The
speciﬁc research questions are as follows:

0 How do co-operating teachers and student teachers describe their

8

expectations of the other in an instrumental music placement?
0 How do co-operating teachers and student teachers describe the role of the
other?
0 What kind of relationships do the co-operating teachers and student
teachers expect to have with the other?
0 What factors cause stress for co-operating teachers and student teachers
when working with one another?
Gaining an understanding of these expectations and their diversity could result in a more
productive learning experience for co-operating teachers and student teachers.

Expectations of the co-operating teacher and student teacher in terms of their roles
are often misunderstood by both the co-operating teachers themselves as well as the
student teachers assigned to them, and are in need of clariﬁcation (Berthelotte, 2000).
Issues, such as providing and receiving feedback, developing a relationship between a
student teacher and co-operating teacher, evaluation strategies for the student teacher,
reﬂective practice, role modeling, amount of time co-operating teachers and student
teachers should expect to have with each other, and expectations regarding a music
teacher’s role need to be addressed.

The expectations of the student teacher also need to be addressed. From a student
teacher’s perspective, student teaching contains many inconsistencies. Issues such as (a)
evaluation, (b) expectations of the co-operating teacher, (c) type of feedback received
from the co-operating teacher, and (d) the amount of time a co-operating teacher is
willing to provide the student are inconsistent from co-operating teacher to co-operating

teacher and leave student teachers feeling isolated and stressed (Berthelotte, 2000;

9

 

McDOnald, 1993). In a pilot project conducted at the University of Windsor, Berthelotte
(2000) found that student teachers and co-operating teachers have many inconsistent
expectations of each other from one practice teaching placement to the next.
Framing the Problem

Research concerning the student teaching experience has led researchers to
believe that the triad of the co-Operating teacher, the student teacher, and the university
supervisor is directly involved in either the success or failure of a student teacher’s
experiences (Brand, 1985; McDonald, 1993;). All roles in this triangle are crucial to the
successful outcomes of student teaching. However, for the purposes of this research _
study, only issues pertaining to the co-operating teacher and the student teacher will be
the primary focus.
The Co-operating Teacher

Researchers have found that co-operating teachers play a critical role in the
professional growth and socialization of student teachers (Boydell, 1986; Grifﬁn, 1989;
Miklos & Green, 1987). Theoretically, a co-operating teacher accepts the responsibility
for the ﬁeld supervision of a student teacher. In practice, however, the role of the co-
operating teacher is ambiguous. Some researchers suggest that co-operating teachers are
oriented to the more practical aspects of teacher training and are generally unprepared for
the task of adequate student teacher supervision (Grifﬁn, 1989; Grimmet & Ratzlaff,
1986; Richardson-Koehler, 1988; Shavelson & Stern, 1981). Gillis (1987) sees the co-
operating teacher as a way to bridge the gap between theory and practice. Grifﬁn (1989)
suggests that co-operating teachers orient their supervisory role to either that of facilitator
or an apprenticeship model, in which students are expected to emulate their teachers.

10

According to Kahn (1999), current research on student teaching and the student
teacher experience has oﬁen neglected the point of view of the co-operating teachers.
Through interviews with 20 co-operating teachers, Kahn obtained data on how co-
operating teachers identiﬁed a successful student teaching experience and what they
believed could enhance their success as student mentors. Results from interviews
conﬁrmed certain trends in these perceptions, including the importance of a “rriutual
learning relationship” between student and co-operating teacher. Co-Operating teachers
also requested greater support and collaboration from the university community, as
deﬁned by (a) improved communication about university expectations, (b) more in-
service courses for co-operating teachers, (0) more input from co-operating teachers on
the content and delivery of methods courses, and (d) more input from co-operating
teachers in the development of teacher education programs.

The traditional role of the co-operating teacher as the direct supervisor of student
teachers continues to be important because the student teaching experience represents the
student teacher’s “real life” entrance into the profession Of teaching. However, it is clear
that the scope of this task is being broadened, as co-operating teachers desire to play a
greater role in the overall training of student teachers, including identifying criteria for
selecting student teachers, helping design professional development programs for
individual and school improvement, and participating in research endeavours intended to
broaden the teacher preparation knowledge base (Association of Teacher Educators,
1991)

MacDonald (1993) found that co—operating teachers are unsure of their roles and
could beneﬁt ﬁom having them more clearly deﬁned. According to MacDonald, co-

ll

Operating teachers describe having a student teacher in their classroom as having both
good and bad outcomes. The outcomes often depend on the relationships that the co-
operating teachers have with their student teachers. When co-operating teachers perceive
that the relationships between themselves and the student teachers are good, there are
more good outcomes and fewer bad ones. Researchers for the past 40 years have
consistently found that it is the co-operating teachers who play the most signiﬁcant role
in helping the student teachers direct themselves in the many decision-making aspects
that go along with successful teaching (Boydell, 1986; Conant, 1963; Grifﬁn, 1989;
Karmos & Jacko, 1977; Manning, 1977; Miklos & Greene, 1987). The majority of
student teachers view their co-operating teachers as being more inﬂuential than their
university supervisors during their student teaching experiences (Boydell, 1986; Grifﬁn,
1989). A study conducted by Calderhead (1987) suggests that, in many situations, student
teachers reject feedback from university staff, as it is perceived to differ from the
feedback given by their co-operating teachers. Student teachers feel that it is the co-
operating teacher who holds the more expert opinion. In addition, Calderhead’s study
revealed that student teachers’ lesson planning and teaching were inﬂuenced by
differences in opinions between the co-operating teachers and their university
supervisors. In those instances, co-operating teachers were regarded as the most reliable
source of knowledge about real teaching.

Woolley (1997) conducted a study of student teachers’ perceptions of their
supervision by their co-operating teachers. An open-ended survey was used to gather the
opinions of 469 student teachers. Common themes involved important skills and
characteristics of successful co-operating teachers. These themes included type of

12

guide/mentor, understanding expectations, feedback, evaluation/ grades, expert, style,
power, availability, and support. Results revealed that, while student teachers were
pleased with their supervision for the most part, they identiﬁed a lack of communication
in expectations, feedback, and guidance through their student teaching experience as
areas needing improvement. Woolley suggested that offering more workshops for co-
operating teachers on providing feedback, clarifying expectations, and giving guidance
could result in a more successful experience for both the student teacher and the cc-
operating teacher.

The Student Teacher

By the time student teachers are ready for the experience of teaching in a
classroom setting, they have successfully completed their methods courses. Student
teaching provides the preservice teacher an opportunity to practice these methodologies.
However, the transfer of methodological theories to student teaching practices may not
occur (Gallant, 1992). While student teaching is an important facet of becoming a
teacher, according to Gallant, student teaching is different from inservice teaching, and
lessons learned in undergraduate study may nOt transfer to the student teaching
experience.

Student teachers themselves have complained that their university teacher training
provides inadequate preparation for dealing with some speciﬁc issues, such as discipline,
and is too theoretical, with insufﬁcient practical application (Pataniczek & Isaacson,
1989). The university has a responsibility to provide the student teacher with a
combination of music methodology and other course work that can be applied to
classroom teaching, as well as to prepare musicians to ﬁrrther develop their skills in order

13

to be excellent in a music-teacher role. Towards these ends, the university is expected to
offer appropriate courses and experiences that will result in such achievement. These
classes usually include instrumental techniques, voice, keyboard, conducting, ear
training, sight singing, music history, music theory, child development and educational
psychology, which are presented in a sequential order meant to aid in the development of
the music education student. Further, the university must provide structured observations
at elementary, middle school, or secondary levels to prepare the student to function well
in the classroom.

Kelly (2000) suggests that the university should ensure that students of music
education develop sufﬁcient subj ect-matter expertise, appropriate instructional
techniques, and adequate classroom management skills to progress through student
teaching and into the beginning years of inservice teaching. Although the university is
attempting to teach the novice to be a thoughtful, imaginative, empathic, creative teacher,
the outcome of the student teaching experience often has been a new teacher who is
dogmatic and authoritarian (Zeichner & Tabachnick, 1981). Further, a study by Howey
(1983) revealed that the impact of university-based knowledge is often substantially
diluted or abandoned during the student teaching experience by students who see what
they do at the university as not being relevant or important in the real world of teaching.

Student teachers have an opportunity to face their fears during their student
teaching experience. Fears about discipline and classroom management, failure (not
being cutout for teaching), not being competent, and not meeting expectations are
examples of such fears (Schmidt, 1994). However, according to Kelly (2000), if pre-
internship fears are not successfully resolved during preservice training and student

14

teaching experiences, these fears may continue during the initial years of inservice
teaching and, if left unresolved, may negatively affect an individual’s success as a
teacher.

MacDonald (1992) found that, although student teachers consider student
teaching a valuable experience, they also view student teaching as the most stressful part
of their teacher education program. MacDonald (1993) conducted a study with 11 student
teachers to investigate the strategies student teachers developed to cope with stress.
Factors such as role clariﬁcation, expectations, conformity, time management, pacing,
evaluation, assignments, peer discussions, and feedback were all sources of stress for
these student teachers. Berthelotte’s (2000) pilot study concerning expectations of student
teachers by their co-operating teacher supported MacDonald’s ﬁndings.

The University Supervisor.

Even though the roles of the co-operating teacher and the student teacher are the
foci of discussion for this study, it is important to brieﬂy discuss the role of the university
supervisor, as the university supervisor can have either a positive or negative effect on
the student teaching experience (Slick, 1998). University supervisors’ roles are varied.
The supervisor ensures that all requirements are completed during the student teaching
experience. They are facilitators of relationships among students, teachers, and school
administrators. They also serve as a personal conﬁdante of the other two members of the
triad (Grifﬁn et al., 1983; Koeheler, 1984; Zimpler, DeVoss, & Nott, 1980). Further,
according to O’Neal (1983), the university supervisor can help to raise the level of
discourse during feedback sessions between the co-operating teacher and the student
teacher.

15

Some advocate the elimination of this supervisory position, while still others
advocate a clearer deﬁnition of its role and role expectations (Emans, 1983; Zeichner &
Teitlebaurn, 1982). Richardson-Koehler (1988) drew three conclusions from a study
investigating barriers to the effective supervision of student teaching by the university
supervisor. The ﬁrst conclusion was that there is a lack of time, both in the supervisor’s
observation of the student teacher and in the feedback sessions between the university
supervisor and the student teacher. The second conclusion involved the sense that both
the co-Operating teacher and student teacher were being evaluated. In three-way
assessments, problems concerning the co-operating teacher and student teacher were not
discussed, whereas one-on-one conversations with the university supervisor and the
student teacher resulted in signiﬁcant time being spent discussing such problems. The
third conclusion described the co-operating teachers’ perceptions of the university
supervisors. Several co-operating teachers suggested that there existed a university
perspective rather than a classroom perspective in the interactions of the university
supervisor. The supervisors did not take the time to learn about the school setting in
which they were evaluating student teachers, which, in turn, would allow university
supervisors an opportunity to make student teachers more aware of expectations.

This particular study centers on investigating and comparing the expectations
between the co-operating teacher and the student teacher in instrumental music settings.
The university supervisor is important in the context of understanding the triangle;
however, that part of the triangle is not a primary focus of this investigation.

Summag
The focus of this study is the nature and extent of both the co-operating teacher

16

and the student teacher during instrumental music teaching blocks. Although ambiguous,
the role of the co-operating teacher is integral to the nature and quality of the student
teaching experience. In practice, the co-operating teachers’ expectations of student
teachers manifest themselves in a variety of ways, and these expectations affect the
relationship between the co-operating teacher and the student teacher, which is a key
factor in the quality of the student teacher and co-operating teacher experience.

Student teachers consider student teaching to be a valuable experience. However,
many student teachers feel inadequately prepared to translate theory into practice. Their
undergraduate experiences often do not prepare them to implement effective
methodologies, nor do they feel prepared for the “real world” classroom experiences.
Student teaching is an opportunity to confront the variety of fears associated with
practical classroom experiences. Therefore, student teachers should be aware of co-
operating teachers’ expectations and of exactly how these individuals view a student
teacher’s role as a second source of knowledge and authority in the classroom in order to
be as successful as possible.

Deﬁnition of Terms

Deﬁning terms within the conﬁnes of a study allows the reader to better
understand the intent of the author. Terms for this particular study are based on
terminology used at the University of Windsor by Faculty of Education professors and
are familiar to both the student teachers and their co-operating teachers.

Inservice teacher: A teacher qualiﬁed by the Ministry of Education in the
province of Ontario who is on a paid contract at either an elementary or secondary school
level.

17

CO-operating teacher: A teacher with a minimum of ﬁve years teaching experience
who supervises the student teacher during a three-week teaching block in the same area
of expertise in which the student teacher is applying to be provincially qualiﬁed.

Teaching block: Student teaching in a classroom for three consecutive weeks in
either an elementary or secondary school setting.

Student teaching: The placement of student teachers in classrooms in which they
teach under the supervision of their co-Operating teachers. These placements will occur in

both elementary and secondary school settings.

18

CHAPTER TWO
Review of Related Literature

Student teaching is an important aspect of most teacher education programs.
According to Conant (1963), student teaching remains the one indisputably essential
element in professional education. For many prospective teachers, it is their ﬁrst
prolonged experience in the role of music teacher. In Ontario, student teaching
experiences usually begin at the end of a completed four-year degree in a chosen subject
area. Student teachers attend a Faculty of Education for 26 weeks, totalling two
semesters. During this time student teachers are required to teach for 64 days, supervised
by a co-operating teacher, and spend the rest of this time attending related education
methodology courses. For many students, the student teaching experience includes a
sudden confrontation with numerous unforeseen situations, expectations, and demands,
some of which may clash with previously held ideals. Pritchard (1974) refers to this year
at Teachers’ College as the shortest apprenticeship period of any profession in which the
purpose is “to transform a novice into an initiate” (p.1).

Cole & Knowles (1993) discuss “shattered images” held by student teachers in
their introduction to the real world of teaching. Through reﬂective practice, such as
journals, audio-taping, and interviews, they gathered information to study the perceived
discrepancies between preservice teachers’ expectations and their actual experiences of
learning to teach. They found that preservice teachers select attributes and practices of
their former teachers and synthesize them into an idealized image or model of the kind of
teacher they want to become. Additionally, disillusionment comes about as student
teachers become more cognizant of what teaching and being a teacher really is (Cole,

19

1985). According to Cole & Knowles (1993), student teachers are often surprised by the
role of the teacher and the reality of the workload they carry. The authors discussed the
inappropriate or unrealistic expectations that student teachers have about the students
they are to teach, due in part to the commonly held perception that the classroom students
that student teachers encounter will be like them when they themselves were students
(Hollingsworth, 1989; Knowles & Holt-Reynolds, 1991).
Student Teacher and Co-operating Teacher Experiences

General Education

Historically, research investigating the expectations of the student teacher and co-
operating teacher during student teaching is limited. Horowitz (1968) investigated the
relationship between student teachers and their co-operating teachers, on the assumption
that conﬂict between these individuals affects the success of the student-teaching
experience. He approached his study using the conceptualization model developed by
Getzel (1960), in which there are two main components within social systems. One
component is institutional, and the other individual. “Human behavior, resulting from
expectations and need-dispositions, can be a function of both personality and role” (p.
318). Getzel’s model draws attention to the individual and institutional dimensions of
behaviour and suggests patterns of behaviour along the continuum, from exclusive
concern with personal needs to exclusive concern with the expectations held by others.
Horowitz’s model had three speciﬁc purposes: (1) To determine the effect of the initial
student-teaching experience on student teachers’ expectations and perceptions, regardless
of the co-operating teachers to whom the students are assigned, (2) to determine the
extent to which the expectations of co-operating teachers inﬂuence the expectations and

20

perceptions of their student teachers, and (3) to determine the extent of agreement

between student teachers’ expectations and co-operating teachers’ expectations.

Using the Teacher Role Description (TRD) instrument developed by Guba-

Bidwell (1957) to measure role expectations and role perceptions, Horowitz (1968) found

that:

Student teachers and co-operating teachers differ in their expectations of
the role of co-operating teacher, and this difference is perceived by the
student teachers before and aﬁer student-teaching experiences;

Student teachers changed in their attitudes toward teaching, even if the
student teaching period was Short;

Student teachers were more concerned with personal needs and less
concerned with the expectations of others than were co-operating teachers;
Student teachers and co—operating teachers differed in their expectations of
the role of co-operating teacher. Student teachers perceived co-operating
teachers as being more extreme in their expectations than co-operating
teachers saw themselves;

Co-operating teachers claimed to have achieved a much better balance
between concern with self and concern with the expectations of others
than student teachers were willing to ascribe to them; and

Student teachers’ expectations differed from co-operating teachers’
expectations, student teachers’ perceptions of co-operating teachers’
expectations differed from co-operating teachers’ self-expressed

expectations, and student teachers’ perceptions of co-operating teachers’

21

expectations differed from student teachers’ self-expressed expectations
(p. 139).

In a survey of 300 student teachers, F arbstein (1965) categorized over 700
expectations of co-operating teachers. In addition to expectations, such as ﬂexibility,
providing personal support, and assisting with classroom management and discipline
problems, student teachers expected that co-operating teachers would do the following:

0 Allow them to sit in on parent/teacher interviews.

0 Possess an adequate to superior knowledge of subject material.
0 Be aware of student teachers’ needs.

0 Be pleasant.

0 Control their tempers.

0 Trust the student teachers as equals.

0 Show an interest in the student teachers as human beings.

Tabachnick et a1. (1982) found that the perspectives of student teachers were
dominated by utilitarian concerns, such as maintaining quiet and order throughout a
lesson, ﬁrlﬁlling the expectations of others, seeing techniques as ends in themselves, and
surviving student teaching. Tabachnick found that, while teachers conformed to
organizational demands, their basic teaching styles were likely to remain unchanged. The
study explored the socializing effects of the student teaching experience on the
perspectives on teaching of thirteen student teachers. Before the start of their student
teaching, the subjects responded to the Teacher Belief Inventory (TBI). The TBI was
developed to assess teacher beliefs related to six speciﬁc categories: (1) teacher role:

passive-active, (2) teacher-pupil relationship: custodial-humanistic, (3) knowledge and

22

curriculum: strong frame-weak frame, (4) student diversity: negative-positive, (5) the role
of the community in school affairs: passive-active, and (6) the role of the school in
society: reproductive-transformative. Responses in each of these areas provided a proﬁle
of teacher beliefs that comprised the individual's perspectives on teaching. In addition to
completing the TBI, each student teacher was interviewed at least ﬁve times and
observed while teaching at least three times. Interviews were also held with pupils, co-
operating teachers, and supervisors to discover developments of perspectives of the
student teachers, any observed changes, and inﬂuences that might induce change.
Resulting data indicated that student teaching did not result in a homogenization of
student teacher perspectives. Students came into the experience with different
perspectives on teaching, and signiﬁcant differences among them remained at the end of
the semester. Little evidence was found of passive response to institutional forces. It
should be noted, however, that the subjects of this study selected the schools in which
they did their student teaching and, in this selection, naturally chose positions in schools
most reﬂecting their own perspectives.

Tardif (1985) conducted a study that focused on the process of becoming a
teacher. Operating from the theoretical orientation of symbolic interaction, the researcher
sought to interpret the meaning that student teachers attach to their student teaching
experiences. Four exploratory questions guided the study:

0 What aspects of the practicum experience take on meaning for the student
teacher?
0 Is the meaning transformed as the student teacher progressively moves

through the various phases of the practicum?

23

o How is the meaning handled and modiﬁed by the student teacher in
dealing with Signiﬁcant others in the student teaching setting (teachers,
students, university supervisors)?

0 Is the meaning transferred into practice? (p. 26)

Four student teachers became key informants over an 18-month period,
representing the different phases of the student teaching experience. An important
criterion in the selection of the student teachers was the willingness of these individuals
to relate and share their feelings and experiences with the researcher. Data collection
included classroom observation, informant interviewing, document analysis, stimulated
recall interview sessions, and video recording. Themes such as “self as teacher,” “taking
the class through the lesson,” “ﬁnding a happy medium,” “taking the path of least

” “

resistance, securing control,” and “justifying behavior” emerged as common to all four
study participants. Becoming a teacher was a process of “. . . adopting classroom teacher
behavior as legitimated by the social reality of the classroom world. It involved learning
how to interpret the patterns of behavior of the students, the co-operating teacher and the
wider school community, of knowing their expectations and adjusting one’s behavior
accordingly” (p.146).

McDonald (1993) explored the causes of stress that student teachers experienced
during student teaching and investigated strategies student teachers implemented to cope
with this stress. A lack of clear expectations from the co-operating teacher was among the
most salient factors causing stress. Student teachers reported that not knowing the

expectations of co-operating teachers regarding discipline, lesson plans, daily routines,

amount of teaching, roles, and evaluations were sources of stress for them. Further,

24

MacDonald reported that addressing their concerns with co-operating teachers did not
always alleviate their stress. Student teachers in their focus groups resolved that
improved communication would be a good coping strategy and would help to alleviate
this speciﬁc stress.

The majority of literature supports the belief that co-operating teachers play a
critical role in the professional growth and successful process of student teachers
(Boydell, 1986; Grifﬁn, 1989; Miklos & Greene, 1987; Vogt, 1988). However, Vogt
(198 8) determined, in a review of research on the role of the co-operating teacher, that,
although a variety of tasks are expected of the co-operating teacher, there is disagreement
as to how the role of the co-operating teacher should be delineated. On one hand, a co-
operating teacher is seen as the best way to bridge the gap between theory and practice
(Gillis, 1987). On the other hand, research suggests that co-operating teachers are
oriented toward the practical application aspects of student teacher training and are
unprepared for the task of student teaching supervision (Grifﬁn, 1989; Richardson-
Koehler, 1988).

Co-operating teachers appear to be the most inﬂuential people in the student
teaching experience (Friebus, 1977; Seperson & Joyce, 1973; Yee, 1969). Yet, O’Neal
(1983) determined, in a study of co-operating teachers, that the practical and particular
methods already established by the co-operating teacher do not necessarily allow student
teachers to learn how to adjust to various classroom situations and demands. For
example, practical classroom management strategies used by the co-operating teacher
may work in one situation but not necessarily in another.

Grimmet and Ratzlaff (1986), in a groundbreaking and frequently cited study,

25

explored ‘ ‘the expectations that teachers held for their work as co-operating teachers” (p.
42). Using a closed-response survey instrument, the teachers indicated four key
expectations they regarded as central to assisting beginning teachers in learning to teach:
providing student-teachers with an orientation to the school, supporting and modelling
instructional planning, conducting and Sharing formative and summative evaluations, and
involving the student teachers in the life of the school (for example, professional
development and extra-curricular opportunities). Projecting beyond what co-operating
teachers currently do, the cO-operating teachers indicated the need “to play a more active
role in the professional development of would-be teachers’ ’ (p. 48).

Zimpher and Shenill’s (1996) study concurred with these results and noted that
co-operating teachers felt overall, ‘ ‘that they were well prepared for their work with
student-teachers” (p. 292). Other studies Show that co-operating teachers appreciate the
opportunity to contribute to the profession through their work with student teachers
(Korinek, 1989; Zimpher & Sherrill, 1996), in part because of reciprocal professional
development beneﬁts that occur. Book (1996) notes that ‘ ‘supervisors have begun to
realize that their role in supervising student-teachers has enabled them to learn more
about teaching [because] in helping novices improve, they articulate more explicitly what
they know and believe about teaching” (p. 202). Other researchers, such as Neufeld and
Freeman (1993 ), suggest similar outcomes.

Richardson-Koehler (1 98 8) determined that co-operating teachers themselves felt
that they had to learn much on their own during their student teaching days and that their
student teachers would have to do the same. Feedback following a teaching experience
centred more on what activities would take place the next day than on how to improve.

26

Also, Richardson-Koehler found a lack of openness on the part of co-operating teachers.
Of the fourteen co-operating teachers in this study, only one determined that it would be
valuable for the student teacher to observe other classroom practices. Koehler determined
that the co-operating teachers’ lack of ability or unwillingness to engage in reﬂection of
their own or their student teachers’ classroom practices contributed to the poor quality of
feedback received by the student teachers. The amount of reﬂection necessary to
facilitate a successful ﬁeld experience for both the student teacher and the co-operating
teacher was not an expectation of the co-operating teacher. The students, on the other
hand, expected more feedback than was received.

Stout (1982) surveyed 40 secondary school teachers to ascertain what co-
operating teachers look for and expect from a student teacher. The sample for this study
included teachers of diverse subject matter. Of the responding teachers surveyed, 37
percent had worked with more than ten student teachers, 58 percent had worked with
between ﬁve and ten and the remaining ﬁve percent had worked with four or fewer. In
this survey, teachers were asked to share their views conceming ﬁve items relating to the
classroom teacher and their expectations of a student teacher. Each survey item required
the teachers to list what they thought would describe their expectations of student
teachers.

Results revealed that co-operating teachers felt that overseeing student teachers
was a way of fulﬁlling a professional obligation, having a positive inﬂuence on a student
teacher, having an opportunity to learn new methodologies from student teachers, and
forcing themselves to re-examine and re-evaluate their own teaching strategies. The
researcher concluded that 72 percent of co-operating teachers expected that student

27

teachers would have a ﬁrm grasp of subject matter and be willing to seek out resources to
implement knowledge in subject areas other than their own. Additionally, 78 percent of
co-operating teachers expected that student teachers would possess enthusiasm for the
subject matter that they were teaching as well as for how it was taught. Also, 38 percent
of co-operating teachers determined that student teachers’ taking initiative, being
creative, and trying out methods used in undergraduate work was an expectation. Finally,
13 percent identiﬁed a sense of humour as strength of successful student teachers.
Macdonald, Baker & Steward (1995) investigated co-operating teachers’ perspectives on
having a student teacher in the classroom. This study involved collaboration between two
classroom teachers and an education faculty member as researchers. Five co-Operating
teachers, including two of the researchers, were participants in this study. The assumption
underlying the study was that what was missing from the knowledge of the teaching
practicum were the voices of the co-operating teachers. The objective of the researchers
was to determine the beneﬁts and drawbacks of having a student teacher in the
classroom, to identify what co-operating teachers perceived to be stressful about student
teaching, and to identify the coping strategies that they used or recommended for dealing
with this stress. Focus group interviews, joumaling, individual interviews, and
observation were used to collect data.

The researchers determined that there were both beneﬁts and drawbacks to having
a student teacher in the classroom. Further, these beneﬁts and drawbacks were often
dependent upon the relationship that the student teacher had with the co-operat'mg
teacher. Beneﬁts included positive experiences in watching the personal growth of the
student teacher, enthusiasm displayed by the student teacher, and new methods and ideas

28

brought to their classroom by the student teachers. Also, the opportunity to observe the
student teacher provided an Opportunity for the co-operating teacher to observe classroom
students. Drawbacks included the amount of time co-operating teachers felt that student
teachers demanded of them, the disruption of giving up power in their classrooms to
allow the student teacher an opportunity to experiment freely, time required for
evaluation, change of routine, and conﬂict caused by different personalities. Personality
conﬂicts posed a substantial stress for co-operating teachers. The co-operating teachers
preferred to have student teachers whose approach to students was similar to their own.
Co-operating teachers wonied that opposite personalities and approaches of student
teachers would affect the way in which they worked with the student teacher as well as
the way that they evaluated them. Further, co-operating teachers reported that, when co-
operating teacher expectations for the student teachers were different than what the
student teacher expected for themselves, the result was often a stressful experience. As
well as causing stress, the co-operating teachers felt that a disparity in expectations also
affected their relationships with their student teachers.

Richardson & Killen (1994) determined, in a study involving co-operating
teachers’ and student teachers’ and their practicum experiences, that shadowing co-
operating teachers for a period of time prior to teaching would allow student teachers to
experience the multi-faceted task of teaching, including becoming involved in student
welfare activities, being involved in all extra curricular music and playground
supervision, and in the overall day-to-day dealings of teachers. In other words, they found
that co-Operating teachers Should allow student teachers to immediately be immersed in
the school community. Allowing student teachers to immediately be immersed in the

29

school community could address the frustrations voiced by both the co-operating teachers
and the student teachers in this study. The idea of shadowing could alleviate many of the
frustrations of both the student teachers and the co-operating teachers. Unfortunately, the
student teachers in this study had one day of observation prior to beginning their student
teaching block with their co-Operating teachers. This Observation allowed the student
teachers to watch the co-operating teachers in action, but did not leave adequate time for
questions, preparation for classes, and other issues that should have been addressed
beforehand. Richard & Killen (1994) found that the co-operating teachers’ felt that the
student teaching experience was more proﬁtable for the student teachers when shadowing
had occurred and they, as co-operating teachers, felt it easier to offer guidance to the
student teacher under these conditions. Shadowing enabled student teachers and co-
operating teachers to sit down, communicate, and learn from each other

Co-operating teachers uncovered a multitude of expectations for the student
teacher that were revealed in a study conducted by Woods & Weasmer (2003). This study
included expectations of student teachers outside the traditional classroom practices, such
as participating in extra-curricular activities, attending faculty meetings, and volunteering
on various committees while practice teaching in their assigned school. Participants of
this study were 28 (5 male and 23 female) public school teachers, who had served the
previous semester as co-operating teachers. Included in this study were co-operating
teachers representing ten elementary schools, seven middle schools and 11 secondary
school settings. Among the subject matters taught by these co-operating teachers were
math, English, science, special education, and music.

Two primary sources provided data for this study. A demographic survey was

30

completed, followed by interviews with each of the co—operating teachers at the
completion of the student teaching experience. The interviews were conducted using an
interview guide for consistency. The 20-30-minute interviews were tape recorded and
later transcribed for analysis.

Results revealed that, according to the co-operating teachers, expectations of
student teachers during student teaching were clearly identiﬁed by the university
supervisor, but misunderstood and confusing to the co-operating teacher and the student
teacher. Issues, such as extra-curricular assignments, attending faculty meetings, and
performing all tasks expected of the co-operating teacher were an expectation of the co-
operating teacher but not necessarily the student teacher, who was already overwhelmed
by classroom expectations. Co-operating teachers agreed that the primary focus of the
student teacher was to gain teaching experience: however, there were multifarious
expectations of teachers beyond the classroom. In order to have a “complete student-
teaching experience,” student teachers should be engaged in all facets expected of the co-
operating teacher. If the belief is that co-operating teachers are there to provide the “real-
world” experience for student teachers, it then stands to reason the student teacher should
be involved in all activities outside of the classroom. Some of experiences that co-
operating teachers wanted their student teachers to experience included:

0 Serving as a role model,

0 Understanding and caring about students,

0 Developing a love of teaching,

0 Establishing a positive rapport with parents,

0 Demonstrating professionalism,

31

o Becoming adaptable.

Several studies have reported problems encountered by both student teachers and
co-operating teachers, and most of these studies point to differences in expectations as a
source of the problem. According to Applegate & Lasley (1982), co-operating teachers
want student teachers who come to them committed to teaching, rather than wondering if
the career will be the right one for them. Many co-operating teachers want partnerships
with the student teachers and do not want to be totally responsible for evaluation. They
want enthusiastic, well-organized, professional and knowledgeable individuals as student
teachers. Many co-operating teachers believe that the university teaches and encourages
skill development and practice, rather than emphasizing skill proﬁciency. In other words,
co-operating teachers often feel that student teachers come to their classrooms with a lot
of book knowledge about skills, but lack the practical skills to implement that book
knowledge.

Co-operatin g teachers identiﬁed that an important coping strategy, when having
student teachers in their classroom, was the establishment of communication strategies
that enabled the student teachers to understand better the speciﬁc expectations of the co-
operating teacher (MacDonald, 1995). Co-operating teachers felt that it was the job of the
university faculty to inform student teachers of the expectations of student teachers, and
that this communication would facilitate the development of a better relationship between
student teacher and co-operating teacher. Further, this communication would result in a
better student teaching experience for all involved (Applegate & Lasley, 1982).

Music Education

Having knowledge concerning expectations of both the co—operating teacher and

32

the student teacher can change the ideal into the real and vice versa, the real into the
ideal. Thus far, the literature on expectations of student teachers and co-operating
teachers is broad in terms of subject matter and individual concerns. Research has made it
clear that co-operating teachers and student teachers have expectations. Studies of those
expectations are in the voices of either the student teachers or the co-operating teachers,
but not of both within the same study. There are studies that have identiﬁed those
speciﬁc areas of concern for both the co-operating teachers and the student teachers such
as classroom management, rehearsal techniques, discipline, speciﬁc fears of the
practicum, and so forth.

Investigating the needs for both student teachers and co-operating teachers in
music education has the potential to change the outcome of these experiences positively.
Walker (1998) states that future music educators must “be prepared both mentally and
academically for the administrative challenges that will confront them the very ﬁrst day
they walk into music classrooms and rehearsals” (p 5). The College music teacher
education programs strive to prepare the music student teachers musically and
academically for the challenge of teaching music. However, many teacher-preparation
programs focus primarily on the theory behind the practice of teaching music. When the
student teacher enters the placement with the co-operating teacher, the student has the
opportunity to convert theory into practice with the guidance of the co-operating teacher
as an additional resource. Ideally, the co-Operating teacher addresses the mental
challenges that come into play in the music room as well as illustrating how to put theory
into practice. The student teacher then is exposed to ideas that the co-operating teacher
has found useﬁil and successful for him or her, such as teaching strategies, classroom

33

management skills, paperwork, school responsibilities, and administrative tasks. This
collaboration is the beginning of the co-operating teacher enhancing the preparation that
the student music teacher received in college, since these very issues may not have been
addressed in methods classes.

Taylor (1970) investigated music teachers’ opinions of their preparation on both
graduate and undergraduate levels in light of their teaching experience. In response to
“effectiveness of student teaching,” 99 percent of teachers responded, with 62 percent
reporting an effective outcome. However, 37 percent voiced concerns about lack of time,
poor school situation, poor supervision, an inadequate co-operating teacher, unclear
expectations, unrealistic or regimented situation, and poor scheduling.

Exploring the fears of undergraduate music education students prior to their
student teaching experiences has identiﬁed that the lack of knowledge of expectations
held by their co-operating teacher was a primary fear, along with classroom management
and discipline issues that could arise (Kelly, 2000; Madsen & Kaiser, 1999). Kelly
suggests that this kind of fear could be related to the effectiveness of student teaching and
could continue into the teaching career. The purpose of Kelly’s study was to identify,
classify and compare preservice undergraduates’ fears or concerns regarding the student
teaching placement and their ﬁrst years of teaching. Prior to their internship, 62 music
education majors were surveyed regarding fears or concerns they had about their student
teaching and initial inservice teaching experiences. Results indicated that preservice
teachers were generally secure about their student teaching and initial inservice year of
teaching except in the areas of handling discipline problems, working with their co-
operating teachers, and dealing with non-teaching duties and responsibilities. They were

34

unaware of what was expected of them, which heightened their fears even more.

Brand (1982) acknowledged that student teaching experiences are important, but
questioned whether the experiences are designed to be optimally effective for the student
teacher. In his study, Brand explored the following research questions: (1) Does the
music student teaching experience affect student teachers’ classroom management beliefs
and skills and; (2) As a result of student teaching, do student teachers classroom
management beliefs and skills become more like those of their co-operating teachers?
Brand selected the area of classroom and rehearsal management because it is an essential
competency for music student teachers, and co-operating music teachers are expected to
provide primary leadership in this area. The study involved 40 music student teachers and
their co—operating teachers. The “Beliefs on Discipline Inventory” and the “Behavior
Management Inventory” were the two instruments used as pre and post-tests to determine
music student teachers’ and co-operating teachers’ classroom management beliefs and
skills. To determine if their classroom management beliefs and skills became more like
their co-operating teachers, differences between the student teachers and the co-operating
teachers were compared. The results showed that there were no statistical differences
between the student teachers in respect to their beliefs and skills before and after the
student teaching experience. Similarly, the study also showed that there were no
signiﬁcant differences between the student and co-operating teachers in classroom
management beliefs and skills.

While the results of the study were surprising, Brand (1982) surmised that
perhaps the stress of new state testing requirements and the inﬂux of new programs to
meet more individual student needs, as well as the public reports of ongoing discipline

35

issues within the schools, have resulted in providing more realistic experiences, such as
the use of videotapes and case studies to prepare student teachers to deal with discipline
issues that are likely to arise. These experiences may have opened the eyes of idealistic
music education majors. As a result, student music teachers were entering the student
teaching experience with more realistic views of music teaching in schools, and, .
therefore, their beliefs and expectations concerning classroom management and music
teacher issues paralleled those of their co-operating teachers.

Brand (1985) also determined that, while the initial unchanged beliefs and skills
were due to a “reality check” on the part of the student teachers prior to entering the
classroom, perhaps the co-operating teachers did not possess superior classroom skills
themselves and that student teachers did not change their beliefs because co-operating
teachers were not effective in assisting them in these areas. Student teachers expected that
co-operating teachers would be better equipped with speciﬁc ideas in classroom
management and discipline that would allow them to view their co—operating teacher as
superior. Brand suggests the need for proper training and selection of co-operating
teachers so as to allow them to work with student music teachers more effectively and
efﬁciently.

Krueger (1987) investigated the extent to which music student teachers’
perspectives toward their role as teachers were altered or maintained during the process
of student teaching in public schools. Using two choral music students as her sample,
Krueger devised four questions to guide her research. One of these questions was: “What
is the implied or hidden cuniculum and pedagogy of student teaching in public school
music and what are the implicit expectations of experienced educational personnel who

36

interact with the student teachers?” (p. 40) Krueger found that student teacher
perspectives toward their role as teachers were highly inﬂuenced by the existing
structural organization of the school setting. Student teachers perceived the continuation
of the curriculum in place to be an expectation of their co-operating teacher, and they
rarely attempted to venture into new content materials of their own or of students’ special
interest. The co-operating teachers of these students expected individual planning and
teaching to be done using existing school schedules and organized activities. While
student teachers viewed this as a constraint, as time went on, they found it less
problematic, became more accepting, and, as a result, began to practice methods that they
viewed as survival tactics and as necessary for successful teaching.

Gordon (2000) identiﬁed and explicated factors that induced stress for new public
school music teachers. Four practising music educators served as case study participants
and were interviewed on three consecutive occasions over a period of 6 months. Results
of the study found three categories of stress factors. One of these stress factors was
inadequate preservice preparation for music teaching. These inadequacies included lack
Of planning Skills that resulted in unsuccessful lesson presentations, lack of knowledge
and skill in curriculum design, inadequate or incomplete pedagogical and methodological
preparation, absence of Skill and knowledge in classroom management and discipline,
and insufﬁcient knowledge of literature and particular instruments. Recommendations for
alleviating this stress included placements with a co-operating teacher who could be a
guide for the student teacher and offer more expertise to the student music teacher.
Teacher as Expert

Teacher expertise refers to a speciﬁc type of knowledge or skill. In an educational

37

context, expertise includes the emergence of the public perception that such knowledge is
the exclusive domain of specially trained and qualiﬁed practising teachers. According to
Welker (1991) expertise requires more than intellectual capacity. Expertise provides for
occupational distinctions drawn along formalized lines, and in turn fosters an increasing
reliance on institutions and organizations as mediators to service. Experts require not
only specialized training to set them apart from their colleagues, but also special places in
which to practice as experts.

Research studies investigating how one becomes an expert in teaching have
focused on identifying those inﬂuences that aid in the student teacher’s growth during the
student teaching experience. Much discussion has centered on the learning institution or
the background and personality of the student teacher. However, some researchers have
been less interested with the socialization process of the student teacher and more
concerned with the cognitive aspects of their learning. For example, researchers have
been inquiring into the nature of the differences in pedagogical expertise between the
novice and the experienced teacher. Methods, such as laboratory simulations, naturalistic
observations, and stimulated recall, have been used to investigate this area of teaching.
Findings suggest that expert teachers draw on “. . .richly elaborated and well-organized
stores of procedural and declarative knowledge (schemata) about classrooms, students,
and teaching” (Livingston, 1990, p. 254).

What makes a teacher an expert is an ongoing area of research. There are some
models that attempt to describe the characteristics of expert teachers focusing on teacher
styles, teacher interaction and teacher characteristics, while other models of expert
teachers focus on products such as student outcomes and teacher effects (Borko &

38

Livingston, 1987; Saber, Cushing & Berliner, 1991). According to Stemberg & Horvath
(1995), a master teacher is knowledgeable in subject matter content and pedagogical
considerations. Master teachers use knowledge to make sound, quick, and efﬁcient
decisions about problematic situations within their teaching setting, often using insight
and novel approaches to do so.

Stemberg and Horvath (1995) believed that there does not exist a well-deﬁned
standard that all experts meet and that no non-experts meet. Rather, experts bear a family
resemblance to one another, and it is that resemblance to one another that structures the
category “expert.” In this study, the resemblances centered on the co-operating teachers’
willingness to be open-minded, collaborative, ﬂexible, willing to Share their expertise,
and a genuine excitement at the prospect of providing their student teachers with a
positive classroom experience as music student teachers. Stemberg and Horvath (1995)
proposed that teaching expertise should be viewed as a similarity-based category, with
something like a prototype as its summary representation. This prototype View could
contribute in important ways to the dialogue on expert in teaching. According to the
researchers, the adoption of a prototype could allow for a fuller, more inclusive
understanding of teaching expertise; second, a prototype View could provide a basis for
understanding apparent “general factors” in teaching expertise. The prototype view
provides a basis for understanding and anticipating in social judgments about teaching
expertise.

Using the results of psychological research on the development of experts,
Stemberg and Horvath (1995) identiﬁed expertise related to family resemblance through
prototyping. The results included the notion that the prototype expert is knowledgeable.

39

He or she has extensive, accessible knowledge that is organized for. use in teaching. In
addition, the prototype expert has knowledge of the organizational context in which
teaching occurs and is able to adapt to practical constraints within the ﬁeld of teaching.
Because his or her teaching is extensive, the prototype expert is able to perform many of
the constituent activities of teaching rapidly and with little or no cognitive effort. This
skill enables the prototypical expert to “reinvest” cognitive resources in problem
reformulation and problem solving within the domain of teaching. The prototypical
expert plans and is self aware in approaching problems. Finally, the prototypical expert is
able to encode, combine, and compare information selectively to arrive at insightful
solutions to problems in teaching.

In the 1980’s, psychologists and scholars in education produced a set of assertions
about the characteristics of expert teachers that were linked to the general psychological
reSearch on expertise (Glaser, 1987, 1990). As differences in experts and novices began
to become codiﬁed across ﬁelds, the idea of a theory of development emerged to describe
the transition from novice to expert.

According to Berliner (1994a, 1994b, 2001), there are propositions about

expertise that describe expert teachers. These include:

Expert teachers often develop automaticity and routinization for the

repetitive operations needed to accomplish their goals;

0 Expert teachers are more sensitive to the task demands and social
situations when solving pedagogical problems;

0 Expert teachers are more opportunistic and ﬂexible in their teachings;

0 Expert teachers represent problems in qualitatively different ways;

40

0 Expert teachers have fast and accurate pattern-recognition capabilities;
0 Expert teachers perceive meaningful patterns in the domain in which they

are experienced;

Expert teachers, although slower at beginning to problem solve, bring richer and more

personal sources of information to bear on the problem that they are trying to solve.

Berliner ( l 98 8) has suggested a ﬁve-stage model for the development of

pedagogical expertise based on a general model presented by Dreyfus and Dreyfus (1986)

in their book Mind Over Machine. Berliner describes these stages as:

Novice — tends to comply to whatever rules and procedures they are told to
follow, behaviour is inﬂexible, experience must be gained;

Advanced beginner — melds book knowledge with on the job experience, still not
very ﬂexible;

Competent performer — has sensible goals, choose ﬂexible means for reaching
goals and can determine what is and what is not important, ﬂexible, can articulate
goals;

Proﬁcient performer - recognizes similarities between quite different situations,
holistic understanding of processes involved, is intuitive and;

Experts — respond effortlessly to the demands of the situation they are confronted
with, when things go well experts seldom appear to be reﬂective about their
teaching. (p. 8-12)

Sabers, Cushing, & Berliner, D. (1991) studied the differences in the monitoring

of classroom events between the novice, advanced beginner, and expert teachers. The

novice teachers chosen were prospective teachers going through alternative certiﬁcation

41

and had no pedagogical training. Advanced beginners were chosen ﬁ'om student teachers
or ﬁrst-year teachers. Expert teachers were identiﬁed as experts on the basis of
observation by two different observers who had at least 5 years of teaching experience.
Advance beginners and novices were interviewed to determine their suitability for the
study. A total of seven experts, four advanced beginners and ﬁve novices were selected
from each of their respective pools. The expert and advanced beginners all taught
secondary science. Novices worked in areas in which scientiﬁc knowledge was required,
but had not training or experience in teaching in the public schools.

The design of the study required one classroom period of a junior high science
classroom to be videotaped for an entire week. One videotape was edited and made into
three separate tapes in order to Show different views of the classroom. Then each of the
participants viewed all three television monitors simultaneously while taking notes on
what they observed. It is important to note that the three monitors were not always on at
the same time. The data were coded by two researchers, and both qualitative and
quantitative methods were used to analyze the data.

A study by Sogin & Wang (2002) explored factors associated with expertise in -
music teaching. The study compared how music teachers enrolled in a summer
professional development program perceived their teaching in terms of factors related to
novice and expert teaching as represented by different models. Results revealed that,
while the novice and expert teachers agreed on characteristics of successful teaching,
87% of group expert teachers, the group that had completed three or more specialized
teacher-training courses, ranked ﬂexibility as the most important characteristic for
effective teaching.

42

Differences were found in how the participants perceived classroom events in
relation to simultaneity, multidimensionality, and immediacy. The term simultaneity is
used to describe how an expert can monitor many different events that occur at the same
time in the classroom. Multidimensionality refers to the large number of responsibilities
and events that happen in a classroom throughout the time, not necessarily at the same
time, and immediacy refers to the rapid pace of classroom events. In scanning all three
monitors, it appeared that experts were better able to: “ a) monitor and comprehend the
events presented, b) interpret the instructional strategies used, c) hypothesize reasons for
behavior seen, and (1) offer solution strategies for problems identiﬁed” (Sabers, (ﬁshing,
& Berliner, 1991, p. 84). Novices were found to be more dualistic thinkers. For example,
they focused mostly on student behavior, especially when they believed the behaviour
was inappropriate. Novices did not make an effort to understand the cause or offer
solutions to address these behaviours. Advanced beginners tried to attach meaning and
offer suggestions for improvement, but they were not as insightful as experts. For all of
these reasons, the researchers, in this study, challenged the assumption that teaching
requires only content knowledge.

Borko & Livingston (1989) studied the differences in mathematics instruction
between three student teachers (two secondary and one elementary) with their co-
operating teachers. The student teachers were selected because of the depth of their
knowledge in mathematics and their high achievement in mathematics methods courses.
Co-operating teachers were thought to be experts on the basis of interviews with building
administrators. For one week, the elementary student teacher and co-operating teacher
were observed teaching mathematics for approximately one hour on consecutive days.

43

Both the secondary student teachers and co-Operating teachers were observed teaching
two sections of the same course that had the same preparation. This was conducted in this
way because, in an earlier study, it was found that teachers revised their teaching
strategies between classes when teaching the same course. The student teachers were
interviewed before teaching about their planning, and following each lesson about their
thoughts after teaching. The “Ethnograph”, an automated coding and retrieval system,
was used to code and sort the data. Case descriptions of each participant’s planning,
teaching, and post-lesson reﬂections were prepared. The authors identiﬁed novices as: (1)
being slower and less efﬁcient planners; (2) encountering problems when attempts to
respond to children led them away from the scripted lesson plans, and; (3) having less
selective post-lesson reﬂections than experts. When interacting with students during a
lesson, novices had difﬁculty improvising. Experts, on the other hand, were better able to
predict where students might have problems. It seems that “experts” propositional
structures for pedagogical content knowledge include stores of powerful explanations,
demonstrations, and examples for representing subject matter to students.

A key element in determining success in student teaching is the relationship
between the student teacher and the co-operating teacher. The student teacher works in an
apprenticeship of observation (Lortie, 1975), becoming acculturated to the coeoperating
teacher’s classroom. Co-operating teachers were once themselves student teachers and
some are easily able to empathize with the student teacher’s anxieties during evaluation-
laden visits by the university supervisor. The deﬁnition of a teacher expert is still
developing, and there is much research to be learned about its application for music
teachers.

44

Bridging the Co-operating Teacher and Student Teacher Gap In the Music Classroom

While there are a number of studies that identify the expectations of co-operating
teachers (Berliner, 2001; Brand, 1982; Castillo, 1971; Grifﬁn, 1989; MacDonald, 1993)
and the expectations of student teachers (Bumsed,1982; Cole, 1993; MacDonald, 1993)
individually, there is little research that brings the expectations of both parties together to
compare and identify those expectations within the boundaries of student teaching.

Schmidt (1994), as a non-participant observer in a qualitative study, explored the
lessons learned by four instrumental music student teachers during their student teaching
experiences. Through detailed observations, videotapes, journals, and interviews,
Schmidt collected data concerning the thinking of these student teachers and the
important inﬂuences in their development as teachers. The primary goals of the study
were to identify the student teachers’ perceptions and experience-based inﬂuences on
those perceptions and to draw connections between each student teacher’s perceptions
and teaching practices in music classrooms. She compared differences and similarities in
the content and processes of the learning acquired from student teaching and other
learning experiences in teacher education. The three research questions were:

0 What are music student teachers’ perceptions of good and poor teaching,
themselves as teachers, and their problems and successes in the
classroom?

0 What experiences shaped the music student teachers’ perceptions?
- What connections exist among the music student teachers perceptions’,
their experiences, and their teaching practices? (p26).

While Schmidt does not make a comparison of similarities and differences between

45

student teachers’ and co-operating teachers’ perceptions, the study does recognize the
direct inﬂuence that the co-operating teachers had on the student teachers’ perceptions of
their experiences, and the ways in which they would like to teach. The perceived quality
of the relationship with their co-operating teachers affected what the students learned
from them.

According to Schmidt (1994), these student teachers lacked a signiﬁcant role
model in music education; their personal experience came from poorly deﬁned models
that they either wanted to or did not want to emulate. The major theme of the four
student teachers consistently emerged as “I want to be myself,” a wish that student
teachers did not communicate to their co-operating teachers. Self-image was an
important factor in how they perceived themselves in the role of teacher. The student
teachers also had little time to reﬂect on and learn from classroom experiences and
expected that they would receive more adequate assistance in making sense of classroom
events from their co-operating teacher than was actually the case. The co-operating
teachers intended to help, but they lacked appropriate models of mentoring. The co-
operating teachers shared their own learning experiences, but they talked more than they
listened and failed to understand the student teachers’ own perceptions of the situation.
All four student teachers expected to please their co-operating teachers and ﬁt into
existing classroom procedures. This belief resulted in student teachers feeling restricted
and not feeling free to be themselves.

Co-operating teachers expected that student teachers would follow and implement
particular teaching practices and routines that were already in place in a classroom. Co-
operating teachers deterrrrined by Krueger (2006) to be experts believed that the student

46

teaching experience was more successful when certain routines were promoted and
practiced. The co-operating teaChers modeled these routines for their student teachers and
subsequently guided and encouraged them through the same practices. Among the most
important of these practices was developing the skill of reﬂecting on the day’s lessons.
Guiding and aiding student teachers to develop these practices on their own, is an
expectation of the co-operating teacher.

An analysis of papers and subsequent discussion led by Zeichner (2002)
addressed many issues concerning student teacher learning. Papers representative of a
variety of subjects; preservice programs at New York University (NYU), Mills College,
Roosevelt University and the University of Haifa were used for the discussion forum.
Additionally the papers also represented a variety of methodologies that have been used
to address the question of what makes a good placement setting: surveys of student
teachers, co-operating teachers, and university supervisors; interviews of preservice and
inservice teachers; and analyses of student teacher journals. Summarized, Zeichner
(2002) agreed with much of what was asserted in the papers:

0 Student teaching is a critical aspect of preservice teacher education, and
co-operating teachers are key participants in determining the quality of
learning for student teachers.

0 Being a good co-operating teacher is important to but is not synonymous
with being a good teacher. Being a good co-operating teacher is more than
providing access to a classroom or modeling a particular version of good
practice. It involves active mentoring.

o The quality of human relationships is important to the making of a good

47

student teaching placement. Speciﬁcally, the importance of a safe and
supportive environment in which student teachers feel able to take risks
and explore options is stressed in the papers.

0 It is important to consider the compatibility of the teaching enacted in the
placement setting with that which is advocated in the rest of the teacher
education curriculum. These papers also discussed the possibility of
compatibility and familiarity acting as a barrier to teacher learning.

Zeichner (2002) emphasized the need to examine student teaching more
systematically, stating that the results of student teaching research are often contradictory
and ambiguous. These inconsistencies need to be addressed in instrumental music, and
the perspectives of the student teacher and the co-operating teacher regarding
expectations are crucial to completely understanding the issues. Little attention has been
given to the co-operating teacher’s expectations or to the expectations of the student
teacher during the music student teaching placement.

Zeichner’s (2002) ﬁndings are important in that they state what makes successful
student teacher and co-operating teacher experiences. However, the problem is that,
rather than aiding and guiding the student teacher to have these successful outcomes
during the ﬁeld experience, co-operating teachers expect that they will happen on their
own. Co-operating teachers do not necessarily know how to facilitate these outcomes.
Student teachers, on the other hand, do not know what to expect during the ﬁeld
experience. All that they know is that they want a positive outcome to occur. Providing
both student teachers and co-operating teachers with the tools for success is dependent

upon what each of their expectations are of each other.

48

Berthelotte (2000) investigated and compared the expectations of a current
student teacher, a former student teacher and their co-operating teacher during one of
their instrumental music student teaching placements. Qualitative data were collected
using ﬁve open-ended questions that were administered in an e-mail interview format to
the three participants. All three participants answered the questions during the
instrumental music teaching block in which they were either the co-operating teacher or
the student teacher.

Analysis revealed that co-operating teachers and student teachers do have
expectations of one another. These expectations fell into the categories of feedback,
observation, creativity, and relationship. Feedback was a primary concern for the student
teachers, but not the co-operating teacher. The student teachers expected more feedback
than was given; the co-operating teacher, however, found that the student teachers were
not always Open to feedback. The co-operating teacher was ﬁ'ustrated more by a lack of
knowledge and speciﬁc music skills than by providing feedback to the student teachers
(Berthelotte, 2000).

The second theme to emerge in Berthelotte’s (2000) study was that of
observation. The student teacher believed that an observation period should occur to
enable student teachers to become familiar with classroom communication, teaching
techniques, organization, scheduling, and the course outline for the music program in
which they were placed. The student teachers expected that she would have a chance to
observe how an experienced teacher handles issues and then begin to assume teaching
responsibilities slowly with an assigned topic to teach. However, what actually occurred
was a quick immersion into teaching with little observation time, leaving the student

49

teacher feeling unprepared to teach independently. Both the current student teacher and
former student teachers felt that their ﬁrst few days were spent trying to ﬁgure out the
achievement level of the music class and that they could have saved time and frustration
if their co-operating teacher had allowed for more observation time. The co-operating
teacher expected that the students should observe the established class routines but did
not believe that extensive observation was needed.

Creativity was the third theme to emerge. The co-operating teacher expected her
student teachers to use her own strategies in the music classroom and to create interest for
the students. Also, the co-operating teacher expected that student teachers would show
initiative, do research, and be creative in the classroom. Both the current and former
student teachers felt that they were encouraged to try new things, and, although frustrated
initially, they appreciated this opportunity later on. The student teachers reported that the
expectation to be creative was one of their most positive experiences during their student
teaching experiences.

Relationships emerged as a fourth and ﬁnal theme of this study. Results clearly
revealed that developing and maintaining a positive relationship was an important
expectation for both the co-operating teacher and the student teacher. The co—operating
teacher determined that a good relationship existed when the student teacher established a
good rapport with students and other teachers. Further, the co-operating teacher expected
that her relationship would be non-threatening and team-like and that the student teacher
should be approachable and compatible. When the student teacher displayed these
characteristics, the co-operating teacher felt that a good relationship was in place. The
student teacher expected the relationship with the co-operating teacher to be professional.

50

Student teachers believed that they could establish a positive relationship if the co-
operating teacher was supportive, open to their ideas, and objective.
Summary

Co-operating teachers and student teachers have roles that are not clearly deﬁned.
These roles can be deﬁned through communication between co-operating teachers and
student teachers prior to the student teaching experience. A lack of congruence between
expectations of these two parts of the student teaching triangle can result in conﬂict and
tension.

One such expectation involves the relationship between the co-operating teacher
and the student teacher during practica. According to MacDonald (1995), conﬂicts exist
within the relationship between the co-operating teacher and the student teacher. Co-
operating teachers believed that having student teachers in the classroom had beneﬁts and
drawbacks. These beneﬁts and drawbacks were often dependent upon the relationship
that the student teacher had with the co-operating teacher.

Student teachers often feel dominated by concerns such as classroom
management, fulﬁlling the expectations of others when they are unclear as to what those
expectations are, and simply surviving student teaching. However, student teachers
develop strategies that allow them to cope. Among the most salient factors causing stress
for the student teachers is the lack of clarity of the expectations of their co-operating
teachers (Gordon, 2000).

According to F arbstein, (1965), student teachers need to know the expectations of
their co-operating teachers and how to adjust their teaching behaviours accordingly.
Expectations voiced by student teachers of their co-operating teachers revealed that part

51

of the process of becoming a teacher involved the ability to interpret the behaviour of the
students, the co-Operating teacher, and the wider school community.

The vast majority of literature supports the belief that co-operating teachers play a
critical role in the professional growth and success of student teachers. Some studies
suggest that cO-operating teachers themselves believe that they had to learn on their own
during their student teaching days and that their student teachers should do the same.
Other studies cite co-operating teachers acknowledging ways in which they should be
able to help the student teacher, but feel they lack the skills to do so. These strategies
include issues such as providing feedback, allowing for more observation time, and
feeling a willingness to engage in reﬂection with the student teacher.

Studies of co-operating teachers and student teachers that focus on instrumental
music have investigated stress factors for the student teacher and co-operating teacher
during student teaching. Co-operating teachers were already aware of the many issues
that result in stress. However, student teachers did not expect that a lack of interest in
music programs on behalf of students, parents, colleagues, and administrations would be
one of those pronounced stresses.

Other researchers investigated the inﬂuence of co-operating teachers’ on student
teachers’ beliefs about and skill development for becoming a music teacher and found no
statistical differences between the student teachers’ before-and-after student teaching
beliefs and skills. Brand (1985) suggested that the lack of a co-Operating teacher with
superior classroom skills and unclear expectations could have contributed to this result.
Student teachers believe that the process of becoming good music teachers depends upon
a strong relationship with their co-Operating teachers.

52

A number of studies (Zeichner, 2002; Krueger, 2006; MacDonald, 1993) have
reported problems encountered by both student teachers and co-operating teachers, and
most of these problems were a result of differences in expectations. Co-operating
teachers identiﬁed the establishment of communication strategies that would enable the
student teacher to understand the speciﬁc expectations of the co-operating teacher as an
important coping strategy when having student teachers in their classroom.

Expectations of co-operating teachers and student teachers during student
teaching in instrumental music warrant investigation. Studies discussed within the
literature review shed light on the diversity of issues faced by both the co-operating
teacher and student teacher in a variety of classroom settings and subject areas. The
ﬁndings of these studies have implications for this study.

Determining and investigating the expectations of co-operating teachers and
student teachers could potentially change the way the student teaching experience is
approached by both the co-operating teacher and the student teacher. Developing a
communication strategy for both the co-operating teacher and student teacher could result
in the student teaching experience being individualized to the needs of the student
teacher, rather than solely on the needs of the co-operating teacher. The role of the co-
operating teacher could be enhanced when communication is open, because co-operating
teachers could become comfortable and look forward to providing feedback, offering
. opportunities to the student teachers, and reﬂecting about their own roles as co-operating
teachers, allowing them to search for new ways to improve in this role. Both parties
could become better experienced in anticipating needs and developing plans better suited

for success during student teaching. Further, due to the short teaching blocks assigned to

53

the student teachers and co—operating teachers in Ontario, ﬁnding ways that expectations
become standard and are transferable rather than repetitive from placement to placement
could potentially increase the Skill development and lessen the stress factors experienced
in the roles of both the co-operating teachers and the student teachers.

The expert-novice or student teacher studies provide a comparison of the thinking
between student teachers and expert teachers. Researchers have concluded that student
teachers seem to have a difﬁcult time understanding the many things that occur in and
around the classroom at any given time, and lack knowledge of what is “typical” in a
classroom setting. Novices tend to have more difﬁculty “winging” it and have to pay
attention to their prepared lesson plan more than expert teachers, who are able to
anticipate difﬁculties and adjust methods accordingly.

As a co-operating teacher and a novice teacher, these experiences are familiar to
me. Although novice teachers feel they have been prepared in music education through
their undergraduate work at college, their ability to implement that work in a music
classroom setting is not experienced until they are in a classroom. Lesson plans provide
the novice teacher with a resource somewhat likened to a security blanket at this phase of
their teaching experiences. Expert teachers, on the other hand, possess the ability to
anticipate ways of student learning without a detailed lesson plan. Time experience and
good mentorship in the classroom is the only method I have experienced that will allow

novice teachers to develop into experts.

54

Chapter III
METHODOLOGY

Participants: Co-0perating Teacher and Student Teacher Selection

The purpose of this study was to investigate and compare co-operating teachers’
and student teachers’ expectations about student teaching during instrumental music
teaching blocks. This investigation involved four instrumental music teachers and four
student teachers majoring in instrumental music education. CO-operating teachers and
student teachers described their expectations of each other before, during, and after
practice teaching blocks through data collection procedures including one-on—one
interviews, focus group interviews, and joumaling. Participants are identiﬁed by
pseudonyms to protect their conﬁdentiality.

This project beneﬁted from the participation of four respected, experienced
instrumental music educators as co-operating teachers: two were teaching instrumental
music to students in grades 9-12, and two were teaching instrumental music to students in
grades 5-8. Co-operating teacher selection was based on experience as co-operating
teachers in the past, diversity of teaching situation (for example, the participants, one
elementary teacher worked in an inner city school, and one in a more suburban area),
professional reputation, and teacher willingness. In addition, I had previous professional
associations with all four teachers.

“Tammy,” who holds a Bachelor of Music Degree and a Bachelor of Education
degree, has developed her school music program by increasing numbers of students and
raising the quality of both performances of her ensemble and musical experiences. This
has resulted in her establishing a positive reputation within the community and

55

administrative acknowledgement of the importance of music in her school over the past
four years. Tammy has taught at the elementary school level for the last eight years. She is
involved in her community as a musician and continues to perform in community-based
ensembles. Tammy attends at least one music education conference a year to strengthen
her teaching skills.

Tammy teaches instrumental music to students in grades 5 through 8. In addition,
Tammy is also responsible for math and science on a rotating system for all grade 7
students. She runs lunchtime band rehearsals as well as band classes scheduled during the
regular school day. She sees all of her instrumental students two times per week in their
regular mandatory band class. Lunchtime rehearsals are voluntary. There are no before or
after school rehearsals, because virtually all of the students are bussed to and from
school. Her work with the grades ﬁve through eight music students is highly respected,
and her students have won national music awards in competitions for the past two years.
Tammy and I have collaborated through my university teaching. She often volunteers to
host music education students who are completing observation portfolios as a project for
music education classes that I teach.

“Yvonne,” a second elementary teacher, holds a Bachelor of Music Degree and a
Bachelor of Education degree from the University of Western Ontario. She has been
teaching instrumental music at a variety of schools throughout the Province of Ontario
for the past 21 years. She was a piano major who took many techniques classes while
doing her undergraduate work. She has been at her current school for 13 years and has
acted as a co-operating teacher ﬁfteen times prior to this study.

Yvonne’s school offers a tremendous number of challenges, and she has taught in

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this same inner-city school for the past 13 years. This school is rich in cultural diversity,
having students new to Canada, often unable to speak English. Many of her students are
considered “at risk,” and she uses music as a tool to teach self-respect, respect for others,
and self-discipline. Additionally, this school is known as a compensatory school,
meaning that it receives additional funding from the Government of Ontario to run
breakfast and lunch programs, clothing programs for whole families, and various other
social needs programs. More than 50 percent of the students in this school are ESL
(English as a second language) students. A high percentage of the schools’ families
receive social assistance of some kind. It is not unusual for class rolls to change each
week with new students arriving and others leaving, usually without notifying the
teacher.

Yvonne teaches music to students from junior kindergarten (four years of age) to
grade eight. The students ﬁ'om grades six to eight receive mandatory instrumental music
classes. Yvonne runs lunchtime rehearsals for intermediate and senior choirs, as well as
intermediate and senior bands. Her population of students causes her to choose choral
music with words geared to developing motivation, courage, and self-respect. She offers
many perforrrring opportunities for her students in the community and at the local Kiwanis
Music Festival each year. She is actively involved in her community as a musician. She
continues to sing in a local choir and is the director and accompanist for her church.
Yvonne has sat on many committees for designing new music curricula in the elementary
system. She is passionate about the inclusion of at risk students in the music program, and
she is highly respected in her ﬁeld. I have collaborated with her on many occasions,
sending her university music education students who can provide extra help with her

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classes. Undergraduate music education majors have beneﬁted profoundly from being
involved with her and her school.

“Leo” is one of two secondary school teachers participating in this study. In terms
of years of experience, Leo is the youngest of all four teachers, having taught at the high
school level for the past 10. He has acted as a co-operating teacher on two prior occasions.
Leo was apprehensive about acting as a co-operating teacher, explaining that his prior
experiences with student teachers had not gone well.

Leo spent his ﬁrst 5 years as a music educator developing a general music program
in a secondary school for students with multiple learning disabilities. In his present school,
Leo works with junior and senior concert bands. These ensembles are both for credit at his
high school, so there are no extra-curricular music rehearsals. He is a highly respected
music educator.

Recently, Leo completed a Masters of Education degree. In addition, Leo is
actively involved in the community by volunteering to operate a marching band pro gram
made up of school music students from across the city and county, which he describes as
his way of giving back to the community. He remains active in the community as a
professional jazz saxophonist. I was Leo’s supervising teacher during his year at
Teacher’s College.

“Brad” began teaching after a successful professional career as an orchestral
trombone player in Vancouver, 3.0 He has been employed in various secondary schools,
one of which offered a general music program suited to the needs of the learning disabled.
Brad is currently the Head of the Arts department at the local arts high school. This high
school specializes in dance, drama, music, visual arts, and photography. He teaches

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instrumental music to students in grades nine through 12, including guitar classes.
Additionally, he runs the pit band for musicals and before school band rehearsals for
credit. Brad has a Bachelor of Music and a Bachelor of Education degree from the
University of Windsor. In addition, Brad continues to freelance heavily as a professional
musician, both in Canada and the United States. Brad has acted as a co-operating teacher
on seven occasions prior to this study. Brad and I attended university together and have
worked together in various professional music venues prior to becoming teachers.

Because of my rapport with these teachers, I was comfortable in asking them to
participate in this study. According to Patton, (1990) rapport means “. . .that I respect the
people being interviewed, so what they say is important because of who is saying it.
Rapport is built on the ability to convey empathy and understanding without judgrnen ” (p.
317). All participating co-operating teachers were colleagues of mine working within the
same city and surrounding county. We have shared educational ideas and strategies, relied
on each other for various needs, and played in music ensembles together. Although I did
not know all the student teachers, I have acted as both a student teacher and a co-operating
teacher. As a result I was empathetic to the stress surrounding the student teaching
experience for both parties. Additionally, I hoped that these co-operating teachers would
be comfortable enough with me so that their teaching would not change, despite the fact
that they knew there would be student teachers reporting to me about them. I also hoped
that they would be able to reﬂect honestly about their student teachers and about
themselves as co-operating teachers during the various data collection processes.

The four student teachers who participated in this study were in attendance at the
University of Windsor’s Faculty of Education, also known as Teachers’ College. This is

59

an eight—month program. These particular student teachers have completed a Bachelor of
Music from various universities around Canada or Europe and would qualify, upon
completing their student teaching, to teach instrumental music as one of their subjects in
the Province of Ontario.

Early in September 2004, I attended an Instrumental Methods class taught by a
colleague at the University of Windsor’s Teachers College to recruit participants for this
study. Using handouts for students (Appendix A), I presented a summary of research
ﬁndings regarding the co-operating teacher and student teacher experiences in both
general education and music education. Additionally, this presentation outlined the
purpose of the study, the speciﬁc research questions and the data collection procedures.
Next, I explained the responsibilities of the student teachers who would choose to
participate in this study (Appendix B).

There were 14 students in attendance in this class. The presentation lasted
approximately 30 nrinutes. Upon completion of the presentation, I asked students
interested in participating in the study to e-mail or call me. The only criterion for
inclusion in the study was that the student teachers would be teaching instrumental music
in elementary or secondary schools as a primary, not a secondary teachable, and that they
would agree to the data collection procedure.

Within a week of the presentation, I was contacted via e-mail by three students.
Two of them were qualifying for M (Junior/Intermediate, grades 4-10) and one for US
(Intermediate/Senior, grades 6-12). The fourth student participant contacted me two
weeks after the presentation. As each student e—mailed me, I called them by phone. In
brief conversations, they assured me that they were willing to participate. I, in turn,

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answered any ﬁnal questions that they had regarding their responsibility as a participant
in the study.

The ﬁrst student teacher to respond to participate was “Mary.” Mary completed a
Bachelor of Music Degree. She was attending Teacher’s College to qualify to teach
instrumental music in junior grades. Mary’s music background was not from school
music programs but instead from being a member of the local military band as she was
growing up. There was no high school music program at her school. Her band experience
was limited to military band and military repertoire until she arrived at university. Mary
was a trumpet major while at university. I have had no association with Mary before this
study.

The second student teacher to respond as a participant was “Tom,” who held a
Bachelor of Musical Arts degree. He spent the last several years owning and running a
restaurant as well as being a new father of two small children. Tom’s major instrument
was tuba. He spent his university years concentrating on course work that he knew would
beneﬁt him when he became a music educator. His high school music program had a
profound impact on him as a student, and he believed he could have that effect on others.
Although he no longer played in the community, he continued to sing in a choir. Tom was
a past student of mine in a music education class that I taught at the university.

“Mike” was the third student teacher to respond. Mike holds a Bachelor of Music
degree and was a trombone major. His interests as a university student were primarily in
composition and history. His initial reason for attending Teachers’ College was to gain
some experience as a teacher of grade six and seven students. His plan was to continue to
compose while teaching. I did not have any prior associations with Mike.

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The last student teacher to respond was “Kate.” Kate was from Romania and
came to Canada with an already established performing and teaching portfolio. She was a
professional violinist in her hometown of Cluj-Napoca, Romania. She held both a
Bachelor of Music and a Bachelor of Education degree from Romanian’schools and
arrived in Canada in 1990. Kate taught instrumental music (band and strings) for a
number of years at a private school in Toronto, Ontario. She had worked as a music
teacher in her native country of Romania, but she had to qualify in Ontario in order to
teach for publicly funded schools. The majority of her teaching experience was with
students from grades ﬁve through eight. Kate was qualifying to teach intermediate and
senior grades and work in a secondary school setting. Kate was multilingual, speaking
four languages, and was an adult student in her 40’s at Teacher’s College, as well as a
mother and wife. Kate moved to Windsor to complete her teaching qualiﬁcations. I had no
association with Kate prior to this study.

I immediately felt comfortable with the students who had agreed to participate.
Although Kate had expressed concerns about an already heavy workload and fear of not
being able to complete the requirements of a participant, I thought her perspective as a
foreign national and adult student would add an interesting dimension to this study. She
contacted me a week after the others. Even though I was concerned, because of the
limited response of willing students, I included Kate as a participant.

This study involved student teachers and co-operating teachers. during
instrumental music teaching placements at both the elementary and secondary levels. In
Ontario, most elementary schools are conﬁgured as Junior Kindergarten to grade eight.
Generally speaking, secondary schools consist of grades 9 through 12. The ﬁeld

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experience program at university Teachers Colleges in the Province of Ontario provides
for a total of 64 days of classroom observation and teaching. At the University of
Windsor, where this study took place, the student teaching schedule consists of four 3-
week teaChing blocks. These occur in October, November, February, and April.

The four co-operating teachers participating in this study worked with a student
teacher for two 3-week blocks of instrumental music teaching at either the elementary or
secondary level. The four student teachers had four blocks of student teaching practice,
and at least two of those blocks were in instrumental music. The other two 3-week
teaching blocks were reserved for “secondary teachable subjects.” These subjects were
dictated by the levels in which teacher candidates were qualifying to teach. For example,
the student teachers involved in this study included two qualifying to teach at a
J unior/Intennediate level. This means that in addition to qualifying to teach instrumental
music, they also taught elementary classroom subjects during two of their student
teaching blocks. Additionally, those music education majors qualifying to teach
Intermediate/Senior level students, taught in their secondary teachable of one subject for
two of the student teaching blocks. These two blocks of instrumental music student
teaching occurred in November, 2004 and April, 2005. For the purpose of this study, I
only collected data from student teachers during the instrumental-music student teaching
blocks.

Methodology Frame

My goal as a researcher in this study was to listen to and interpret the expectations
of both student teachers and co-operating teachers during instrumental music student
teaching placements. This requires a ﬂexible research design that was open and

63

emergent; it involved the researcher interpreting the meaning of events for the co-
operating teacher and the student teacher; it involved people in familiar and unfamiliar
settings, and representations and interpretations of multiple realities; it involved various
contexts; and it involved the participation of an actively reﬂective researcher who was
open to continual discovery. These factors contributed to what Lincoln and Guba (1985)
describe as a constantly evolving design that allows research to “unfold, cascade, roll,
and emerge” (p. 210).

In this study, I interviewed student teachers and co-operating teachers. I have
served in both of those roles before. As a high school instrumental music teacher, a co-
operating teacher, and a lecturer of undergraduate music education classes, I brought
certain understandings to the study. My professional background and personal experience
provided me with a strong theoretical sensitivity to this study. I tried to remain aware of
this during data analysis, as this awareness was crucial to ensure that I was not making
assumptions and overlooking important factors.

The focus of the study was on the lived experiences of the participants during
student teaching, suggesting a phenomenological approach. Bogdan and Biklen (1998)
discuss the importance of theoretical orientation as “a way of looking at the world, the
assumption people have about what is important and what makes the world work” (p. 22).
Merriam (1988) discusses the theoretical orientation of the researcher as an important
element in qualitative research. According to Bogdan and Biklen (1998), the researcher
should become aware of his or her theoretical orientation, because this awareness
facilitates the collection and analysis of data. In spite of the considerable debate that exists
around the word “theory” in research, Patton (1990) suggests that the idea of linking a

64

theory to a speciﬁc method Of research means “. . .that how you study the world
determines what you learn about the world” (p. 67).

Patton (1990) states that, “. . .phenomenological inquiry focuses on the question:
What is the structure and essence of experience of this phenomenon for these people?” (p.
69) Phenomenological researchers attempt to understand the meaning of events and
interactions of ordinary people in particular settings (Bogdan & Biklen, 1992). According
to Bresler (1995), phenomenology is “. . .lived experience. . .it is human science which
Studies persons” (p. 8). As a researcher within this phenomenological frame, it was
important for me to act as an observer to the extent that it was possible. While the
inclusion of my own personal lived experiences and the beliefs I have contracted from
them was important, it was also important for me to acknowledge my assumptions,
attitudes, and views in order to see the experience more clearly. I believed that I could
only begin to understand the expectations of both student teachers and co-operating
teachers by giving them a voice with which to describe these expectations. According to
Patton, “. . .there is no separate reality for people, there is only what they know their
experience is and means” (p. 69).

Theoretical Framework.

This is an instrumental multiple case study and I am studying the participants to
ﬁnd out more information about the expectations of the co-operating teachers and student
teachers during instrumental music placements. Case study is an ideal methodology
when a holistic, in-depth investigation is needed (F eagum, Orurn & Sjoberg, 1991). Case
studies have been used in varied investigations, particularly sociological studies, but also
increasingly in instruction. According to Stake (1995), when the study is experimental or

65

quasi-experimental, the data collection and analysis methods are known to hide some
details. Case studies, on the other hand, are designed to bring out the details ﬁom the
viewpoint of the participants by using multiple sources of data. Stake’s (1995) term
“instrumental case study design” is used when the researcher wants to understand more
than what is obvious to the observer. The method of phenomenology gave direction to.
becoming aware of, and understanding, the meaning of co-operating teacher and student-
. teacher experience. The goal of this study was to achieve what Merleau-Ponty (1956) saw
as the purpose of the effort of phenomenology: “to describe experience as it is and to
describe it directly, without considering the various causal explanations social scientists
may give” (p. 59).

Turning to the nature of lived experience

The fundamental process of understanding demands a posture of thoughtful
attending or orienting toward an abiding area of concern. Phenomenological research
originates in a particular, real-life awareness that makes the researcher want to make
sense of some aspect of human existence. This study was motivated by a desire to
construct an interpretation of what the human experience of the student teacher and co-
operating teacher is really like; speciﬁcally, what does it mean to be such a student or co-
operating teacher?

Bracketing, or placing one’s knowledge about a phenomenon outside of it, is
essential. This is a conscious process of becoming aware of what is known and setting it
aside, rather than trying to ignore or forget that the knowledge exists. Personal and
professional understandings, beliefs, biases, assumptions, presuppositions, and theories
about student and co-operating teacher information were made explicit and recalled

66

throughout the study. A primary concern was to be open to the experiences described by
all participants.

In this study, explications of meaning of the student teacher and co-operating
teacher experience provided a deeper understanding of the phenomenon. Phenomenology-
guided description of the student teacher and co-operating teacher experience provided a
structure for unfolding the phenomenon before the eyes and ears of the researcher. The
process uncovered meaning in experience.

Role of the Researcher

My role as researcher was that of observer, and I was immersed in the experiences
of the participants in this study as they were voiced during focus group interviews, one-
on-one interviews, and as I read-through electronic joumaling. Guba and Lincoln (1981)
describe this research role as allowing the researcher to, “...emphasize, describe, compare,
portray, evoke images and create, for the reader or listener, the sense of having been there"
(p. 149). In order for participants to share openly their experiences during data collection,
I had to negotiate the boundaries that separated me as observer. This allowed for a more
meaningful construction of knowledge and understanding.

Having been a student teacher within this same structure of four three-week block
teaching experiences, I was reminded of the concerns that I felt during my own student
teaching. By the time that I had arrived at Teachers’ College, I had a Master’s Degree in
French horn performance with a theory minor. I was making a living as a freelance
musician and was auditioning around the country for a permanent orchestral job. I was
going to Teachers College just in case I could not ﬁnd a playing job.

Each block teaching experience was negative for me. This reaction was, in part,

67

because I was not open-minded about teaching, and, in part, because I felt a lack of
direction in what was expected of me from the co-operating teacher during each student
teaching experience. I was often left on my own, because my co-operating teachers felt I
was technically skilled enough in the classroom to be trusted alone with students. I was
often used to strengthen their brass section rather than to work as a teacher within a
classroom. This made it difﬁcult for them and for me to recognize the weaknesses that I
displayed as a teacher of instrumental music. I was often unaware of what the students
already knew, and, as a result, lesson planning often faltered. I felt as if I had failed. I
received little meaningful feedback. There was never a time that the co-operating teacher
and I just sat and talked about teaching instrumental music, what it did for students, what
it did for the co-operating teacher, and what it could do for me as a teacher. There were no
observation days. On the days that they were to occur, I was immediately immersed into
actual teaching.

I was naive enough to believe that all students enrolled in music in high school
were there because they wanted to be. Upon reﬂection, I blame this belief partially on a
lack of exposure to a philosophy of music education. My own philosophy was built on
my goals and not on goals of the students that I was teaching. I completed my year of
Teachers’ College feeling like a failure, yet grateﬁrl that I would have something to fall
back on if playing did not work out.

After completing Teachers’ College, I was hired for an instrumental music
teaching position. This position was a dream for a brand new music teacher. The school
had award winning, established musical ensembles. There was another full time music
teacher on site who could mentor me daily. The program was popular, supported, and a

68

source of pride in the community and the high school. It was a wonderful opportunity
through which to learn. While this ideal placement should have been something that I
looked forward to and alleviated some concerns, it had the opposite effect. I did not ask
questions. I did not regard the other teacher as my colleague or mentor, because I felt that
I should already know the answers. I felt unprepared for the task of teaching and
constantly believed that I was not good enough to be a successful teacher. I felt that my
job was to create professional players, who should think about music the way I thought
about it. I had a deeply held feeling that, because I felt so inadequate, I was unable to
provide students with a meaningful music education. After two weeks of teaching, I quit.
I returned to the auditioning circuit, won a full time orchestral position in another
province, and pursued a playing career. It was ﬁfteen years before I returned to the
classroom. A clearer understanding of the role and expectations of the student teacher and
the co-operating teacher might have changed my career path.

Winning an orchestral job in a new province was an opportunity to see and
experience music education in a different way. Part of my job was teaching the local
university French horn majors as well as French horn students enrolled at the conservatory
of music. I ended up with a studio of 31 born students, an unusually large number. French
horn students would often talk of their school music programs, which were a primary
reason why they were studying music privately. Many positive comments from my
students made me wonder what it was about school music that had them so enthused. I
began to go into the high schools to observe ﬁrst-hand how music was being taught.

One of the ﬁrst things I noticed was the camaraderie amongst the music educators
themselves. There was collaboration between the elementary school music teachers and

69

teachers of the secondary schools that these students would eventually attend. Music
education was viewed more as an education for students rather than a competition between
schools. I was encouraged. A parental advocacy group for arts in schools was strong in
this province, and the voices of these parents allowed music educators to provide students
with a more comprehensive music education than what I had been accustomed to seeing.
Music education in instrumental music was not just about playing, entertaining, and
winning competitions. It centered on learning about music and creating an educated
audience.

Constant encouragement and consistent contact amongst music educators and
student teachers allowed for successful student teaching experiences to occur. Co-
operating teachers viewed their role as crucial in continuing the level of music education
that was occurring in schools by welcoming student teachers to work with them. This was
the kind of experience that I had wanted for myself. In this school system, constant
attention and direction from co-operating teachers provided student teachers with positive
experiences. Approximately two years later, I took on a secondary school instrumental
music job and began to develop my self concept as a music educator. What I learned at
that time has carried directly into how I conduct myself now in my own job as a high
school music educator and a university lecturer in music education courses.

As a co-operating teacher, I have seen ﬁrst-hand the need for open communication
with the student teachers that are assigned to me. We talk about how I will evaluate them
while observing them. This talk about evaluation tends to open up the lines of
communication between the student teacher and me. I welcome comments and questions
from them while we speak. I take it upon myself to see that the student teachers are

70

videotaped so that they can see themselves as teachers, which I believe strengthens their
attitudes and their own personal philosophies. Prior to beginning each student teaching
experience, I spend time detailing the expectations I have of these student teachers, and I
ask them to think about what they expect of me and to voice these expectations. My
expectations not only concern rapport within the school and the classroom, but also their
level of musical skill. I expect that, if my student teachers do not know how tocorrect
things, they can acknowledge the problem and ﬁx it with work and guidance. My primary
concern, however, is that each student teacher leaves my classroom with a positive music
teaching experience and a view of him or herself as a teacher of music. Student teachers
must understand what they need to do to allow themselves to be more successful with each
subsequent teaching experience. Through continuing my own education, I have begun to
discover the needs of student teachers and co-operating teachers and to pay more attention
to them. I regard student teaching as crucial to becoming a successful teacher. Current
student teachers may become co-Operating teachers in the future. Making student teachers
aware of the importance of voicing their expectations in their own student teaching
experience potentially could change the way in which they think about their roles as co-
operating teachers later in their careers.

As a lecturer of music education classes for undergraduate students, I am aware of
the need for students to take ownership for the type of experience that they have as student
teachers. Collaboration with their co-operating teachers, expressing their needs as student
teachers, and reﬂecting on their daily student teaching experiences are key contributors to

successful outcomes.

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Data Collection
Data collection techniques included an individual interview with each participant,

two focus group interviews for both the student teachers and the co—operating teachers in

separate groups, and electronic joumaling by both student teachers and co-operating

teachers during student teaching placements. Student teachers and co-operating teachers

were sent a schedule of data collection dates and procedures via e-mail (see Appendix C).

Times and dates for the individual interviews and both focus group interviews were

scheduled via e-mail correspondence. The journals were forwarded via e-mail from study

participants to the researcher at the end of each week throughout their teaching block

experiences. These journals were printed and ﬁled for consequent data analysis by the

researcher.

Several types of data from eight study participants were collected over a period

Of eight months. A week prior to the ﬁrst block teaching experience, scheduled for
October 2004, each participant was interviewed individually. Questions for these one-on-
one interviews (Appendix D for student teachers and Appendix E for co-operating
teachers) were sent via email to participants one week before their scheduled interviews.
The purpose of the initial interview was four-fold. First, it was an opportunity to conﬁrm
with all participants their responsibilities as participants in data collection, including the
interview, two focus group interviews, and joumaling. Second, each participant had a
chance to read the letters granting permission for the study to be conducted from both the
University of Windsor Ethics Board and Michigan State University Committee on
Research Involving Human Subjects (U CRIHS). Third, participants signed their consent
forms (Appendix L) and permission forms granting permission to audio-tape the

72

interviews (Appendix M). Fourth, it was the beginning of the data collection process.

In the one-on-one interviews, conducted in October 2004, I collected as much
general data as I could with four open-ended questions for the student teachers (Appendix
D). The answers to these questions helped to identify the expectations of student teachers
and co-operating teachers during instrumental music placements. Additionally, co-
operating teachers were asked ﬁve open-ended questions (Appendix E) in a parallel set of
individual interviews.

After each block teaching experience, a focus group interview was held for the
student teachers and another for the co-Operating teachers. During these focus group
interviews, student teachers were asked ﬁve open-ended questions (Appendix F) and co-
operating teachers were also asked ﬁve parallel open—ended questions (Appendix G).
Analysis of these interviews involved asking progressively more reﬁned questions in
addition to the ﬁve open-ended questions during the interview (Spradley, 1980; Spindler,
1982) that I believed would aid in answering the speciﬁc questions of the study. Finally,
individual joumaling, including scenarios or stories, was part of data collection process.
Each student teacher (Appendix H) and co-operating teacher (Appendix I) was asked to
focus on particular issues during practice teaching ﬁeld experiences. These issues were
speciﬁc to each week of practice teaching and were identiﬁed as a result of the analysis
of the interview data. Thus, the process of collecting data, asking questions, and
analyzing data were all concerned with ﬁnding relationships among the data (Burgess,
1985; Spradley, 1979; Strauss, 1987). I analyzed the data, coding according to patterns
and categories, and developed themes that included and accounted for the data (Merriam,
1988; Spradley, 1980; Strauss, 1987).

73

Focus group interviews occurred in December 2004 and May 2005. Participants
received their times and questions (Appendix F for student teachers and Appendix G for
co-operating teachers) two weeks before each focus group interview via email. All
interviews were audio-taped using two tape recorders and transcribed by a paid
transcriber. Permission was granted from the Head of the School of Music, University of
Windsor (Appendix O) for both individual interviews and focus group interviews to be
conducted in a classroom at that site.

Journaling was the ﬁnal source of data collection for this study. At the beginning
of each block teaching experience, student teachers and co-operating teachers received an
e-mail guiding them toward issues on which to focus during that particular week for their
journal writings (Appendix H for student teachers and Appendix I for co-Operating
teachers). At the end of each week, j oumal entries were e-mailed to the researcher from
the participants.

Trustworthiness

The issue of trustworthiness was addressed through a variety of triangulation
methods. Data triangulation was achieved through the variety of data collection
techniques, which included one-on-one interviews, focus group interviews, and joumaling
and through the multiple data sources, which included the four co-operating teachers and
the four student teachers. Also, data analysis triangulation was achieved through peer
review. An experienced qualitative researcher in education research at the University of
South Carolina and colleague, Dr. Victoria O glan, examined the raw data to conﬁrm my
codings.

Finally, member checks were used to further enhance trustworthiness. I sent all

74

transcripts from interviews to participating co-operating teachers and student teachers for
comments. According to Lincoln & Guba (1985), the purpose of member checking is to
test for factual and interpretive accuracy and also “. . .to provide evidence of credibility —
the trustworthiness criterion analogous to internal validity in conventional studies” (p.
374). “Member checking is directed at a judgment of overall credibility, while
triangulation is directed at the accuracy of speciﬁc data items” (p. 316). Both informal and
formal member checks were carried out throughout the study. It was especially important
to allow the participants to view my interpretation of their voices as what they intended to
be heard. All participants agreed during the study that my interpretations were
representative of their own thoughts and feelings and provided meaning for the
experience. In addition, I was corrected by both Kate and Mary regarding their

backgrounds prior to arriving at Teacher’s College.

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Chapter IV
VOICES OF THE PARTICIPANTS AND IDENTIFICATION OF THEMES

The goal of analysis in phenomenology is to gain “. . .insight into the essence of a
phenomenon and it involves a process of reﬂectively appropriating, of clarifying, and of
making explicit the structure of meaning of the lived experience” (van Manen, 1990, p.
77). In analyzing the data, I interpreted structures of meaning or themes about the lived
experience from the transcribed interviews and journals with student teachers and co-
operating teachers. Creating themes “. . .is largely an intuitive process but it is also
systematic and informed by the study’s purpose and the investigator’s orientation and
knowledge” (Merriam, 1988, p. 133). Interview transcripts, focus group interview
transcripts and journal entries were analyzed according to the case study research analysis
procedures outlined by Merriam (1988) and Yin (1994). Common elements were coded
in the data, and themes were identiﬁed. The process of discovering phenomenological
themes involved grasping and formulating an understanding of meaning structures of the
student teachers and co-operating teachers.

Themes were formed and became interpretive products that evolved through a
conscious, unbiased openness to all data in response to the question, “. . .what is the
essence of the notion being expressed here” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962; VanManen, 1990).
Coding strategies were used to categorize and manage concepts from statements and
words abstracted from the data. Thus, I attempted to isolate the essence of meaning of the
views of the student teachers and co-operating teachers.

The danger in a study using a variety of data collection techniques is that the
researcher will collect “a large mass of data of dubious theoretical relevance” (Glasser &

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Strauss, 1967, p. 72). To counteract this possibility, data analysis, which is “the process
of making sense out of one’s data” (Merriam, 1988, p. 127), began with the initial
collection of data and continued throughout the duration of the study. I noted insights as
they happened (Burgess, 1985; Erickson, 1986; Spradley, 1980). I included these insights
in the analysis of data, making reference to such things as vocal expression, physical
gestures while speaking, subjects who did not participate in certain portions of the focus
group interviews, and so forth, when I felt it meaningful to the interpretation of the data.
Creating Codes and Themes

Immediately following all interviews, I taped my comments about the interview
dynamics and environment to capture immediate insights and to help retain speciﬁc data
about each student teacher and co-operating teacher. These taped comments were also
considered to be data in my phenomenological reﬂection. There were 13 tapes in total.
One tape was designated to each participant involved in the study for the individual
interviews. Five other tapes were as follows:

- Co-operating teachers, focus group #1

Student teachers, focus group #1

Co-operating teachers, focus group #2

Student teachers, focus group #2
a My taped comments
Tapes and journal writings were divided into two groups. One was student
teachers’ tapes and journals, and the other was co-operating teachers’ tapes and journals.
Both individual interviews and focus group interview tapes were included in each of

these groups. After each taped interview was transcribed, I read through the transcript

77

while listening to the tape to be certain that it accurately reﬂected the content of the
interview and to review and immerse myself in the content. Additionally, I read and re-
read each journal entry, while I made notes simultaneously in the margins. As the data
was gathered, I generated a list of words or phrases that seemed to capture thematic
aspects of that interview and the subsequent journal. These words or phrases were written
in the margins of the transcriptions and in the margins of the journals. Also, 1 evaluated
the dynamics of the interviews for openness, objectivity, and use of interview techniques,
so that necessary adjustments could be made for future interviews. This procedure was
followed for each of the three interviews, including the one-on-one interviews that
occurred in October 2004 and the focus group interviews that occurred in December 2004
and May 2005. Similar processes were followed with the journal entries that occurred in
December 2004 and May 2005.

Copies of the original tapes were made, labelled, and placed in a locked cabinet,
and the originals were taken to the transcriber. The names of the participants were not
written anywhere on the tapes. On occasion, I addressed the participants by their ﬁrst
names, but their last names were not disclosed. These were subsequently changed to
pseudonyms in the transcripts.

The need for strict conﬁdentiality was discussed with the transcriber. She was
alone when she transcribed at the computer, and she designated ﬁles for each participant
and each interview separately on her computer. When she completed each tape, the
transcriber returned the tape to me along with the transcriptions, and I placed them in a
locked cabinet for subsequent analysis.

Data from interview transcripts and journals were read and re-read to get a sense

78

of meaning ﬁom the participants. It was important to divide the data according to groups
and read data from both groups separately to get a sense of meaning from within each
group. First, I read the data transcriptions from the co-operating teacher group several
times. Each time I read the data from this group, I highlighted important words. I
followed the same procedure for the student teacher group. After reading the data of each
group several times, I re-read all data, intertwining both groups rather than reading
separately to get a sense of group meaning as a whole. I highlighted any additional words
that were important but had not yet been highlighted during these readings.

I then read the transcripts again while listening to the tapes, speciﬁcally listening
to the inﬂections and emphasis given to words by the student teachers and co-operating
teachers, as this was important for sensitive interpretation. This also conﬁrmed my choice
of signiﬁcant words and statements.

Developing coding categories

Groups of descriptive data were created by separating certain words, phrases,
patterns’ of behaviour, subjects’ ways of thinking, and events that were repetitive or
stood out to me. This grouping strategy allowed me to sort the descriptive data within the
individual groups so that certain preliminary codes would begin to emerge. I began to
generate preliminary codes by using yellow Post-it notes® for co-operating teachers and
purple Post-it® notes for student teachers. I wrote the highlighted words, statements, and
words written in the margins taken from data transcripts on the Post-it notes® and taped
them onto the ﬂoor separated by colour and group.

I then re—arranged the Post-it notes® taped on the ﬂoor by merging the student
teachers’ group and the co-operating teachers’ group. Grouping was again a means of

79

organizing the preliminary codes into groups that demonstrated similar meanings,
opposite meanings, events, patterns of behaviour, and subjects’ ways of thinking. When I
determined that words and statements were grouped appropriately, a one-or-two code
word description representative of that group of words was written on a pink Post-it®
note that was attached to the wall. Pink Post-it® notes were used to identify these codes.
There were 68 codes on pink Post-it® notes resulting from the data from the two groups.
I then shared these codes with my peer reviewer, Dr. Victoria Oglan, who conﬁrmed my
ﬁndings.

Often spending several days simply looking at the codes on the wall, I began to
merge these emergent threads together into groups that eventually became categories.
When I could not make sense of the categories, I would try a different grouping. It was
difﬁcult not to manipulate the categories into what I thought they should be, and I was
conscientious about avoiding this and letting the themes emerge through the analysis of
the data. Categories emerged that were representative of behaviours, events, perceptions,
similar meanings, opposite meanings, and places. After several days of formulating
meanings through various category groupings, the following themes emerged:

0 Building a music learning community
0 The blame game

0 It’s overwhelming!

0 Do as I do, not as I say!

0 Assessing versus. assisting

o The co-operating teacher as the sage.

The themes were reviewed by Dr. Victoria Oglan to conﬁrm that the data within .

80

each were consistent and that I had not unconsciously forced data into any pre-
determined category. Then themes were analyzed for the purpose of possibly reducing
them by combining those that were redundant or similar in meaning. Some preliminary
codes were created during the various phases of the data collection process, but the major
analysis occurred after all the data had been transcribed. Once I had established the
themes, I e-mailed a COpy of my results to my peer reviewer, Dr. Victoria Oglan, as well
as to my dissertation co-chair, Dr. Mitchell Robinson, for validation.
Theme Results

The following reﬂections on each essential theme make the meaning of the human
experience of student teacher and co-operating teacher more understandable. Selected
quotes from interview transcripts and journals are included to allow the reader to know
each participant and to grasp the message in the words of student teachers and co-
operating teachers.
Building a Music Learning Community

Trying to deﬁne the word community is a difﬁcult task, as it is a word used in
various contexts. Researchers have described and deﬁned communities as having
mutually-Shared values. (Grant, 1988; Hallinger & Murphy, 1986; Lightfoot, 1984; Sizer,
1984). A community can be deﬁned as a group of people engaged in a common task. It
can be a group in one speciﬁc location, such as a classroom, or a group of people
separated by geographic space but linked through technology. Sharing common ideas
and experiences, both good and bad, helps to shape a community. A music learning
community can provide student teachers and co-operating teachers with a sense of
belonging and may instil a willingness and desire in them to make the community better.

81

Included in the music learning community of this dissertation are students, student
teachers, co-operating teachers, the school faculties, administrations and parents.

A school as community is not a new concept. Literature on “school as
community” has begun to identify speciﬁc variables that contribute to a sense of
community. Based on both empirical research (Battistich, Solomon, Kim, Watson &
Schaps, 1995; Bryk & Driscoll, 1988) and a synthesis of existing research (Boyer, 1995;
McMillan & Chavis, 1986; Meier, 1995; Sergiovanni, 1994), Sharing values, teaching and
learning from one another, being honest, developing coMunication strategies and
creating bonding relationships emerged as critical elements of community-building in
school settings.

In this study, co-operating teachers and student teachers described themselves as
sharing some things and not others. The shared issues voiced by co-operating teachers
and student teachers included such things as belonging to the school, being supportive of
each other in teaching music, sharing views about music teaching and learning,
developing a relationship that is professional and provides mentorship, and being
responsible in their roles as student teachers and co-operating teachers for the teaching
and learning that takes place within student teaching. Yet, some co-Operating teachers felt
that their student teacher would be inclined to learn more if they were involved with
many aspects of the school. On the other hand, some co-operating teachers felt that their
student teacher should only be with them, because they voiced concerns that the student
teachers were not fully aware and prepared for the role of an instrumental music teacher.
Student teachers feared leaving their co-Operating teachers to take part in the larger music
learning community.

82

Building a music learning community was a theme that emerged out of the data
from both the co-operating teachers and the student teachers. Initially during the one-on-
One interviews, each student teacher and co-operating teacher described themselves in
roles that involved similar ways of thinking. Each co-operating teacher enjoyed a music
program that was geared towards the types of learners they had in their school
communities. These schools involved in this study were diverse in their demographics,
socio-economic status, population numbers, and ethnicities, and each teacher, while
following curricular guidelines, accomplished expectations within their school
communities. Student teachers also described similar expectations for themselves as
student teachers. During the one-on—one interviews, each student teacher had an idea of
what he or she wanted to accomplish, but the student teachers were not sure of how they
would fulﬁll these expectations as they worked with their co-operating teachers.

The theme of “Building a Music Learning Community” emerged from codes such

3, 6‘ 9’ ‘6'

as “belong,” “faculty involvement, parent-teacher interviews, Immersion,”

’9 ‘6 ’, 6‘

“experience, acceptance, collaborate with,” and, “want to learn.” Student teachers, in
their focus group interviews and joumaling, often described themselves as not ﬁtting
anywhere while student teaching. It was difﬁcult for these student teachers to decide if
they should immerse themselves in the school community or wait to be invited by their
co-operating teacher. Co-operating teachers, on. the other hand, expressed themselves as
being separate from their student teacher except when they were in the classroom. It did
not seem to occur to co-Operating teachers that allowing their student teachers to become
involved in all areas of the school community could potentially heighten the overall

student teaching experience and allow the student teachers to be more successful as

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community members.

Student teachers and co-operatin g teachers had different ideas concerning what
was needed to create a positive, productive learning community. Student teachers, for the
most part, believed that a sense of belonging and a sense of membership in the school
community was a pre-requisite for the positive learning experience of a music student
teacher. Student teachers felt from the beginning of each experience that two
communities existed: one was the community of teachers and another of student teachers.

One thing that was kind of weird is that in the middle of the staff room there was

a huge table and all the teachers were at the table and we the student teachers have

a small round table somewhere on the side of the room. We had our environment

and they had their environment. Many, many times I had the feeling no one cares

about us (Kate, focus group interview #1, December, 2004).

Co-operating teachers agreed that they wanted to provide a positive experience
for their student teachers, but they felt a sense of ﬁ'ustration at the lack of understanding
on the part of the student teachers of the multiple dimensions of the roles of music
teachers and what the community entails. This sense of frustration took precedence over
other areas of concern faced by the student teachers. Perhaps as a result, the idea of
helping to create a sense of the student teachers belonging to the school community was
not a consistently voiced concern of the co-operating teachers. Yet, co-operating teachers
expressed early concerns about providing positive learning experiences for student
teachers that would help provide a “sense of belonging,” since they described their roles
as much more complex than just teaching:

Student teachers are there to experience all aspects of the teaching profession as it

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pertains to an‘instrumental music teacher, including such things as creating lesson
plans, teaching the music curriculum, conducting ensembles and preparing for
concerts, being involved in extra curricular music programs, ﬁxing/maintaining
instruments and all other aspects of school life (Leo, individual interview,
October, 2004).
This sense of misunderstanding the role of the music educator in the classroom was of
key concern to the co-operating teachers, and immediately stood in the way of their
inviting student teachers into the larger community.

Immersion in the school community could allow both student teachers and co-
operating teachers to understand each other’s roles during student teaching experiences.
That understanding could have allowed for the sharing of values, teaching and learning
from one another, being honest, developing communication strategies, and bonding
relationships to begin developing. Yet, while I read the data, it became clear to me that,
although the co-operating teachers had Similar ideas regarding the roles of student
teachers, student teachers did not understand what their roles were, nor did the co-
operating teachers delineate those roles for the student teachers. Co-operating teachers
did not display a fundamental community value, “. . ..the principle that people are as
important as any information to be learned or techniques to be used. The fundamental
values of community are those of open and honest communication, mutual vulnerability,
signiﬁcant commitment to each other, and collective responsibility for sustaining the
commUnity” p.5 (Larivee, 2000, p.5). During the initial few days of being with each
other in the classroom, there did not appear to be a willingness to establish open and
honest communication that could result in a positive outcome between the student

85

teachers and the co-operating teachers. As a result of this apparent lack of
communication, the student teachers appeared more confused with where they ﬁt, not just
at the beginning of their student teaching experiences, but in subsequent experiences as
well. As a result, they were alienated, rather than becoming essential members of the
community.

In the ﬁrst focus group interview with co-Operating teachers conducted in
December, 2004, co-operating teachers shared their collective frustration regarding the
lack of preparation of the student teachers. This frustration occurred as a result of a
variety of dimensions, such as inadequate student teaching time and a lack of exposure to
the myriad of instrumental music teaching roles, including repairing instruments,
arranging, analyzing scores, conducting, running extra-curricular rehearsals,
programming and advocating, fundraising, purchasing, and presenting concerts. One co—
operating teacher described the ﬁ'ustration in this way:

I will have a student teacher who is required to teach 25% of my course load

during their ﬁrst practice teaching experience. However, being a music teacher
requires many other things, not just course work. I don’t think student teachers are
really aware of their job roles and it’s not their fault (Brad, focus group interview
#1, experience. December 2004).
When student teachers appeared to lack the practical skills and knowledge needed to
successfully ﬁrlﬁll music teacher roles, co-operating teachers became concerned with not
being able to effectively guide the student teachers assigned to them. Just as co-operating
teachers shared their desire for a positive learning experience for their student teachers,
they also Shared this ﬁ'ustration, which became apparent after the ﬁrst student teaching

86

block. Co-operating teachers initially, but not intentionally, set themselves up to be
frustrated with the student teachers. Rather than using a lack of student teacher
knowledge as an opportunity to guide their student teachers and open up the lines of
communication between the two parties, they allowed their frustrations to fester, creating
rifts in the learning community.

On the other hand, student teachers also voiced concerns about their experiences
with their co-operating teachers. Prior to the ﬁrst student teaching experience, in
individual interviews, student teachers expressed a desire to have a positive learning
experience by participating in as many facets of the school community as possible.
However, student teachers were unable to voice how this might occur. While student
teachers deﬁned their roles uniquely, each student teacher expressed their need to do and
experience as much as possible. They understood that experiencing as much as possible
meant that they had to be a part of the school as much as possible. For example, Torn felt
that being involved with the school community was the ﬁrst step to an effective learning
experience in the classroom. He stated:

Initially I thought that my role would be that of an observer, a visitor to the

school. I think now that if I dive right in and become a member of the school

society and be a part of the school as a teacher, not so much an observer, I will

learn more (Tom, one-on-one interview, October 2004).

Kate, an older student teacher who was 40 years of age, was afraid that she would
not be accepted as a student teacher within the community due to her age. In addition, she
was a teacher with 10 years experience from another country. Consequently, Kate had
expected that she would experience a positive outcome if she were able to immerse

87

herself immediately into the school community in the role of teacher, rather than have to
conform to the designated percentage allotted to younger, less experienced teachers. The
designated percentage of teaching time set by the Faculty of Education is 25% for the
ﬁrst teaching block. Faculty of Education restraints did not permit Kate to become a

‘ member of the school community as much as she desired. She reported:

I don’t know why I have to wait to teach. I want to get to know the staff and the

school environment. I want to sit in with my teacher and experience parent-

teacher interviews, staff meetings and other things. I want to get to know my
musicians. This is frustrating. I’m losing valuable time in the classroom (Kate,

individual interview, October, 2004).

Kate’s beliefs about community were already somewhat established before she
began her ﬁrst student teaching block. She wanted to communicate and share information
with her co-operating teacher. She was committed to learning from her co-operating
teacher, a Characteristic valued highly in belonging to a community.

Not all student teachers were able to discern the types of experiences they wanted
to have. Mary initially began her student teaching with confusion regarding her role as a
student teacher. She was unable to articulate what she wanted to experience and also
lacked the ability to express her desire for guidance from her co-operating teacher.
Mary’s remarks, when she was asked to describe her role as a student teacher, reﬂected a
lack of ability to communicate as well as an interest in learning how. She felt from the
beginning that she was on her own and not a part of a school community. Mary
expressed confusion regarding her role as a student teacher.

I think that, in the role as a student teacher, it’s really difﬁcult in an instrumental

88

music placement because often times you’re faced with numerous bands. My job

is really to sort of observe and watch her for the ﬁrst little bit and then do some

teaching. I just want to be able to do it, and give it a go, and see how it happens

(Mary, individual interview, October, 2004).

Without a plan upon which to rely for the initial student teaching experience,
Mary had pre-determined that her success or failure during student teaching was entirely
up to her. She was apprehensive and believed that teaching band was difﬁcult. Whether
the reason was that Mary lacked the skills or was nervous and fearful of the unknown was
not clear.

Brad expected a positive learning experience. His difﬁculty, however, lay in the
fact that he could not develop a sense of belonging that would allow for the experience to
feel authentic. Brad determined that he did not want to develop himself as a teacher in
someone else’s classroom, but, rather, he wanted to emerge as a teacher in his own
setting. Brad did not describe his need for guidance from a co-operating teacher, or his
need to be a part of the school community in order for his positive experience to occur.
Brad said, “The problem I had to deal with is that you always ﬁnd yourself as a guest in
that class” (Brad, focus group interview #1, December, 2004). If Brad had understood
that the opportunity to be involved in someone else’s class could provide a meaningful
learning Opportunity for him, he might have felt more like a community member and less
like a guest. However, he was unable, initially, to determine the positive effect that this
approach could have on his overall experience. On the other hand, Brad’s attitudes could
have been a result of the lack of open and honest communication with his co-operating
teacher ﬁ'om the onset of student teaching. An honest conversation between the student

89

teacher and co-Operating teacher at the beginning of the student teacher experience might
have quelled this feeling for Brad, as well as made his co-operating teacher aware of the
responsibility of alleviating Brad’s feeling like a “guest.”

Student teachers and co-operating teachers had different ideas about the positive
learning outcomes of student teaching. Some student teachers believed that a sense of
belonging and a sense of membership in the music learning community was a
prerequisite to their positive learning experiences, and some determined that they could
have achieved this sense of belonging by being immersed in the student teaching
experience. Other student teachers thought that they were on their own, needing to
observe more, as well as function in their own classroom in order to really experience the
“teacher role.”

The other “sense of belonging” identiﬁed by student teachers involved pupil-
given recognition. In this study, the student teachers felt that they had to have continuous
contact with classes in order to allow pupils to redeﬁne them as teachers rather than
student teachers. Being accepted by pupils as a teacher appeared to be an important
indicator of being conﬁrmed as a teacher. Achieving teacher status in the eyes of pupils
conveyed a powerful message to students about both professional credibility and personal
fulﬁllment. While not all students involved in this study had the opportunity to achieve
this “sense of belonging” through their teaching experiences, it was signiﬁcant that the
student teachers sought out the “sense of belonging” on their own by forming
relationships with teachers outside of their areas. This sense of belonging needing to be
experienced by student teachers in this study is supported by McNally, Cole & Stronach
(1994)

90

To develop the secondary sense of belonging Kate wanted to teach 100% of the
teacher’s load rather than the Faculty of Education’s designated 25% for the ﬁrst student
teaching block. Also, Tom expressed his need to dive right into the experience of
belonging to the school community, believing that this experience could provide him
with a more holistic view of a teacher’s role. The short allotment of time for the ﬁrst
block as a student teacher could be the cause of the student teacher’s sense of lack of
belonging. On the other hand, the immediate immersion into the role of a teacher could
help to alleviate the frustration for the co-operating teacher regarding the
misunderstanding of a music teacher’s role, as well as provide the student teacher with a
sense of belonging to the entire school and the students they are assigned to teach during
student teaching.

Part of the deﬁnition of corrrrnunity used in this study involved the fundamental
values of community as those of being open and honest in communication and of having
a collective responsibility for sustaining the relationships and values of the community.
Co-operating teachers all agreed that they wanted to provide positive experiences for the
student teachers, but their sense of frustration at the lack of understanding on the part of
the student teachers of the multiple dimensions of the roles of instrumental music
teachers deterred them. Co—operating teachers wanted the student teachers to understand
that, while teaching music is of paramount importance, the time allotted to it was small
when compared with the preparation portion of the job. Co-operating teachers felt that
student teachers did not have realistic views of their future roles as music teachers and
that they were not equipped to Show or explain to the student teachers what was entailed.
This ﬁ'ustration on the part of the co-operating teachers deterred them from

91

corrrrnunicating with the student teachers and from allowing the student teachers to see
what music teachers do more fully. As a result, the student teachers did not ask questions
regarding the role of teachers, which further reinforced the co-operating teachers’
assumptions that student teachers should have come with this knowledge and did not
need to be nurtured in this direction. Rather than using the student teachers’ lack of
understanding as an Opportunity to teach them about the role of teachers, co-operating
teachers felt insulted. As a result, the co-operating teachers held early concerns about
providing positive learning experiences for student teachers, since they described their
roles as more complex than the student teachers believed them to be.

Some research paints a bleak picture of co-operating teachers’ understanding of
their roles and responsibilities (Wideen, Mayer-Smith, & Moon, 1998). The Faculty of
Education at the university in this study offers a voluntary two-hour orientation for co-
operating teachers. In attendance at this orientation are usually those teachers who have
volunteered to act as co-operating teachers for the ﬁrst time. During this orientation, co-
operating teachers leam about the use and submission of the evaluation sheets for the
student teachers, how to contact the university supervisors when necessary, and what the
designated teaching percentages are during each practice teaching block. Issues such as
feedback, building a relationship, rapport with other faculty, and immersion into the
community of the school are not the central focus of the orientation.

F eiman-Nemser (1996) has suggested that, if teacher educators want teacher
candidates to learn new ways of thinking and acting, they must be placed with co-
operating teachers who are already practising the kinds of reform teacher educators want
to see or establish contexts in which collaborating teachers and teacher candidates

92

explore new strategies together. Teacher educators in some settings, has little control
over the selection of co-operating teachers, and few co-Operating teachers practise the
kind of learner-centred teaching currently advocated by teacher education programs
(Cochran-Smith, 1991; Cohen, McLaughlin, & Talbert, 1993; Feiman-Nemser, Parker, &
Zeichner, 1993). The Faculty of Education involved in this study did not choose the co-
operating teachers for their student teachers. Each school within the various boards of
education for this area asks for one teacher volunteer who will co-ordinate the co-
operating teacher placements within their school. These teachers often solicit co-
operating teachers via email requests. Once the teacher co-ordinator has the list for the
school, it is shown to the principal of the school. The principal approves the list, which
then is forwarded to the co—ordinator at the Faculty of Education, who later assigns
student teachers to the co-operating teachers on the list. The only criteria necessary to act
as a co-operating teacher is a minimum of ﬁve years experience in a primary teachable
for secondary school, and ﬁve years of classroom experience for elementary school.
Gallant (1994) suggested that viewing the role of a co-operating teacher as being
more work than break can help ensure a better chance of success for the student teacher.
In his study, Gallant implied that co-operating teachers have a responsibility to provide
student teachers with many opportunities that will reﬂect the job description of a music
educator. To do this, Gallant suggests that co-operating teachers should allow the student
teachers to be involved in the community of the school by attending faculty meetings,
department meetings, extra-curricular activities, and observing parent—teacher interviews.
This might have alleviated the concerns voiced by both the student teachers and the co-
operating teachers in this study. Co-operating teachers wanted student teachers to

93

experience the myriad of roles that deﬁne a music educator; yet, in some respects, their
hands were tied. The Faculty of Education is quite strict in their allotment of time
designated for each student teaching block. It is not until the ﬁnal block of teaching that
student teachers are expected to teach 100% of the time. However, it is typical practice
that the fourth teaching block will be at a school that the student teachers have never been
to before and with a new co-operating teacher. This makes immediate immersion
difﬁcult.

The Blame Game

“The Blame Game” emerged as a theme mostly out of codes found in journal
writings. Codes such as “too busy,” “feed,” “feeling sorry,” “ﬁgure it out,” “it’s not my
fault,” “hate,” and “agree to disagree,” deﬁned this theme as putting the onus of
responsibility on the other party. In other words, student teachers and co-operating
teachers consistently blamed each other for why something did not work, rather than
looking within (reﬂecting) to determine how something could have gone better.

During focus group interviews, participants listened and involved themselves in
sharing information with their peers. It appeared to me that this information was shared
cautiously by the participants to position themselves favourably in the eyes of their peers.
Journal writings, on the other hand, were personal exchanges of information with the
researcher. The purpose of the journal writings was to reﬂect on teaching experiences,
including lesson planning, lesson delivery, student rapport, classroom management,
behaviour management, relationship with co-operating teachers, handling day to day
issues in a classroom and school, and seeing themselves as teachers of music. The tone in
these personal writings was different than the tone in the focus group conversations.

94

Whereas the tone in the focus group interviews was reserved and generic, the tone of the
journal writings was forthcoming and speciﬁc. The intent of the journal writing was to
provide the participants with an opportunity to look inward and reﬂect on their journeys.
However, what actually appeared in the journal was not introspective. Rather,
participants used the journals as an opportunity to blame the other party rather than
talking about and reﬂecting on themselves and their teaching.

Reﬂective practices appear to be lacking for both student teachers and co-
operating teachers. While the student teaching experience is a powerful inﬂuence upon
prospective teachers, these experiences might have more positive, lasting effects upon
their views about teaching if reﬂectivity is stressed and modeled by expert in-service
teachers. Hollingsworth (1989) found that preservice teachers modiﬁed prior beliefs and
made conceptual changes, and that expert co-operating teachers encouraged them to
confront their past perceptions.

It’s the co-op’s fault!

Student teachers blamed their co-operating teachers for providing too few positive
learning experiences and for their feeling like “failures.” This happened for a variety of
reasons. Student teachers needed the co-operating teachers to validate the work that they
were doing in the classroom by telling them what they wanted to hear, rather than the
truth. When this did not happen, rather than questioning their co-operating teachers
regarding speciﬁcs or reﬂecting themselves about their own work, they blamed their co-
operating teachers. Mary wrote:

I don’t feel successful because I don’t feel like she appreciates any of my efforts,

or what I’m trying to do. I know how much work I’m doing and how much I’m

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. accomplishing. I can’t even get positive feedback from her. It’s very difﬁcult to

want to do better (Mary, journal writing, December, 2004).

The short placements also resulted in student teachers blaming their co-operating
teachers for disappointing or unexpectedly negative experiences. Student teachers were
aware from the beginning that there would be four placements of three weeks each.
Rather than plan and learn from each experience, they used the Short placement as an
excuse to vent their ﬁ'ustration and blame their co-operating teachers. According to the
student teachers, the multiple venues and co-operating teacher changes did not allow for
the student teachers to experience continuity of teaching ideas from placement to
placement. Student teachers expressed frustration at the multiple expectations of the
Faculty of Education as well as the different expectations of each co-operating teacher.
Kate discussed the mixed messages she received:

My co-operating teacher says it’s this way, this is what we need done, and this is

how I would do it. And if I’m not doing it that way I almost feel like, okay I can’t

do this. When my university supervisor came to Observe me, I was doing
something that my co-operating teacher told me to do and my university
supervisor made a comment about it being done wrong. I didn’t know what to say.

That moment made me feel like a complete failure (Kate, focus group interview

#1, December, 2004).

An experience such as Kate’s took place while I, too, was student teaching. The
lack of time to develop comfort with both the students that a student teacher is teaching
and to develop a relationship with the co-operating teacher was frustrating. Expectations
change from co-operating teacher to co-operating teacher, and it perhaps is unrealistic for

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student teachers to understand them quickly.

At times, however, co-Operating teachers took responsibility and voiced concerns
regarding their ability to provide feedback for their student teachers. All four co-
Operating teachers reﬂected openly on their processes of providing feedback during the
second focus group interview. Many thoughts were expressed by the co-operating
teachers when recounting their feedback experiences with their student teachers, ranging
from having to be explicit when providing feedback to accepting the fact that they did not
model reﬂection to their student teachers. These realizations seemed to profoundly affect
the co-operating teacher group during the focus group interview.

When I was talking with Kate regarding a lesson she had just completed, I didn’t

realize that what I was saying was too speciﬁc and too much for her to take in all

at once. I thought that she was ignoring my advice (Leo, focus group interview

#2, May, 2004).

Although feedback is an important part of the co-operating teachers’ role, until they were
given the opportunity to really think about the way in which they provided feedback, co-
operating teachers did not regard it as an important part of their job. All co-operating
teachers agreed that they needed to develop better feedback strategies with their student
teachers.

It’s the student teachers fault!

Co-operating teachers blamed their student teachers for having inadequate
musical, practical, and classroom management strategies. While it was difﬁcult,

' according to co-operating teachers, to provide feedback to their student teachers
concerning these inadequacies, co-operating teachers voiced their concerns in their

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journal entries. However, the co-operating teachers continued to blame the student
teachers for their Shortcomings rather than to examine and reﬂect on their own roles.
Tammy said:

I worry about my student doing well. She told me that She was worried about

having a job like mine because “you just do so much.” Instead of trying to get

something out of the experience, she just complains about it (Tammy, journal

entry, December, 2004).

Tammy’s inability to help her student teacher understand the job of a music
educator resulted in a negative experience for the student teacher and in less growth on
the part of the co-operating teacher. Tammy could have questioned the student teacher
about what she could do to prevent her student teacher from feeling this way. Rather,
Tammy exhibited an inability to reﬂect on what her student teacher was experiencing.
While co-operating teachers were concerned with the lack of understanding of the role of
a music educator on the part of the student teachers, they appeared to be unable to
understand that they have a responsibility to teach their student teachers about their roles.

A study conducted by Clarke (2006) represents one of the ﬁrst attempts to
systematically explore the nature and substance of co-operating teacher reﬂection in
practicum settings. One purpose of the study was to move beyond brief observations,
surveys, interviews, and self-report data of co-operating teachers to a more in-depth
exploration of the nature and substance of co-operating teachers’ work with beginning
teachers. Results indicated that interaction between the co-operating teachers and their
student teachers promoted co-operating teacher reﬂection. Further, reﬂection typically
fell into two main categories: reﬂection on one’s advisory practices or reﬂection on the

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sense they made of the student-teachers’ teaching practices. Both categories were
important in that they enabled the co-operating teachers to bring new perspectives to bear
on their work as school-based teacher educators. Additionally, this study supports the
concern in my study regarding reﬂective practices among both co-operating teachers and
student teachers and their communication issues. Following the suggestion of better
communication between these two parties could also promote better reﬂection skills.

It’s the university’s fault!

Co-operating teachers also expressed frustration about the brief duration of the
experience and blamed student teachers and the Faculty of Education. A study conducted
by Ewart & Straw (2005) addressed and conﬁrmed this frustration. During focus group
interviews, co-operating teachers expressed their dissatisfaction with a program in which
teacher candidates were split into short 3-week practicums. These co-operating teachers
believed that, when the practicum was split into brief practicums, the teacher candidates
never had the chance to develop their own teaching styles. Also, co-operating teachers
agreed during focus group interviews that short student teaching experiences encouraged
student teachers to copy the personality of the co-operating teachers in order to survive,
whereas a longer practicum, with the same co-operating teacher, might have allowed
teacher candidates’ personalities to ﬂourish:

You can't hide and you can't become the other person either because eventually

the students will get to know you or they will tell you (Mike, focus group

interview #2).

Co-operating teachers felt that a longer practicum could provide more of a "real-
life" experience. Their criticism of split block student teaching as too short gave no

99

doubt of their support for a structure that gave teacher candidates a longer period of time
in individual classrooms, and this long time frame could be inﬂuential in helping student
teachers see the “real picture” of a music teacher’s role.

In addition to blaming one another in journal writings, both student teachers and
co-operating teachers pointed a ﬁnger at the Faculty of Education during focus group
interview #2, May, 2005. Co-operating teachers and student teachers consistently
remarked during these focus group interviews that they felt that the Faculty of Education
was remiss inpreparing students for a positive practice teaching experience. One co-
operating teacher posited:

I think that the Faculty of Education, if they’re going to train people to teach in

public schools, should have something concrete in terms of appropriate courses

coming in and insist that those people take those courses. I’ve had student
teachers who have never played in a band, orchestra or wind ensemble before

(Brad, focus group interview #2, May, 2005).

It is not unusual for vocal music candidates to be placed into instrumental music
placements in which they feel inadequate because instrumental music is not their area of
«expertise, nor have they any experience in this area. Co-operating teachers, who are
instrumental, not vocal, music Specialists become ﬁ'ustrated with this. Both the student
teachers and the co-operating teachers often feel inadequate in facilitating a successful
student teaching experience under these circumstances. In her case, Tammy felt that the
current procedure for selecting teacher candidates within the Faculty of Education
hindered the way she acted as a co-operating teacher. While some faculties of education
interview potential teacher candidates, the University of Windsor is among those who do

100

not. The faculty relies on transcripts to determine the qualiﬁcations of potential teacher
candidates who apply to its program. While transcripts allow for a particular type of
screening process to occur, successful entry is determined by cumulative averages rather
than by which courses have been taken to develop the body of knowledge needed to be
successful in the classroom. In other words, the overall grade point average is more
important than the courses taken to achieve the overall average.

According to Bymes, Kiger & Schechtrnan (2003) most teacher-education
programs select students based on academic criteria, such as grade point average (GPA)
and standardized test scores (Haberrnann & Post, 1998). While this may be common
practice, research demonstrates that these academic criteria are generally poor predictors
of who will be successful teachers (Baskin, Ross, & Smith, 1996). Much of the research
on effective classroom teaching emphasizes the importance of verbal, interpersonal, and
leadership skills (Dunkin & Barnes, 1986; Westbrook, 1998). Despite these ﬁndings,
teachers colleges tend to ignore outstanding verbal, interpersonal, and leadership qualities
in favour of easier—to-measure academic criteria.

Both the co-operating teachers and student teachers blamed the Faculty of
Education for the three-week, split block scheduling. Teacher candidates are assigned to
four different co-operating teachers for three week teaching blocks during their year at
Teacher’s College. Co-operating teachers also receive four different student teachers in a
year. Because the teaching blocks are only three weeks long, it is difﬁcult to establish
working relationships between co-operating teachers and student teachers. These types
of relationships are difﬁcult to develop that quickly. Student teachers are expected to
increase their teaching load by 25% each time they are practice teaching, and co-

101

operating teachers are expected to let that happen as part of the agreement between the
Faculty of Education and the co-operating teachers. This scenario makes it difﬁcult for
both the co-operating teachers and student teachers. Tammy described the problem:

I think the system that’s in place does have an effect on how we are as co-

operating music teachers. I’ve seen some places where it’s four months straight. If

I could get one student teacher for all that time, it could be more personal for me

and them. I could try to mould and direct that person more, and I think the result

would be better prepared music teachers (Tammy, focus group interview #2, May,

2005)

Student teachers must be well prepared in the areas of music theory, history,
literature, performance practice, instrumental and choral techniques, and current theories
of learning, including how to work with students with special needs, students from
diverse backgrounds, and students who are at risk Like co-operating teachers, student
teachers also experienced four different placements validating the need to be prepared
musically. Often student teachers’ decision making regarding teaching would need to be
speciﬁc to each new placement. These multiple changes did not allow for the student
teachers to experience continuity in teaching. Student teachers expressed frustration at the
multiple expectations of the Faculty of Education, as well as the different expectations of
each co-operating teacher.

It’s Overwhelming!

“It’s Overwhelming” surfaced as a theme for both the co-operating teachers and
the student teachers. Codes such as, “I’m swamped,” “I can’t do this,” “how can I learn
this?,” and “survival” helped to identify this theme. Fears, concerns and many questions,

102

particularly from the student teachers, were central to this theme. Student teachers felt
overwhelmed with such things as developing a relationship with the co-operating teacher,
communicating with their co-operating teachers, developing classroom management
strateg'es, learning to undertake the multi-tasking role of the classroom music teacher,
and developing assessment strategies as well as being assessed, all while trying to emerge
as a teacher in their own right.

On the other hand, the theme of “it’s overwhelming” emerged for one co-
operating teacher who was concerned with staying on track curricularly, meeting the
needs of the student teachers, maintaining performing skills of their own students,
teaching new skills, working with the student teacher to understand the music teacher’s
role, and having enough time for their student teacher.

Finding out what the job’s really like. To be honest with you I had no idea what it

was really like. I mean I loved the thought of it, worked my tush off, but

realistically I had no idea of what the job was. I feel sorry for the student teachers,
but my concern is they will never get it, or when they do, it will be too late. They

will have already left this profession. I don’t have time for all of this. How can I

get them to understand better, what it is I do (Tammy, focus group interview #2,

May, 2005)

Student teachers felt overwhelmed by the amount and variety of duties that they
were expected to perform at school. Part of this problem was that, while student teaching
provides plentiﬁrl opportunities for growth and for the development of teaching
knowledge, it simultaneously exposes the student teacher to a mineﬁeld of possible
disasters. Although the practical experience in schools is considered by many preservice

103

teachers to be the most signiﬁcant part of their education program (Cole & Knowles,
1993; Grifﬁn, 1989), it is fraught with risks. These risks include failure to learn the
designated content, implied criticism of the co-operating teacher if her or his approach to
teaching is not followed, danger of loss of control of the class while using an unfamiliar
teaching approach, and risk of effects on the student teaching evaluation if things do not
work properly.

As stated previously, the student teaching placements at the University of
Windsor require that, during each. teaching block of three weeks, student teachers will
increase their teaching load by 25%. In other words, by the third teaching block, student
teachers should be teaching 75% of the co-operating teachers’ courses. While reading the
data from this particular block, I identiﬁed many concerns of the student teachers, as well
as a new found fear. While student teachers had already expressed their nervousness
about student teaching, 75% of the course load suddenly seemed to be overwhehning. .
Mary expressed:

I feel like I don’t have time to do anything well. Lesson planning, teaching,

instrument expertise, rehearsal, reﬂecting, communicating. . .anything. Student

teaching doesn’t allow for review on the speciﬁcs because I’m too busy trying to

ﬁt it all in (Mary, journal writing, December, 2004).

Part of the student teachers’ concerns and fears were that they had a new co-
operating teacher with new expectations, a new class with students who they did not yet
know, new learning styles and needs, and a new portion of the curriculum being covered.
These were concerns and fears not only for the student teachers but for the co-operating
teachers as well. Covering the curriculum requirements can be a daunting task in and of

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itself and co-operating teachers must ensure that, in spite of having a student teacher in
the room, the curriculum has to continue to be taught. Student teachers have to follow the
cuniculum at a pace set by the co-operating teacher and, therefore, co-operating teachers
feel that time cannot be wasted. As a student teacher explains:

Student teaching should be a time of experimentation but I feel extremely

restricted and restrained because of the structured timetable (Kate, journal writing

December, 2004).

Student teachers were also aware of this, and they felt obligated to ensure that the
pace of the curriculum delivery was maintained and did not slacken, while they were
learning to teach simultaneously. Co-operating teachers often added to the stress of the
student teachers, as they were concerned that, with the student teachers wanting to teach
differently than they did and using new methodologies, the cunicular pace may be
slower. One of the outcomes of this concern was that student teachers tended to “play it
safe” and conformed to the patterns of teaching that they observed in the classroom.

I’ve found that this placement has been incredibly stressful. I don’t want to do the

job the way she does it, and I have to because I feel that that’s the way she’s

looking for me to do it and there’s no time to do it any other way (Mary, focus

group interview #1, December, 2004).

Concerns and fears for both student teachers and co-operating teachers ranged
from actual implementation of lessons and learning outcomes to classroom management.

Mike’s concerns and fears focused on students who he did not yet know:

105

What will their attitudes be like while I’m teaching? Will it be different for me
than their teacher? Will they welcome me or will they resist me? Will my co-
operating teacher like the way I try new things or would they rather have things
stay their way? The problem for is that I will lose credibility with these new
students and my co-operating teacher if the way I want to do things does not
accomplish what my co-operating teachers wants them to know (Mike, journal

entry, May, 2005).

During their student teaching experiences, student teachers taught at the same
time they became acquainted with the classroom environment, and attempted to meet
learning expectations of the co-operating teachers. This contributed to that sense of being
overwhelmed. Student teachers consistently voiced in their journal writings and in focus
group interviews a myriad of fears regarding the multi-dimensional role of the music

teacher. Tom expressed:

I can’t believe how much I had to change my expectations of where I thought my
grade school students should be instrumentally. My expectations were of what my
grade six band was doing when I was in it, or at least what I thought they were
doing. I had to change my expectations of the program and what I had to do to
succeed. My biggest fear is that I won’t do better than this (Torn, journal entry #1,

December, 2004).

Another set of concerns and fears voiced by the student teachers was being
overwhelmed by the issues of classroom management. This fear consistently surfaced

both at focus group interviews and in journal writings for the duration of the study. I

106

expected that student teachers would gain more conﬁdence in their abilities to maintain
classroom order with each teaching block; however, this fear continued to surface in each

new setting, and particularly among those student teachers in secondary school settings.

Classroom management was rarely mentioned in the music education courses I
took during my four years prior to Teachers College. In the music classroom
especially, my professor referred to it as “positive chaos.” During teachers college
the professor would spend at the most, one class period on what classroom
management means, and how to manage bad behaviour (Leo, focus group

interview, May, 2005).

AS numerous studies have documented (Brophy & Everston, 1976; Doyle, 1986;
Latz, 1992; Veenman, 1984), student teachers entering their teaching experiences
frequently report feeling inadequately prepared to effectively manage a classroom. The
common complaint among student teachers is the lack of preparation they received
during their undergraduate methods classes that ascribe to “real classroom” management

situations (Siebert, 2005).

Both the student teachers and co-operating teachers felt overwhelmed, but their
fears were communicated differently. Student teachers displayed fears regarding a
multitude of issues, including classroom management, application of university methods
classes and new theory, fear of their own shortcomings as a music teacher in front of their
students and their co—Operating teacher, and getting it all done. Co-operating teachers
were concerned with getting the student teachers to act as music educators, maintaining

the pace of the curriculum, and having adequate time for their student teachers. Co-

107

operating teachers seemed torn between concerns regarding their classroom students
getting behind and providing their student teachers with enough direction to allow them
to be successful.

A ﬁnal contributing factor to the feeling of being overwhelmed was that co-
operating teachers held differentiviews than their student teachers regarding the same
teaching events during practice teaching. Although there was not necessarily a single
correct view, student teachers felt that they should interpret situations in the same way as
their co-operating teachers. Unfortunately, co-operating teachers tended to voice their
views in a manner that made the student teachers feel that their own views were wrong
rather than different. This inhibited effective communication between the two parties.

During the second focus group interview for student teachers, Kate told a story to
the student teachers group. The same story was recounted by Leo in the co-operating
teacher’s group. 1 While the details regarding the incident were similar when told by the
student teacher and the co-operating teacher, their interpretations of the event were
substantially different. The student teacher and co-operating teacher interpreted it
differently.

In this incident, Kate was introducing composition to grade nine instrumental
music students during her second practice teaching experience. The co-operating teacher
assigned partners for this activity rather than having students pick their own. There was a
detailed list of criteria involved in creating the composition that students had to follow,
and, upon completion, they checked off the box that indicated that they were done. The
students were allotted 20 minutes during each class to work on their compositions for a
ﬁve-day period.

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The student teacher narrated in her focus group interview that, during the ﬁrst two
days, students seemed to be hard at work accomplishing the task, as well as enjoying the
task during their allotted times. The partnerships seemed to be working well, except for a
few groups. These particular groups had pairs that were directly opposite of one another.
Students who had behavioural issues as well as learning issues were paired with the
students who excelled in the class. The co-operating teacher believed that this would help
the weaker student be more successful. For the next two days, the students who excelled
in music seemed to be the only ones working, and their partners ceased to contribute to
the assignment and began to talk with classmates, causing disruption to other groups.
Despite efforts on the part of the student teacher to get those students back on task, they
did not respond. The student teacher made a decision that she would mark those
individuals separately rather than as a group Situation to make it fair.

While recollecting the story, both the student teacher and the co-operating
teacher, identiﬁed issues of organization and management of students as central. They
differed, however, in how they talked about the issues. The student teacher disagreed
with the manner in which groups were chosen by the co-operating teacher. The student
teacher felt that it was unfair for the academically strong students to have to ensure that
the students with behavioural or learning issues were successful in their compositions.
The student teacher believed that the primary reason for the academically strong students
doing the work was that they were concerned about their own marks. As a result their
partners did not contribute. The student teacher believed that:

“. . .the achieving student was too responsible for their partner”, and that“...

collaboration and exchanges of ideas had not worked in these cases” (Kate, focus

109

group interview #2, May, 2005).
In contrast, the co-operating teacher pointed to the organizational properties of the work
students were given to accomplish the composition. The co-operating teacher noted that

the student teacher.

“. . .failed to focus on the disruptive student in the partnership and concentrated
too much on the achieving student to get the assignment done,” and “. . .what
could you have done to include the struggling student more in the activity” (Leo,

focus group interview #2, May, 2005)?

When the co-operating teacher and student teacher discussed the event with each
other, the co-Operating teacher talked more about pacing, timing, student ability,
involvement, and achievement. Additionally, the co-operating teacher displayed his
expertise as a classroom teacher by speaking in terms of diagnosing the Classroom
problems quickly, as well as offering solutions to those problems. On the other hand, the
student teacher gave detailed accounts of the events but did not focus on the work
students were accomplishing or the interactions of students and the curriculum within the
classroom environment. The student teacher seemed to be more concerned with the
particulars of the events and how these particulars affected them personally. Although
there were other instances involving stories from the classroom that both the co-operating
teachers and student teachers told during focus group interviews, this story particularly
seemed to be important to both the co-operating teacher and the student teacher who were

involved.

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This difference in interpretation ultimately caused a problem in communication
between the student teacher and the co-operating teacher. In this case, the co-operating
teacher discussed the issue with such conﬁdence that it made the student teacher feel that
her interpretation was wrong. The outcome perhaps should have involved the co-
operating teacher acknowledging the interpretation of the student teacher, but then
included pointing out the concerns regarding managing such a partnership and working
with students in this collaborative method. Kate found herself feeling confused and
”wrong”; instead of asking the co-operating teacher questions regarding her own

interpretation, she let herself feel unsuccessful in this activity.

This misinterpretation of events is supported by Gonzalez & Carter (1990). While
both Kate and Leo recognized the events as salient in a student teacher’s experience, the
student teacher and the co-operating teacher interpreted them in different ways. In this
study the differences that were found between co-operating teachers and student teachers
in teaching played themselves out in the core student teaching relationship. This incident
demonstrated that co-operating teachers and student teachers did not share interpretive
practices. As a result, communication was likely to be demanding, frustrating and
perplexing for both parties, causing the co-operating teacher and the student teachers to

feel overwhelmed.

Student teachers expressed a variety of concerns about their teaching in the
classroom, and researchers have investigated many of these concerns. For example Fuller
and Brown (1975) identiﬁed three stages of concern in student teacher development: 1)

survival concerns, 2) subject matter concerns, and 3) pupil concerns. During the ﬁrst

111

phase of student teaching, the student teachers are concerned with surviving student
teaching and must overcome any doubts that they have concerning their presence in the
classroom. During the second stage, the student teacher is concerned about classroom
management strategies. It is not until the third stage that the student teacher is concerned
with student understanding and that they use assessment strategies to determine that
understanding. Fuller and Brown found that, when student teachers are in the survival
stage, it is difﬁcult for them to reﬂect on their teaching. The short three-week block of
student teaching does not allow the student teachers in this study to get past the survival.
Further, even by the time student teachers were involved in their fourth practice teaching

experience, surviving the experienced was a primary goal.

Likewise, Borko & Livingston (1980) also found that student teachers move
through different stages of concern during their student teaching experience. Initially,
they focus on personal concerns and must overcome self-doubts. In the second stage,
they are concerned with organizing and managing subject matter; it is not until the third
stage that student teachers begin to focus on the learner.

During student teaching, student teachers can put into practice all that they have
learned about teaching. However, student teachers must go beyond subject matter
knowledge to actually learn how to teach their students. One aspect of this transition from
knowledge to application of knowledge involves “pedagogical content knowledge.”
Pedagogical content knowledge is needed in order to present the material so that learning
will occur. Shulman (1987) believes:

...it identiﬁes the distinctive bodies of knowledge for teaching. It represents the

blending of content and pedagogy into an understanding of how particular topics,

112

problems, or issues are organized, represented, and adapted to the diverse interests

and abilities of learners, and presented for instruction. (p.8)

Student teachers do not enter student teaching knowing nothing. Before they enter
student teaching, they possess their own set of beliefs and ideas about teaching, which are
a result of many different inﬂuences:

I knew by the middle of high school that this was what I wanted to do. Teach

band and orchestra. I had so much fun. We played so many great pieces and went

on a lot of trips. My best ﬁiends were in music. My teacher let me conduct the
class and work with students who were having trouble playing. I thought this
would be great experience for me. Little did I know that my high school teacher is

not the same as these teachers (Mike, Journal, May, 2005).

Learning to teach the subject matter learned in methods courses was a source of
concern for both the student teachers and the co-operating teachers. This study found that
co-operating teachers felt that the student teachers did not possess the skills necessary to
pace instruction at an appropriate level for learning when teaching instrumental music
classes. Co-operating teachers voiced concerns that their students were getting behind in
the curriculum and that student teachers were not skilled enough to run rehearsals,
prepare scores for rehearsing, manage classroom issues as well as conduct. Student
teachers, on the other hand, felt that they had the knowledge, but practice teaching was
their opportunity to put knowledge into practice and at times they felt that too much was
expected of them too soon. Student teachers’ other concern was that developmental
methods courses did not prepare them adequately for transitions to different placements
in which skill levels among students had to be determined quickly in order to prepare to

113

teach. This lack of preparation caused student teachers to imitate their co-operating
teachers rather than attempt to ﬁnd themselves as teachers, which is what they wanted to
do:

It is so hard to ﬁgure out what new students can and can’t do. As soon as I got
comfortable with my students in one placement, my placement was over and the next
placement was so different. I thought I knew and understood my methods and had the
skills to teach music. What I don’t know is how to anticipate learning so that I can be
comfortable quicker. I end up feeling good about what I just did, and then feel like a
failure because I can’t do it again (Kate, focus group interview #1, December 2004).

Gohlke (1994) studied a sophomore level music methods class as a source of
learning to teach. Four questions guided the study:

1) How do preservice music education students, who are collegiate students of

music education, learn to make pedagogical and curricular decisions?

2) What is the source of this knowledge?

3) What effect does a methods course and previous experience in music, teaching

and observing of instruction have on these decisions?

4) How is this knowledge organized and utilized by preservice teachers? (p.9)

Even though her dissertation was concerned with the methods class, it does have
some ﬁndings related to student teaching. The most frequently mentioned sources of
music teachers’ pedagogical knowledge were (1) apprenticeship of Observation, primarily
received through their experience in music learning situations that are performance-
based, and (2) their observations of other teachers through ﬁeld experiences.

Student teachers in this study voiced concerns at the lack of observation time with

114

their co-operatin g teachers that they felt would prepare them for that particular
placement. Some of the student teachers wanted to have the opportunity to observe more
lesson presentations, get a sense of learning from students in the classroom and reﬂect on
what they saw. Some of the co-operating teachers on the other hand felt that there was
not enough time for more observation days and that more observation would encourage
the student teachers to teach like them rather than develop themselves:

I want my student teacher to be better. I want her to understand time management

and pacing. I need her to move faster so I feel that my students are not getting

behind or bored. I also need to step back and stop wishing that she would do
things the way I do them. I have to be careful not to put that pressure on her (Leo,

focus group #2, May, 2005).

Classroom management issues were a primary concern of the student teachers
involved in this study, and the student teachers commented that little was taught
regarding classroom management and discipline techniques in instrumental methods
classes. Schmidt (2006) illuminated a variety of inﬂuences on six instrumental music
teachers’ understanding of classroom management as developed during their student
teaching semester. The study was part of a larger study (Schmidt, 2005) that examined
whether six student teachers in instrumental music incorporated learning from a year long
junior year practice teaching course in their student teaching experience. The larger study
found that, although these student teachers said they learned effective methods of lesson
planning in the practicum course, they did not learn about classroom management. They
claimed instead to have only learned of classroom management as student teachers,
despite claims of the professors that they had taught both.

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Instrumental music classes at times can easily be referred to as “positive chaos,”
and the key to managing them is organization and routine within the classes. Student
teachers often felt limited as to what they could try that was different from what was
being done due to short student teaching placements, and an already established routine.
However, in instrumental music classes that did not seem to be organized or have a
routine set up, student teachers could see where mayhem would occur. These placements
resulted in the most fear for them. Mary said:

We spoke very little of classroom discipline in our methods courses at the

Faculty. But I had two placements that were very different. One was organized

and chaotic, and the other was disorganized and a zoo. I saw ﬁrst hand the

importance of establishing a routine, and I saw what that routine was for an
instrumental music class. When I went to my second placement I was shocked at
the disrespect of the subject itself. Trying to put a routine into my second
placement was pointless. I didn’t have any support from the co-operating teacher,
and I only got attitude from the students. Although I knew it was important, it was
very intimidating trying to do it. That placement made me think twice about being

a teacher (Mary, focus group #2, May 2005). ’

Madsen & Kaiser (1999) found that, when ranking fears of student teachers, even
those student teachers deemed to have “outstanding” potential as future music educators
cited fear of inadequacy in the area of discipline and classroom management at twice the
rate of their next ranking fear of being a “failure”. Lacking classroom management skills
can be an overwhelming concern for student teachers. While most of the student teachers
felt that their co-operating teachers had great control over their classes so that learning

116

would occur, some student teachers were placed in a situation in which discipline was so
difﬁcult it caused them to wonder if their choice of career was right. Student teachers
voiced concerns regarding anxiety over the risk of loss of control of their groups.

Do As I Do, Not As I Say!

“Do as Ido, not as I say!” surfaced as a theme for the student teachers and co-
operating teachers in both journal writings and focus group interviews. Co-operating
teachers have a profound impact on student teaching, for they can inﬂuence the
experiences that the student teachers will have during student teaching. For example, co-
operating teachers as they can inﬂuence their work socialization, feelings of career
satisfaction, perceptions of the professional role, philosophies of teaching, instructional
practices, and whether to continue working in the educational ﬁeld is the right decision
(Achinstein & Barrett, 2004; Britzman, 2003; Brouwer & Korthagen, 2005; Goodfellow
& Sumsion, 2000; Kelchterrnans & Ballet, 2002; Seperson, & Joyce, 1973). The

operational word within this statement is “inﬂuence.” However, codes such as “demand,”

,9 6‘ 9’ “

“model,” “it’s this way, you can’t do it like that, controlling,” and “there’s not
enough time for that,” deﬁned the type of inﬂuence some co-operating teachers had on
the student teachers in this study and resulted in this theme.

The issue of being creative as a student teacher was discussed by both the co-
operating teachers and the student teachers in journals and focus group interviews. The
group of student teachers expected to be able to try new things in the classroom, to learn
on their own to become a teacher, to be immersed in the learning process, and to share
their recent learning from the Faculty of Education with their co-operating teachers. Co-

operating teachers also expected that student teachers would be willing to take risks,

117

demonstrate and share new methodologies, and demonstrate adequate, if not efﬁcient

classroom management and discipline skills. Brad said:
I ﬁnd I am trying to give the student teacher more space to develop a rapport with
the students. I would like to see more risk taking on the student teacher’s part.
Much can be learned from the students themselves if the student teachers would
allow themselves to do that. I would. like to see them initiate this risk taking rather
than constantly telling them what to do. Risk taking includes initiative on the part
of the student teacher (Brad, focus group interview #2, May, 2005).

Mary was eager to have the opportunity to be creative and found this opportunity when-

her co-operating teacher was away. Mary said:
During the week my co-operating teacher was away and I was left with the supply
to teach the classes. I was so excited to teach music, ﬁnally. The students had
been playing all the time so I decided to try something a little different. I had the
students listen to three different works that had different tempos and moods. I
asked the grade 8 class to write a story following the mood changes in the music.
The activity went well and the students enjoyed it. It was great to hear some of the
creative ideas the students had. I left these for my co-op proudly on her desk, and
I was very pleased with myself. When she returned I told her about the activity
and showed her the stories. She picked them up and threw them in the recycling
bin without looking at them. I thought it was a great activity to help those students
who aren’t great at playing to perhaps shine at listening. If a teacher I am
supposed to be working with can’t see the value in an activity that I think was
excellent, then there is something wrong with what I value. Or am I being

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unrealistic (Mary, Journal week one, December, 2004)?

Although co-operating teachers claimed to want their student teachers to be
creative in the classroom and take risks, student teachers told a different story. By the
time the ﬁnal student teaching placement had arrived, Tom expressed that he was excited
to teach 100% of the time and have the opportunity to experience and use all of the
information he had gained throughout his student teaching year. However, despite the
fact that Tom was given free reign by his co-operating teacher, he was surprised to ﬁnd
that his co-operating teacher found fault in anything he did that was different:

I always thought that I would be alright. I like trying new things and I thought I

had a lot of great ideas. I’m relying on their expertise to let me know if I’m on the

right track. Instead of letting me ﬁnd out things on my own, they were constantly

telling me how it should be (Tom, focus group interview #2, May, 2005).

This perception surprised Tom, and his student teaching experience left him feeling as if
he did not have the opportunity to try anything new. Torn felt that his co-operating
teacher did not let him be creative:

I was given free reign when it came to designing the bulletin boards in the

classroom or creating fun games that could go along with the music concepts

being taught at the time, but when I was told that the unit I would be teaching was
on rhythms, rather than letting me research it on my own or use my own ideas, my
co-operating teacher insisted that I only use the materials that she gave me (Tom,

focus group interview #2, May, 2004).

Co-operating teachers voiced during focus group interviews, in one-on one
interviews, and in journals that they wished for their student teachers to be more creative

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in the classroom. However, they provided their student teachers with conﬂicting
information. Tammy wrote:

I don’t know why I take time with her to discuss things. She’s just going through

the motions and she doesn’t really care about what will happen. I still offer

suggestions to be more creative, try things that are different. But I found that at
some points a lot of what she does mimics me and I tell her she should be doing
things on her own, in her own way. She should ﬁnd her own niche. It bugs me
when I take time to offer suggestions and they choose not to use them (Tammy,

journal writing #1, December, 2004).

Although Tammy wrote that she offered suggestions to be more creative, she also voiced
the following in a focus group interview:

My students are not good at change when a student teacher gets up in front of the

class. They are used to things my way and that’s how I know they learn. There’s

not enough time for her to try things her way. It will take me twice as long to
bring my student’s back to the way I do things (Tammy, focus group interview

#2, May, 2004).

Co-operating teachers seem to mislead their student teachers during placements.
Student teachers wanted to be creative in the classrooms, and co-operating teachers
appeared to want that as well. However, the fear of the classroom students getting behind
in the curriculum, lesson plans failing on the part of the student teachers, not enough time
during the placements for student teachers to teach differently, and not knowing how to
offer feedback may be some of the issues that prevent the co-operating teacher from
really endorsing the use of creative ideas in their classrooms. Co-operating teachers may

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have said that they wanted the opportunity to learn new methodologies demonstrated by
their student teachers, as well as have their student teachers take more risks in the
classroom. However, the co-operating teachers appeared to be unwilling to take risks by
allowing student teachers to try something diﬁerent. The mixed message the student
teachers received resulted in them doing as their co-operating teacher did rather than
trying out new teaching ideas.

Student teachers determined during observation days some of the things that they
would like to try differently when they had the opportunity to teach the classes that they
were observing, and they did not ask permission to implement some of these ideas.
However, their trying new things were sometimes hampered by their co-operating
teachers who had clearly established routines: “I would be willing to let them experiment
with the routine as long as they told me ahead of time” (Yvonne, focus group interview
#1, December 2004).

Yvonne, as evidenced in this comment, does not allow the student teacher to take a risk
unless she asks permission ﬁrst. Although co-operating teachers expressed a desire for
student teachers to become their own teachers, the co-operating teachers felt that they
were not as open and willing to allow risk taking as the student teachers would have
liked:

Different student teachers need and want different things. Student teachers can try

to achieve these in different ways. The whole interaction between the student

teacher and the class that I’ve been teaching all year involves a myriad of
variables. I have a hard time to allow the student teachers to be as creative as they
would like to because I haven’t tried these things and I can’t predict how my

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students will react. There is no time to allow for my students to get behind

because a student teacher wants to be creative (Brad, focus group interview #2,

May, 2005).

Although the co-operating teachers said that they wanted their student teachers to
fulﬁll the multi-faceted role of teachers, their actions toward their student teachers
sometimes were in conﬂict with this articulated desire. Co-operating teachers can
inﬂuence student teachers in their work socialization. For university students about to
begin student teaching, the socialization to teaching can be daunting. Faculty advisors
expect them to behave as professionals and to consider student teaching as their “. . ..ﬁrst
job in their new profession” (Knowles & Cole, 1994, p.38). However, when student
teachers enter the public school system to begin their student teaching, co-operating

6

teachers sometimes send a different message: ‘. . .the title of teacher comes after you
complete your student teaching efﬁciently and effectively” (Yvonne, one-on-one
interview, October, 2004).

Realistically, student teachers are situated in two worlds. AS the name implies, on
the one hand they are still students, while on the other hand they are teachers. Student
teachers face the dual struggle of not only educating others, but continuing to be educated
themselves. These two worlds often times wreak havoc with student teachers. The student
teachers feel that they have to adjust to that of their co-operating teachers. Despite the
times that their co-operating teachers expressed they wanted student teachers to do things
their own way, student teachers felt that this would hurt, more than help, them. Doing
what the co-operating teachers do, rather than what they are told to do became a survival

tactic for the student teachers.

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Socialization for student teachers tended to be focused on learning to “play the
game.” The “game” was doing things the way co-operating teachers did them in order to
survive, get' approval, and receive effective evaluations. While student teachers may not
have liked this outcome, conforming to the way in which co-operating teachers did things
appeared to be better than not conforming:

I spent each placement doing what my co-operating teacher does. Running

rehearsals the same way, interpreting a piece of music their way, not mine, all

because you really have to conform to them and their way of doing things. I don’t
know if I’ll be ready for my own classroom because I don’t know if my own true

self has come out yet in a classroom situation (Mike, focus group interview #2,

May, 2005).

In addition to this, student teachers were aware that success in student teaching
might result in employment. Student teachers hoped that the connections of their co-
operating teachers would be helpﬁrl in procuring a job. As a result they conformed to the
routines, methods, and techniques of their co-operating teachers. However, conforrrring to
the way their co-operating teachers did things was frustrating and, in the process of doing
this, they failed to learn about themselves as teachers:

In this last placement I was going to teach my lesson the way she wanted me to

teach it. Her evaluation of me is important for my ﬁrture. I don’t feel like my

lessons are anywhere near as exciting as they could be. How do you teach music-

of all subj ects-someone else’s way (Mary, focus group interview #2, May, 2005)?

The constant presence of the co-operating teacher in the room seemed to be
another way in which student teachers felt their creativity was hindered. During focus

123

group interviews, co—operating teachers identiﬁed their sense of responsibility as the
reason why they remained in the classroom at all times. Outside of the legalities involved
in leaving student teachers alone in the classroom, there were other reasons co-operating
teachers felt it was important to be present:

I want to see where my student teacher is making mistakes so that I can help them

and I can’t do that if I’m not in the room. You have two teachers in the classroom

and you want to take advantage of having a student teacher. I thought the students
could get more individual attention with both of us in the room (Brad, focus group

interview #1, December, 2004).

In this case, Brad wanted the opporttmity to provide feedback about his student
teacher’s lesson later on. Additionally Brad wanted to take advantage of having another
teacher in the room. Student teachers felt at times that the constant presence of the
teacher irnpeded their abilities to be creative when teaching lessons. When co-Operating
teachers really took advantage of having two specialists in the room, they were also
involved with the students, and student teachers felt more at ease while teaching.
However, when the co-Operating teacher was simply watching the student teacher teach
and took notes, student teachers felt that creativity was impeded:

I can see my co-operating teacher at the back of the room shifting and looking at

me and the students in the classroom. She lets me know when students are off task

with hand gestures which distract me from what I’m supposed to be doing (Mary,

focus group #2, May, 2005).

These last two comments suggested that the manner in which the co-operating teacher’s
presence was in the room was displayed, inﬂuenced the way in which the student teacher

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responded. Often times, student teachers referred to comments made by their co-
operating teachers regarding the methods and manners that they not only used to teach,
but also to maintain classroom management. While at the beginning of their placement
with these particular co-operating teachers they were encouraged to “do their own thing,”
student teachers found that most feedback suggested trying things the way the co-
operating teacher did them, rather than complimenting them on Skills that went well but
were different from those of the co-operating teacher. Student teachers regarded gestures
from the co-operating teachers while they were teaching as silent feedback that reminded
them that they were not doing things right or overlooking things that the co-operating
teacher would never miss. Student teachers revealed that co-operating teachers who
strictly observed and took notes while they were teaching made them feel nervous,
whereas co-operating teachers who were also involved in teaching with them made them
feel more trusted and calm.

Classroom management and discipline were areas about which both the co-
operating teachers and student teachers voiced concern. Co-operating teachers felt that
changing the way in which their class was managed could result in chaos. On the other
hand, student teachers wanted the opportunity to apply creative discipline and classroom
management strategies that they may want to use in their own classrooms when they
become teachers. Co-operating teachers interceded to discipline their own students while
the student teacher was teaching the class. This intrusion made student teachers feel that
they could not develop creative discipline strategies and that they were not trusted. It also
had an effect on their sense of themselves as the teacher in charge. When the co-operating
teacher was a constant management presence in the classroom, student teachers did not

125

get the opportunity to practice classroom management.

My co-operating teacher felt free to constantly interrupt my teaching when a child

misbehaved instead of letting me handle it. She would also do this if she felt the

whole class needed reprimanding. Her perception and my perception of students
misbehaving was different. I began to discipline like her, and I didn’t like that

(Mike, focus group interview #1 , December, 2004).

After each lesson was over, student teachers received either verbal or written
feedback from their co-operating teachers. However, this feedback focused more on what
the student teacher did not do or should have done differently:

I didn’t really get a lot of guidance from my co-operating teacher. I kind of

discussed things with her on the two days of observation and I understood where

her classes were in terms of practical and theory work. During the ﬁrst lesson’s
feedback, I was stunned to hear mostly about the things I Should have done. How
could I have done them, if she didn’t tell me to do them? The rest of the
placement was spent wondering what I was going to do wrong, before I did it. It

was disappointing (Kate, focus group interview #1 , December, 2004).

While feedback is a large part of the student teaching process, co-operating
teachers sent mixed messages to student teachers. While co-operating teachers expressed
concern at the lack of risk taking on the part of the student teachers, they also expressed
comfort when student teachers emulated them when teaching. Student teachers on the
other hand were left feeling restricted in their efforts to develop themselves as teachers,
as the co-operating teachers either directly or indirectly implied that the student teachers
should “do as I do” during the student teaching experiences.

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Assessing vs. Assisting

Assessing or evaluating is often an activity to be endured both by the evaluator
and the recipient of the evaluation (Danielson, 1991). Although assessing student
teachers frequently is required during the student teaching experience, most student
teachers and co-operating teachers alike are uncomfortable during the evaluation process.
Dye (1994) asserts that all student teacher supervision contains a somewhat strained
relationship between the co-operating teacher and the student teacher. Despite this
tension, student teachers expect support and help within their student teaching
placements. Co-operating teachers feel that they are less effective assisting their student
teachers because the student teachers are so conscious that they are being assessed by the
co-operating teachers, and that they may depend upon this assessment in their search for

employment.

Assessment refers to the process of gathering, analysing, interpreting and using
information about student’s responses to an educational task (Harlen, 2005; Sadler,
1989). Two key purposes for assessment are identiﬁed in the literature: assessment for
formative purposes and assessment for summative purposes (Angelo & Cross,
1998;Har1en, 2005). The former is concerned with improving the quality of student
learning (Angelo & Cross, 1993), and the latter with summarizing and communicating
achievement in relation to a speciﬁed end point for the purposes of reporting,
accountability and/or certiﬁcation (Sadler, 1989; Torrance & Pryor, 1998). Assisting, on
the other hand, centers on guiding student teachers effectively so that a co-operating

teacher’s guidance will carry on when they are on their own.

127

Co-operating teachers are expected to serve multiple roles, and sometimes these
roles conﬂict. In this study, one such point of conﬂict centered on the issue of assessment
versus assistance. Co-operating teachers needed to grade and evaluate (assess) their
student teachers using guidelines provided by the Faculty of Education. At the same time,
they needed to assist their student teachers in becoming better music teachers. This

conﬂict is difﬁcult for the co-operating teachers:

One of the goals of co-operating teachers is to support student teacher learning.
I want to be there to help direct my student teacher to become better at what he is
trying to do. I want to let him know ahead of time and afterwards of the
“successful” and “need improvement” categories. I want him to evaluate himself
by how his students learned (Leo, one-on-one interview, October, 2004).
Co-operating teachers can assess student teachers in the same way that they assess
their classroom students. In order for student teachers to develop into effective teachers,
co-operating teachers must accomplish two things with them: (1) assess the student
teachers’ progress, where they were, where they are, and where they need to go, and (2)
guide the student teacher to assess their own teaching through reﬂective inquiry. In this
study however, assessment was used by the co-operating teacher for at least one more
reason. Evaluating student teachers was necessary in order to provide them with a grade
that allowed them to complete the requirements to be certiﬁed as a teacher.
Co-operating teachers in this study assisted their student teachers in many ways.
One type of assistance was the sharing of information regarding practical knowledge.
This was often done by the co-operating teacher through professional dialogue. One co-

operating teacher said: “. . ..I want them to ask me what it is they need and I want to

128

provide them with information about their teaching” (Mike, individual interview,
October, 2004).

Another type of assistance provided by the co-operating teacher was that of moral
support. Offering moral support to the student teacher during practice teaching is critical
in developing a strong co-Operating teacher, student teacher relationship (Crow &
Mathews, 1998; Daloz, 1999). The experience of student teaching can be highly
stressful. This was particularly true when the expectations of the placement were not met
for the student teacher or the co-operatin g teacher. In addition, student teachers in this
study found that, although they might have felt successful in one placement, they did not
for all placements. The student teachers believed that the Faculty of Education set up the
placement schedules in a manner that lacked continuity. In addition to practice teaching
in their area of expertise, student teachers were placed outside of their area of expertise
with populations of students that were difﬁcult as well as with grade levels with which
they were unfamiliar. This was frustrating for both the student teachers and the co-
operating teachers. As one co-operating teacher said:

“. . ...almost all student teachers will go through a period of self-questioning,
especially in music. Understanding how to deal with these situations is crucial for
me as a co-operating teacher. Sometimes it is important for me to just act as their
sounding board, and let them unload (Yvonne, focus group interview #2, May,
2005)

Co-operating teachers also assisted student teachers by sharing some of their own
stumbling blocks when they were student teachers. This practice provided encouragement
for the student teachers when their lessons were not going the way that they had planned.

129

Often times student teachers wanted to hear about successes as well as difﬁculties from
their co-operating teachers. Positive responses helped student teachers feel that the good
things they were doing were not going unnoticed, while, at the same time put their work
in perspective:

My student teacher spent a lot of time making very detailed lesson plans for

rehearsals. These lesson plans were dynamic and reached the students. However,

my student teacher had to realize that these were grade seven students... It’s all
about helping my student teachers to keep it all in perspective (Leo, focus group

#1, December, 2005).

One powerful type of assistance was for the co-operating teacher to allow and
encourage student teachers to become their own teacher, although this did not occur
consistently or in all settings. All co-operating teachers had felt at times that they wanted
to take over rather than observe what the student teacher was doing. However, some of
the co-operating teachers learned to understand that student teachers needed time to work
things out in practice, they needed their concerns addressed, and they needed assistance
in building their conﬁdence while becoming new music teachers. Brad described:

I don’t want to mould my student teachers. I want to assist them in realizing what

their own teaching styles are and help them build on their strengths as new music

teachers. I want them to feel self-sufﬁcient in the classroom (Brad, focus group

#1, December, 2004).

During both focus group interviews with the co-operating teachers and the student
teachers, one of the most talked about issues in this theme of assisting versus
assessing was the use of the generic evaluation sheets used to grade the student teachers

130

supplied by the Faculty of Education. Student teachers were graded each time they
taught, using these sheets as guidelines. These generic sheets required both formative and
summative assessments to be determined by the co-operating teacher alone both during
and at the end of each practicum. As stated earlier, summative evaluations are used in this
context to make decisions regarding grades, overall performance evaluations, and to
provide a pass or fail grade that will determine the acquisition of a teaching certiﬁcate.
Formative evaluations on the other hand, are designed to improve student performance or
improve the outcomes on which student teachers are working. In a formative evaluation,
teachers do not issue overall judgments about the quality of a performance but instead
point o'ut particular strengths and/or weaknesses, suggest how those weaknesses might be
. addressed, and encourage reﬂection. Neither the formative evaluation nor summative
evaluations appeared to be easy. The use of the evaluation sheets seemed to create an
almost unavoidable conﬂict of interest when co-operating teachers made summative and
formative evaluations of the performance Of their student teachers. The conﬂict lay in the
fact that student teachers were being evaluated on characteristics that even their co-
operating teachers did not model. This was ﬁ'ustrating to the student teachers, whose
view of these generic evaluations was negative because of their beliefs that they did not
indicate a fair assessment of their work:
I have been teaching for a number of years in Canada and Romania already. That
evaluation sheet is not helpful to me or my co-operating teacher when telling me
the things that I really have to pay more attention to. It’s not the evaluation itself
or the fact that I have to succeed; it’s what’s written there. The sheet doesn’t
allow my co-operating teacher to talk about me as a music teacher. Some of the

131

things written in my ﬁrst evaluation, for instance, were about getting to know

teachers. The evaluation said to continue to get to know them better. But my co-

operating teacher doesn’t even lunch with any other teacher. She eats off by
herself with just a few others. She’s never seen me with other teachers because
she separates herself from that. How can she evaluate me on my relationship with

other teachers when she hadn’t actually seen it? That really frustrated me. I’m

talking about an unfair evaluation because there’s no reference point (Kate, focus

group interview #2, May 2004).

Kate’s co-operating teacher may have been encouraging her to get to know other
members of the staff so that she could learn from other members of the school
community during her student teaching experience. Instead of taking advantage of
becoming a part of the faculty community understanding the suggestion as an opportunity
to enhance her student teaching experience, Kate displayed frustration regarding the
grade and comment. Also, Kate did not take the time to ask the co-operating teacher to
elaborate on her comments. Perhaps by doing so, Kate’s experience could have been
enriched by the many facets of teaching styles and years of experience belonging to her
co-operating teachers and their colleagues.

Co-operating teachers expressed their own concerns about these sheets. The third
practicum occurred in February, 2005, and Leo’s student teacher displayed what he
determined to be “very weak musical skills” while teaching his grade ten instrumental
music class. Leo was surprised that she had been allowed to student teach, as he could not
believe that she would have been successful in previous instrumental classroom
placements. According to this student teacher, her summative evaluations had been good

132

ﬁom prior student teaching experiences. Leo was concerned about his evaluation of this
student:

I did not give her a good evaluation, but it was better than it should have been. I

was suddenly aware that two things could have happened with this student teacher

that would have put me in a bad position. She could have come to me and said

“why tell me so late in this placement? Why not let me know earlier?" and

second, ". . .at the beginning of this placement, I told you about my concerns in the

very areas you now cite as weaknesses, so you are repeating the weaknesses I

identiﬁed earlier without helping me with them. Why should I be punished

because of your ineptness as a co-operating teacher" (Leo, focus group interview,

December, 2005)?

Co-Operating teachers, who by the nature of their responsibilities are acting both
in an assisting and assessing role, are Open to conﬂicts that could arise with not only their
student teachers but also with the Faculty of Education. The assessment aspect of a co-
operating teacher’s role is important and difﬁcult. The University of Windsor Faculty of
Education student evaluation sheets describe the knowledge and skills that every
beginning education professional should possess. These evaluation sheets include
categories of knowledge, disposition, and performance with statements in each of these
categories representing levels of understanding and performance (See Appendix J .). The
same evaluation sheet is used for both the summative and formative evaluations. These
evaluation sheets are not subject speciﬁc, but generic in nature.

Co-Operating teachers are asked to provide a formative evaluation at the end of
the ﬁrst week of student teaching and a summative evaluation at the end of each three-

133

week block. Co-operating teachers keep a copy, student teachers keep a copy, and a copy
is sent to the Faculty of Education. Each criterion provides for four levels, ranging from
poor to excellent. These sheets are used as general guidelines to provide both the student
teacher and the university supervisor with an Opportunity to determine strengths and
weaknesses of the student teacher during each teaching block.

During the focus group interviews, co-operating teachers and student teachers
both commented on the evaluation process. It became clear that the evaluation process
had multiple meanings. For example, in some instances evaluation referred solely to the
grades student teachers received from their co-operating teachers. Student teachers were
constantly aware during teaching that they were being evaluated. The grade was ﬁrst and
foremost on their minds.

The one thing I’ve noticed when having a student teacher is that when you get one

of those informative evaluations, they read every bloody word of those because it

could be the meaning of a job or not. They also try to put a grade to the
comments. I realize that I’m writing a letter of recommendation on those forms.

But, when things are not going well, I still have to think, what can I write on those

forms that will make them have a positive experience? In addition to this, those

forms don’t really tell anyone about how well they did teaching music. All they
tell them is the generic things, teaching things that are crossovers to other
subjects, to all subjects. If I was hiring for music, I want to know things about
music. Can they rehearse, do they have good ears, can they analyze scores, will
they have appropriate expectations, can they conduct for crying out loud (Brad,

focus group interview #1 , December 2004)?

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Co-operating teachers felt, in addition to the completion of these evaluation sheets
as part of their roles, their comments on evaluation Sheets would also serve as letters of
reference. This position poses a potential difﬁculty for the co-operating teacher on a
number of levels. While co-operating teachers have a responsibility to assist their student
teachers, it does not necessarily mean that, although growth is occurring, that they are
comfortable in recorrrrnending these student teachers for future employment. At times,
conﬂicts existed for the co-operating teachers and the student teachers. Co-operating
teachers viewed student teachers as students of teaching and leaming. Major dissonance
occurred when the co-operating teachers were faced with the knowledge that their student
teachers really could not or would not learn what was necessary to teach successfully:

Everything I knew about my student teacher indicated that she would be

successful. She was extremely successful academically, and based on the limited

knowledge I had about her past teaching experiences as a private teacher, I

thought she would learn to teach a class well. She was extremely responsible, and

she spent a great deal of time on her lesson planning and grading papers. The
problems she had with teaching were all based on her inability to interact
positively with students. Her expectations for their behaviour were so far from
reality that she had a difﬁcult time planning appropriate lessons. The atmosphere
in the room during her teaching was often uncomfortable for everyone. She didn't
know or understand the students well enough to predict or anticipate their
reactions. Students perceived her as "stuck-up" to use their terminology.

Unfortunately, the students tested her often, as they usually do with student

teachers. Since she was unable to convey a sense of humour or an interest in

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them, they rebelled more than usual. I felt she sent students a strong message

indicating that she really didn't like interacting with them. I also felt that she

considered herself "above" them, possibly too good to teach "average high school
students." I even felt that she looked down on me for actually choosing this job

(Leo, focus group #2, May, 2005).

Co-operating teachers sometimes struggled to help student teachers overcome
problems that they, themselves, did not struggle with in their own journeys towards
becoming teachers. Leo’s comment was a reﬂection of the fact that he went into teaching
liking his students and was able to develop productive relationships with his students,
thus making it difﬁcult for him to understand his student teacher’s dislike of and inability
to interact with students. Diagnosing what constitutes stumbling blocks for a student
teacher becomes confounding when the stumbling blocks are aspects or dimensions of
teaching that co-operating teachers were "always able to do," or "learned to do
easily." Although Leo expressed his concerns to his student teacher, she did not exhibit
enough grth in her teaching so that he was able to recommend her for a job.

Another conﬂict was the tension that co-operating teachers sometimes felt
between encouraging and critiquing their student teachers. Co-operating teachers felt that
they constantly walked a narrow line between teaching or assisting the student teacher
and assessing the student teacher. On the one hand, co-operating teachers had to adhere to
the evaluation sheets established as benchmarks of performance. At the end of the student
teaching blocks, cO-operating teachers were responsible for determining whether they
could say with some assurance, "Yes, this student teacher is ready to assume a place in a
classroom of his or her own." On the other hand, co-operating teachers recognized that

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learning to teach was a life-long process. Finding a balance between these conditions
became especially problematic in the case of struggling or failing student teachers. When
to prompt student teachers and let them ﬁnd their own way and when to conﬁont student
teachers with their lack of success in meeting program standards became a monumental
decision for co-operating teachers working with struggling student teachers.

Aligned with this tension was the conﬂict that occurred between wanting to do
what needs to be done to foster the grth of student teachers and co-operating teachers’
responsibilities to their own students. Teachers invest a great deal of time and energy in
creating learning Opportunities that will enable their students to be successful. This is,
after all, their ultimate professional responsibility. However, co-operating teachers in this
study also believed that they had invested a great deal of time and energy in helping
student teachers learn to teach.

Student teachers rarely commented on the results of their teaching, in terms of
student leaming. Student teachers did not appear to be aware of how their student
teaching grade and student learning were related to one another. Instead, student teachers
spoke solely about the grade and separated their teaching from it. In other words, student
teachers would teach to the grade rather than teach to learn to be better teachers:

I don’t understand how my co-op can give me all these nice comments and then a

satisfactory level? What does that mean? Who is going to hire me with

satisfactory? I have to have excellent in all my evaluations, otherwise what’s the

point? (Mary, joumaling, May, 2005).

Most of the student teachers commented on the evaluation form, which is generic
to teaching and does not address concerns speciﬁc to instrumental music. Student

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teachers, also, referred to some of the criteria on the form as too general. Some co-
operating teachers did not make any comments under some of the rating categories on the
evaluation. For example, the co-operating teacher would circle the basic rating, and the
student teachers did not understand what speciﬁc behaviours of theirs led to that that
rating. Other student teachers talked of the different philosophies with which co-
operating teachers approached the evaluation sheets. Kate commented that her ﬁrst co-
operating teacher assigned formative ratings at a satisfactory level so that the summative
evaluation would demonstrate improvements. Her second co-Operating teacher assigned
good and excellent as the formative ratings and then all excellent for the summative
ratings. Kate said:
After seeing the two different placements that I had and how they each rated me,
it’s relative to their scale and how they grade individually. My ﬁrst co-op gave me
satisfactory levels, but commented on virtually every one so that progress shown
for the summative was apparent. I know how I got better because I was made
aware of what needed to be done. My second co-op gave me all good and
excellent on the formative and all excellent on the summative, with no comments.
I have no idea how I got there. The second co-op told me to ask questions if I had
any questions about the evaluation, whereas the ﬁrst co-op talked at great length
about both the formative and summative evaluations (Kate, focus group interview
#1, December, 2004).
In these instances, evaluation took the form of feedback offered by the co-
operating teachers in conversation with the student teachers about lessons taught from
day to day. Feedback was sometimes written and other times oral. Co-operating teachers

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often commented on the feedback process:

I used feedback, or so I thought, as a motivation tool. I wanted to let them know

how well they were doing. I always told them the good things ﬁrst and followed it

up with how I thought they could do something better. I have to admit though, if I

had a student teacher who gave me an attitude of knowing it all already, I

wouldn’t bother to take the time to do it. I really believe it would be a waste of

my time (Yvonne, focus group interview #1 , December, 2004).

Some co-operating teachers used feedback as a motivating tool for their student
teachers. However, they were uncomfortable delivering critical comments that they felt
would hurt their relationships or make their student teachers feel unsuccessful about what
they were doing. Because student teachers could not differentiate between the grade that
they would receive and the kind of music teacher that they would become, giving
feedback was a difﬁcult task for the co-operating teachers.

Student teachers wonied about their relationships with their co-operating teachers
and used this as an excuse to accept without question whatever feedback they received
from their co-operating teachers. Student teachers did not ask co-operating teachers to
expand on their comments, nor did they feel free to disagree with what their co-operating
teachers said. Whether student teachers valued the input from their co-operating teachers
was not clear. However, resentrnents due to perceptions of a poor relationship with the
co-operating teacher and feedback were articulated by both the co-operating teachers and
the student teachers:

I thought that my role as a student teacher was to learn from the person I was

working with and to continue the education of the students I was teaching. I had

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hoped that I wouldn’t be searching for the approval of somebody else in order to

get a good grade. My co-operating teacher had high demands on me, or at least

that’s what I felt. So the entire time, I’m aware that not only am I teaching
students, but I’m being graded by this person so I have to please them. My co-
operating teacher and the Faculty of Education have told me a hundred times that
they wouldn’t expect us to do things the way that they do them, but when in

Rome sort of thing. I’m ﬁnding that I’ve been in Rome a lot (Mary, journal

entries, May 2005).

Mary had determined throughout her fourth teaching block that her relationship
with her co-operating teacher made her feel unsuccessful. While this was the ﬁnal block
of student teaching, Mary had not yet become comfortable as a teacher in her own right.
She was unwilling to ask questions and become more involved in her growth as a teacher.
It was easier, more comfortable, or safer to conform to the expectations of the co-
operating teacher.

Mike’s experience with evaluation and his relationship with his co-operating
teacher during his second teaching block were positive. It occurred to Mike during this
block that, while his relationship was positive and he learned a lot from his co-Operating
teacher, he felt he was not being evaluated as a student teacher as much as the co-
operating teacher was evaluating his own work as the co-Operating teacher:

Mine was a teacher who did not forget what the experience of being a student

teacher was really like and was constantly reminding me that he could remember

what this experience was like. It wasn’t do this and don’t do that but rather “I

would have second thoughts about teaching this because...” This manner is very

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good for a relationship with student teachers and co-Operating teachers as well.

It’s very important. So my co-operating teacher ends up evaluating someone else,

not me. He would evaluate actually his own personality because that’s what he

would like to see happening in the classroom. He evaluates himself, not me

(Mike, focus group interview #1 , December, 2004).

Another issue within the theme of assisting versus assessing involved co-
operating teachers and university supervisors. Co-operating teachers discussed that
university supervisors are unwilling to acknowledge the differences from classroom to
classroom. University supervisors assess the student teachers according to what they are
being taught in their methodology classes at the Faculty of Education, rather than what
they are doing in the co-operating teacher’s classroom. What co-operating teachers
deemed to be successful by the student teachers was not always seen that way by the
university supervisor when observation occurred:

1 ﬁnd the university to be far too invasive in my classroom. They are not around

enough to gauge progress or lack thereof of the student teachers. I don’t like it

when university supervisors expect the student teacher to change my classroom in
order to experience what they’re being taught at the university (Yvonne, focus

group interview, May, 2005).

Little contact with the university supervisor, as well as infrequent observation/evaluation
of the student teacher by the university supervisor caused concern for the co-operating
teachers. Also, some of the co-operating teachers found it difﬁcult to meet with the
university supervisors and did not have regular contact with them.

Although co-operating teachers play a profound role in student teachers’

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experiences, they have little interaction with the Faculty of Education. Co-operating
teachers have ﬁrll-time teaching jobs in the public school system and, according to the
cO-operating teachers themselves, have not received adequate coaching to enable them to
fully understand the goals, expectations, or conceptual frameworks of the teacher
education program in which their student teachers are enrolled. At the University of
Windsor, co-operatin g teachers are invited to an after school hours orientation workshop
that is not mandatory. They also received a student-teaching handbook, but they admitted
during the ﬁrst focus interview that they did not read it from cover to cover.

University supervisors, on the other hand, are often full-time or part-time faculty
members and are required to observe student teachers on two occasions during the
teacher’s college year. They spend much of their time observing student teachers during
student teaching placements and, on occasion, help to solve critical problems that may
arise during student teaching. They do not appear, however, to be available for the co-
operating teachers. One co-operating teacher said:

It’s ﬁ'ustrating that they hire you as a co-operating teacher with your ﬁve dollar a

day fee, but they don’t put faith in what it is you have to say. I had a student

teacher practice teaching with me who was terrible. We had lots of meetings with
principals and advisors. This girl can’t do this job. She got a job the next year

(Tammy, focus group interview #1, December, 2004).

Even student teachers expressed frustration with their university supervisors. Tom
felt that, because his co-operating teacher and he worked together each day, she was far
more qualiﬁed to assess and evaluate his entire practicum than was the university
supervisor. He was frustrated that the university supervisor would observe him for one

142

class and determine strengths and weaknesses as well as a grade based upon that single
observation. Tom felt it would be more effective if the university supervisor was involved
in a follow-up after student teaching:

If we are supposed to be student teachers, we should be given all the opportunities

to practice and should be evaluated in our own environments. I think once you get

into your own school, your own class, my supervisor can come back and evaluate
me. And then at least I will know myself better and I would be able to

demonstrate more aspects of the music teachers’ role than what I get to do as a

student teacher (Tom, focus group interview #2, May 2005).

During the second focus group interview with the co-operating teachers, they
seemed to realize the importance of their role in the supervision, teaching, and mentoring
of student teachers. It is not often that music teachers get to dialogue with each other,
because they are often the only music teachers in their schools. Until they really began
talking about evaluating, they, like the student teachers, had not made the connection
between assessing and student teacher learning. They also expressed that, in addition to
guiding and grading the student teacher, they had a responsibility to the profession itself.
They looked forward to acting in the capacity of a co-operating teacher again, and
determined that they needed to become better at this particular role:

As I’ve gotten more experience as a teacher, I’ve realized as a co-operating

teacher you really have to be in a position where you’re willing to fail someone.

You have to be willing to say the hard things which, in my ﬁrst couple of years, I

couldn’t do, nor did I know how to do. Being a co-operating teacher is a huge

responsibility that we have. I think we take that for granted, and then kids slip by

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that maybe shouldn’t have and end up getting a job for thirty years. That’s a scary
point so in terms of my role, I’ve got to be willing to be, on some level obviously
collaborating with this person, be able to adjust that level from collaborator to co-

teacher (Yvonne, focus group interview #1 , December, 2004).

A co-operating teacher's evaluation should be an important index of a student
teacher's competence. It Should indicate the judgment of an experienced professional
educator about the ﬁtness of a student teacher about to enter the profession.
Unfortunately, some researchers have found the ratings made by co-operating teachers to
be invalid. For example, Phelps, Schmitz, and Boatright (1986); Phelps, Schmitz, and
Wade (1986); and Wheeler and Knoop (1982) all found rater errors of leniency and the
halo effect in co-operating teachers' evaluations. Likewise, Chang and Ferre (1988)
reported that, in 135 evaluations by co-operating teachers, there were virtually no below-

average grades.

In this study, co-operating teachers did not fail any of the student teachers. They
commented that the generic evaluation sheets should acknowledge improvement in the
grading and comment portion, but student teachers should not receive an “excellent”
rating their ﬁrst time out, fearing that their next grade from a different co-operating
teacher would be lower. Co-operating teachers felt that grades should improve with
placement, but starting them too high could pose a problem for the student teacher.
Another problem for both co-operating teachers and student teachers was the
inconsistency of the practice teaching schedule. Student teachers were graded each time

they were at a placement. The problem is that they never had the same co-operating

144

teacher or the same placement twice. Co-Operating teachers were forced on some level to
anticipate the grade based on what number the practice teaching block was. CO-operating
teachers felt that, during the third and fourth block, student teachers should be doing
certain things. However, they may not have been expected to do those things at all by
their last co-operating teacher. In addition, student teachers were concerned about
receiving a grade when placed outside of their areas of expertise. Student teachers
believed this to be unfair and worried about using their sheets when applying for
employment. Co-operating teachers seemed to understand their concern and perhaps

awarded a grade slightly higher than it should have been to compensate.

Feedback functions as motivation, reinforcement, and information, and therefore,
may be necessary for behaviour change or intervention. It may be especially beneﬁcial to
student teachers who are still learning to teach (Bunting, 1988). However, results of
research reveal that the co-operating teachers provide limited quality and quantity of
feedback (McIntyre & Killian, 1987; Richardson-Koehler, 1988; Veal & Rikard, 1998;
Wilkins-Canter, 1997). Yet, when feedback is provided, the co—operating teachers’
feedback has a greater impact on student teachers’ than that of the university supervisor
(Richardson-Koehler, 1988; Zahorik, 1988). A study conducted by Richardson-Koehler
(1988) revealed that 80% of student teachers believed their teaching knowledge and
practices were attributable to their co-operating teachers. Jones (1992) found that co-
operating teachers’ positive feedback helped student teachers conﬁrm their career choice.

In light Of the critical importance of feedback during the student teaching
experience, the co-operating teacher has an important and inﬂuential role in the

development of the student teacher. This belief was articulated by both the student
1 45

teachers and the cO-operating teachers in this study. Performance feedback that is
accurate, consistent, multimodal, timely, relevant, and objective has been identiﬁed as a

key component of supervision programs designed to improve teachers' instructional Skills
(Metzlei, 1990; Pelletier, 2000).
Co-ogerating Teacher as The Sage
”Sage” is a term used as far back as Socrates and Plato to describe a person with
perfect knowledge and the ability to transfer that knowledge according to the needs of
others (Johnson, 2006). Kerferd (1978), in his well known essay “What does the wise
man know?” discusses the content of a sage’s knowledge and concluded that a sage
knows what to do in various circumstances and how to do it. Kerferd describes the sage
as being nurturing, caring of others, and willing to promote the good in others:
“. . .the sage is not only concerned with the good of the whole or the good of
others, the sage’s knowledge and role as a craftsperson of virtuous activity means
that she has the capacity to attend to individuals and their particular needs and
circumstances” (p. 128).
Using Kerferd’s description of a sage and transferring it to the world of education, a sage,
then, might take the form of a master teacher who is not only knowledgeable of his or her
craft, but has the ability to transfer knowledge to others according to their needs.
The “Sage” surfaced in this study in two different ways. The ﬁrst was described
on a variety of occasions by the student teachers during focus group interviews and in
j oumals. When a co-operating teacher served as a sage, he or she provided opportunities
for student teachers to ﬁnd out for themselves what would or would not work in a music
classroom. These sages created positive learning environments, selected appropriate

146

instructional goals, used appropriate assessments, used the curriculum to guide decision
making, and employed a variety of teaching methodologies to assist in the learning
process for all students:

She let’s you go with whatever you want to try and she doesn’t fault you for

failing and I need something like that. I need to be able to try anything, and if I

screw up she’s not going to hold it over my head. I don’t need to be coddled at

this age. I don’t need to be told what’s right and wrong. I just need to be allowed

to try (Mike, focus group interview #1, December, 2004).

The second way in which the sage emerged was described by the co-operating
teachers. Co-operating teacher participants considered to be sages by student teachers
generally gave much of the credit of a successful experience to the student teacher.
Student teachers allowed for these co-operating teachers to feel free to share the qualities
that made them sages in the ﬁrst place. These qualities included ﬂexibility, positive
communication skills, and the ability to establish a good working rapport or relationship
with their student teachers:

It’s funny how my opinion has changed over time because I really like both of the

student teachers that I have right now. They’re wonderful. I thought that from the

very beginning. I thought this will be a piece of cake because they both seem to
know what they’re doing musically. They’re really ambitious and eager to dive in
and take over. Actually, it’s taken a whole lot more energy because I want so
much to help these two. It takes so much energy because I want so much to give
them every bit of feedback I can possibly give. I want them to excel, so it’s

draining (Yvonne, focus group interview #1 , December, 2004).-

147

In both focus groups interviews, the student teachers discussed qualities that their
co-operating teachers had and the skills that co-operating teachers used when teaching.
Student teachers believed that these qualities carried over into how these teachers worked
with them as student teachers. Two of those qualities were trustworthiness and
collaboration.

My co-operating teacher is able to collaborate with me like I’m a new teacher. I

feel I can conﬁde in him and that I’m not a topic in the lunchroom with other

teachers. I can tell that one of their goals is for me to be better for me, not so they
can say they did a good job, but because that’s what they really want for me

(Kate, focus group interview #1, December 2004).

Additionally, being a life long learner was a characteristic of a sage. Sages always
wanted to improve their skills. This was regarded with respect by student teachers:

My co-operating teacher is always going to conferences and taking courses. He

recommended to me that I do the same when I’m out there. The last time he went,

he brought back so much material, and gave me some of it to give me an idea of
how much there really is to learn. He didn’t make me feel overwhelmed with it,

just more interested (Mike, focus group #1 , December 2004).

Another characteristic spoken of students was ﬂexibility. Planning was essential
to cover material, but the planning needed to be ﬂexible so that it could be adjusted to the
realities of the actual classroom. Sages as co-operating teachers were not only ﬂexible in
the classroom with their own students they were also ﬂexible with their student teachers
as well:

Yvonne is very ﬂexible and open-minded and she encouraged us to be open-

148

minded about the way that we approach all of our classes and the way we

approach new pieces. She feels good about what she is doing, she feels good at

the end of the day, she doesn’t feel run down or anything like that and she wants
the students to feel good about what they’re doing, and she wants to see some sort

of level of accomplishment at the end of each of her classes from day to day. It’s a

really basic set of guidelines but it’s really obvious that that’s what she needs to

do and she wants us to do the same thing. But the way in which we achieve it is

totally up to us (Mike, focus group #1, December, 2004).

During the teaching blocks for all student teachers, lesson planning needed to
include predictions of the way in which a class would respond to the lesson rather than
just the content of what would be taught. Student teachers were asked to consider
alternative pathways in the lesson if their predictions did not match actual student
response:

It took many tries and sometimes great frustration, but I realized that ﬂexibility

involved the ability to cover the lesson and reﬂect about the lesson, not just

predict the ﬂow of the lesson (Kate, joumaling, May, 2005).

Watching this particular enlightenment allowed co-operating teachers to see ﬂexibility
and understand what it means to include this characteristic when having student teachers:

What I saw, particularly toward the end of her teacher’s college year, was that she

was so intuitive and natural, she did start thinking about her lessons differently;

“You know I could be stronger here, or do this here next time.” Watching that

happen was very powerﬁrl for me (Brad, focus group interview #2, May, 2005).
Tammy’s experience was similar:

149

I think he really had it. After watching him go it alone for awhile, he learned to go

with the ﬂow and he started to ask me the right questions. He forced me to look a

lot harder at answers so I was better prepared to help him. He was good for me. I

think when they get to this stage that it’s easier for them to relax, and they don’t

look at me as much like an evaluator, but rather a colleague (Tammy, focus group

interview #2, May, 2004).

Student teachers deemed rapport and personality to be an important attribute of a
sage. The co-operating teachers who displayed the willingness to establish a
teaching/leaming relationship allowed the student teachers to feel comfortable and
willing to experience anything. Student teachers feared that, if their relationships with
their co-operating teacher were negative, their destiny to experience something negative
was pre-determined. Co-operating teachers who acted as “sages” understood that the
development of rapport and a relationship with their student teacher was important to the
student teacher, but also required time. However, student teachers really did not focus on
the word “develop” at all. Student teachers wanted the relationship to be immediate,
rather than developed.

What if my co-op doesn’t like me? What if I don’t like them? I just don’t feel that

I will be in a situation where my relationship with her won’t reﬂect the way I’m

evaluated by her, or the way she behaves as my co-operating teacher. This is very

stressful for me (Mike, one-on-one interview, October, 2004).

When student teachers were asked what they believed were good qualities of a co-
operating teacher, the ability to develop a relationship was not their ﬁrst answer. Rather,
personality emerged as a characteristic reﬂective of a sage. Over and over again, student

150

teachers directly related the personality of the co-operating teacher to the success or
failure of a placement:

If your co-operating teacher has a good personality and a very good shaped

character then you will feel much on ground and in a position to start your

teaching. You will feel like, I can do this on my own terms and I can Show
actually that what I do and the way that I can do it without thinking that much

about pleasing the teacher (Torn, focus group interview #2, May 2005).

Also, student teachers identiﬁed sage-like characteristics that the co-operating
teachers should possess before they take on a student teacher. Among them was their
willingness to develop collaborative relationships with the student teachers:

I don’t feel that we’re treated like students at all. We have never gotten to the

point that there’s conﬂict because I can easily talk to her. Our personalities match.

I’ve come to the conclusion that before a co-operating teacher takes on a student

teacher, they should look at themselves and ask whether or not they are the type

of person who is receptive to others and works well with others instead of just
teaches or talks to others? My co-operating teacher helped to mould me. She not
only taught me, She also learned from me. That’s an expert (Tom, focus group

interview #2, May 2005).

Co-operating teachers discussed how their own ideas of acting as co-operating
teachers had changed since being involved with this study, and these changes allowed
them to function more as a sage. Credit for this change was given to their student teachers
and to participating in this study:

My idea of being a co-operating teacher has changed as a result of being involved

151

in this study. I know that it’s important for me to be a positive role model with

high moral standards for my student teacher; I think that it’s more important for

me to communicate my love for teaching music to children and the teaching

profession itself (Leo, focus group interview #2, May 2005).

Further, some co-operating teachers talked about sharing their positive experiences with
their student teachers as having changed the way in which they saw themselves as co-
operating teachers:

I don’t want to make my student teachers feel inferior because they can’t do this

job the way I do. I need to learn from her as much as she needs to learn from me.

Being the co-operating teacher doesn’t mean I’m “in charge,” it’s a negotiated

idea. Both the student teacher and I have to be clear on what we both expect from

the experience (Tammy, focus group interview #2, May, 2005).

In the last focus group interview, Yvonne seemed particularly affected by her
participation in this study. Out of all the co-operating teachers involved in this study,
Yvonne felt most that using her role as a co-operating teacher was one of the most
effective ways of learning. Again, she credited her student teachers with her development
as a “sage”:

I ﬁnd acting as a co-operating teacher to be a gratifying experience. Yes, it is

extra work. Yes, it can be a struggle at times. Yes, the monetary compensation is

little. But the rewards are worth the effort. I ﬁnd myself being enriched as a

teacher as a result of my experiences with my student teachers. Any time

educators collaborate, the exchange of ideas is likely to be creative. Student
teachers challenge me, even after all these years, to reﬂect on my own methods

152

and practices. I strongly believe that the experienced teacher has much to offer to

the novice teacher. Sometimes we may fail to realize just how much expertise we

possess until we see ourselves in the eyes of a student teacher (Yvonne, focus
group interview #2, May, 2005).
Yvonne’s willingness to reﬂect in this manner epitomizes the sage.

“Sages” functioning as co-operating teachers is a relatively new area of research.
Kahn’s (2001) results supports this study regarding attributes of a “sage” as described by
student teachers. Kahn’s study involving the success of the student teaching experience
listed speciﬁc attributes of the co-operating teacher as contributing factors to a successﬁrl
student teaching experience. These attributes included ﬂexibility, positive communication
skills, the ability to establish a good working relationship, and crediting the student
teacher for supporting co-operating teachers’ leaming. Kahn’s study, like this study, also
determined that the ability of the co-operating teacher and student teacher to learn from
one another was an attribute that contributed to expert teachers.

The student teachers in this study, when describing experts or sages, did not refer
to the amount of teaching experience of the co-operating teachers. Instead they described
characteristics of teaching and teachers that they felt allowed them to have positive
experiences as well as facilitated their development as a music teacher. Looking back at
the co-operating teachers chosen for this study, the amount of time taught varies. All of
the co-operating teachers had taught music for more than ﬁve years, something the
Faculty of Education requires in order to act in the capacity of a co-operating teacher.
However, each of the co-operating teachers possessed the characteristics of a sage despite
the differences in the amount of time each of them have spent in the classroom.

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During focus group interviews, all of the co-operating teachers believed that part
of their role was to learn from their student teachers, and they voiced this belief.
Additionally, they welcomed this learning. However, a difference between the sage and
non-sage co—operating teacher appeared to lie within the deﬁnition of their roles.
Although all voiced this belief, only two consistently demonstrated this belief,
particularly in the areas of risk taking, ﬂexibility and learning from their student teachers.
Co-operating teachers who were sages thought of themselves as learners and thought of
themselves as mentors for the student teachers, rather than leading the student teachers.
Some co-operating teachers described as sages by their student teachers saw their co-
operating role as a shared experience between themselves and the student teacher.

I provided feedback to my student teacher after each lesson. Why? Because I ‘

needed it! After what I thought was initially going to be a break watching my

student teacher, I found that I was re-charged. I began to become restless waiting

to get back in there. The student teacher was doing an excellent job. . .but I

couldn’t wait. . ..I realized how much I missed it. This time of the year teachers are

beginning to sense the end is near, but I felt as if it was the beginning again... I

was excited. I think a lot ofpthis feeling came from my student teacher. He’s

young, fresh, does all these activities that I’ve not seen. . .shows lots of

variety. . .and I just felt like it was a reﬂection opportunity for me on what I’m

doing, what I could do better. I was excited to try new things that I watched him

do. Just by observing him, I was able to reﬂect on my own approach. It was such 1

a great learning experience (Leo, focus group interview #2, May, 2005).

The most effective co-operating teachers are those that are willing and look

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forward to learning from their student teachers; not just learning more about their student
teachers, but also learn about themselves through the process of serving as co-operating
teachers. The co-operating teachers identiﬁed as sages by the student teachers were the
ones who felt that, at some times, they were students themselves. These teachers were
eager to learn from their student teachers. All of these ﬁndings support those discovered
by Kahn (2001).

All participants spoke positively about the learning that resulted from speaking
with each other about their experiences as both co-operating teachers and student
teachers. A strong desire to continue to learn was demonstrated by both groups,
particularly towards the third block, when focus group interviews and joumaling
provided opportunities to think about what they were doing as well as dialogue with each
other. Co-operating teachers, as a group, consistently credited the student teachers with
wanting to learn more about their co-operating teachers as teachers of music and as co-
operating teachers.

While wishing that all student teachers could be paired up with “sages,” the
reality was that only some of the paired co-operating teachers and student teachers “hit it
off” and formed mutually satisfying relationships during the student teaching experience.
The other instrumental music student teachers struggled under the supervision of "good"
teachers who believed that there was only one way to do things... their way. Still other
student teachers found themselves in mismatched situations with congenial, but
uncommunicative co-operating teachers whose pedagogical and philosophical
orientations were different from their own. These unvoiced differences of style and
opinion at times caused confusion and stress.

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Summgy

Both co-operating teachers and student teachers had mixed views regarding the
expectations of each other during the student teaching experiences. While student
teachers made it clear that they needed to feel a sense of belonging to the school while
they were student teaching, co-operating teachers were frustrated that the student
teaching experience was not a real reﬂection of the role of a music educator. However,
they did not know how to address that with the student teachers. During focus group
interviews, cO-operating teachers could not agree upon a common deﬁnition of their
roles; rather, they found a common frustration. They focused on their roles as music
educators, describing the expectations of their jobs rather than the expectations of
themselves as co-operating teachers. This lack of focus on their role as co-operating
teachers made it difﬁcult for the co-operating teachers to meet the needs of student
teachers, as well as to guide them effectively through the experience of being
contributing members to the music learning community.

A music learning community provides student teachers and co-Operating teachers
with a sense of belonging and a willingness to want to participate in making the
community better. Included in the community for this study are students, student
teachers, co-Operating teachers, parents, and administrators. Results indicated that student
teachers and co-Operating teachers had different ideas concerning what is needed to
create positive, leafning outcomes during the student teaching experience and to become
effective members of the community. Co-operating teachers held early concerns about
providing productive learning practice teaching experiences for student teachers, since
they described their roles as being much more complex than just teaching.

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Understanding, deﬁning, and clearly articulating the expectations of the student
teachers and co-operating teachers before student teaching may create a more effective
music learning community within which co-operating teachers and student teachers
would have a better, more productive student teaching experience.

If student teachers and co-operating teachers were able to sit down, talk more and
learn from each other, more community might be created. Dialogue and comnritrnent to
learning were two fundamental parts of the descriptions of community. Both co-Operating
teachers and student teachers needed to belong to a greater extent to the community as
learners and teachers. 1

Student teachers blamed their co-operating teachers for a lack of positive learning
experiences, a lack of feedback and for their feeling like “failures” more than they
blamed themselves for a variety of reasons. According to the student teachers, the
multiple venues and co-operating teacher changes did not allow for the student teachers
to experience continuity of teaching ideas from placement to placement. Student teachers
expressed frustration at the multiple expectations of the Faculty of Education, as well as
at the different expectations of each co-operating teacher. Expectations changed ﬁom co-
operating teacher to co-operating teacher, and it was unrealistic to assume that student
teachers would be able to understand new sets of expectations in a three-week time
frame.

Co-Operating teachers blamed their student teachers for having inadequate
musical, practical and classroom management strategies. While it was difﬁcult, according
to co-operating teachers, to provide feedback to their student teachers concerning these
inadequacies, co-operating teachers did voice their concerns in their journal entries. Co-

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operating teachers voiced concerns regarding their lack of ability to provide appropriate
feedback to their student teachers. All of the co-operating teachers agreed that they
needed to develop better feedback strategies.

Co-operating teachers also blamed the Faculty of Education for the three-week
teaching block schedule. Co-operating teachers agreed that splitting the student teaching
experience into four blocks encouraged student teachers to copy the personality of the co- _
operating teacher in order to survive, whereas a longer student teaching placement with
the same co-operating teacher might allow teacher candidates’ personalities to ﬂourish.
Also, the short blocks made it difﬁcult to establish working relationships between co-
operating teachers and student teachers, which was difficult for co-operating teachers and
student teachers alike. Co-operating teachers also blamed the Faculty of Education for a
lack of preparation of student teachers and the lack of consistency between the co-
operating teacher and the university supervisor. All of these factors contributed to a
somewhat negative co-operating teacher experience.

Blaming others impeded the growth of both the student teachers and the co-
operating teachers, as neither the co-operating teachers nor the student teachers were able
to reﬂect critically on their own practice. It also appears that neither the co-operating
teachers nor the student teachers were aware of their inability to self reﬂect.

“It’s overwhelming!” surfaced as a theme for both the co—operating teachers and
the student teachers. By the third teaching block, when student teachers were teaching
75% of the co-operating teacher’s courses, student teachers felt overwhelmed by such
things as developing relationships with the co-operating teachers, communicating ideas
with their co-operating teachers, developing classroom management strategies, learning

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to undertake the multi-tasking role of the classroom music teacher, and developing
assessment strategies as well as being assessed, all while trying to emerge as a teacher in

their own right.

Concerns and fears for both student teachers and co-operating teachers ranged
from actual implementation of lessons and learning outcomes to classroom management.
Student teachers consistently voiced in their journal writings and in focus group
interviews a. myriad of fears regarding their being able to succeed in the multi-
dimensional role of the music teacher. This fear was voiced more often among those

student teachers in secondary school settings.

The idea of being overwhelmed was exhibited by both the student teachers and
co-operating teachers. Student teachers displayed fears regarding a multitude of issues,
including classroom management, application of university methods classes and new
theory, fear of their own shortcomings as a music teacher in front of their students and
their co-operating teacher, and getting everything done. Co-operating teachers were
concerned with getting the student teachers to understand their role as music educators,
maintaining the pace of the curriculum, not wanting their classroom students to get

behind, and having time for their student teachers.

Co-operating teachers and student teachers shared the same experiences while
working together in a classroom; however, the interpretations regarding those
experiences were often not the same. This result contributed to the feeling of being
overwhelmed, because student teachers did not feel like they knew what to do differently

if a Similar situation occurred again. The fact that their co-operating teachers analyzed

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things so differently made the student teachers feel inadequate as teachers rather than
informed about other possibilities. Ideally, student teachers have the opportunity to put
into practice all that they have learned about teaching. However, for this to be successful,
student teachers must go beyond subject matter knowledge and immerse themselves in

practice to actually learn how to teach their subject.

Clearly the theme “Do as I do, not as I say,” was a result of mixed messages for
the student teachers from the co-operating teachers. The reality is that student teachers
conformed to the styles of teaching of their co-operating teacher as a survival technique
to get them through their placements. Student teachers were ﬁ'ustrated that they were not
encouraged to develop their own styles as teachers of music. Co-operating teachers, on
the other hand, identiﬁed a lack of time and unknown teaching methods as a restraint on
their being willing to let the student be creative in the classroom.

As a result of the “Do as I say, not as I do” theme, there were many lessons that
the student teachers felt they could not learn on their own. They believed that they were
unsuccessful in trying to “read” their students, because they were too consumed with
“reading” their co-operating teachers. They were not given the opportunity to make any
major decisions during the practice teaching sessions and, as a result, they never faced
any consequences from those decisions. There was little Opportunity to be innovative and
apply new teaching ideas, because materials and methods were dictated to them by their
co-operating teachers. Because the co-operating teachers intervened, they were never
really “tested” by the students, so they never really learned whether they could manage a
class on their own. They never really learned to set their own pace, because they were too

busy “marching to the beat” of the co-operating teacher.
1 60

Although co-operating teachers voiced, during focus group interviews, that they
wished for their student teachers to be more creative in the classroom, in their journal
writings they wrote that their student teachers would be most successful if they were
emulating their teaching styles in the classroom. Student teachers, however, saw things
completely differently from their co-operating teachers. Student teachers expressed many
areas in which they would have liked ‘to try to be more creative and discover themselves
as teachers.

In the theme assessing versus assisting, co-operating teachers faced a conﬂict
when evaluating their student teachers. Co-Operating teachers needed to grade and
evaluate their student teachers using guidelines suggested or provided by the Faculty of
Education, while at the same time assisting the student teachers in beconring better music
teachers. This conﬂict was difﬁcult for both the co-operating teachers and the student
teachers.

During the focus group interviews, co-operating teachers and student teachers
both commented on evaluation. Student teachers were constantly aware during teaching
that they were being evaluated. It was rare that student teachers commented on their
teaching results and whether their students learned from them. Rather, student teachers
focused on their grades. However, some co-operating teachers used feedback as a
motivating tool for their student teachers. Because student teachers could not differentiate
between the grade they would receive and the kind of music teacher they would become,
giving feedback was difﬁcult for the co-operating teachers.

Student teachers worried about their relationship with their co-operating teachers
and used this as an excuse to accept, without questioning, whatever feedback they ,

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received from their co-operating teachers. Student teachers did not ask co-operating
teachers to expand on their comments, nor did they feel free to disagree with what they
said. Whether student teachers valued the input from their co-operating teachers was not
clear. However, resentrnents due to perceptions of a poor relationship with the co-
operating teacher and feedback did appear for both the co-operating teachers and the

student teachers.

Student teachers were graded each time they practice taught using the same
generic rubric as the guideline for both formative and summative assessments. There
exists within these evaluation sheets an almost unavoidable conﬂict of interest when co-
operating teachers make summative evaluations of the performance of their student
teachers. The conﬂict revolves around the fact that, although student teachers may have
improved during the practice teaching experience, it may not be enough improvement to
provide a grade that would be considered for an employment reference. One reason was
that these generic rather than subject-speciﬁc sheets did not allow co-operating teachers '
and student teachers to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the student teacher from a
musical standpoint. Co-operating teachers expressed their own concerns about the

shortcomings of the rubric provided and required by the Faculty of Education.

An additional issue relating to assisting versus assessing involved the interactions
between and roles of co-Operating teachers and university supervisors. Although co-
operating teachers play a profound role in student teachers’ experiences during the
teacher’s college year, they have little interaction with the Faculty of Education. This
lack of communication contributes to issues that concern both co-operating teachers and

student teachers. For example, the expectations of what should be happening in the
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classroom on the part of the university supervisor and the co-Operating teacher are often
different. This difference in opinion affects the experience for the music student teacher,
who at times becomes confused regarding those expectations. Communication between

these two parties, during student teaching blocks particularly, needs to be addressed.

A co-operating teacher's evaluation should be an important index of a student

' teacher's competence. Most research, including this study, provides evidence that this is
not the case. In light of the critical importance of feedback during the student teaching
experience, the co-operating teacher has an important and inﬂuential role in the
development of the student teacher. For co-operating teachers, however, assisting student

teachers was important to them, and often these two roles were at odds.

All of the co-operating teacher participants could be considered to be sages in
once capacity or another. These co-operating teachers generally gave much of the credit
of a successful experience to the student teacher. On the other hand, student teachers
believed that co-operating teachers were sages for a variety of reasons. In both focus
groups in December, 2004 and May, 2005 student teachers identiﬁed qualities that

described their co-operating teachers who they considered to be sages.

Flexibility was a major characteristic spoken of by student teachers, who,
according to their co-operating teachers, ﬁnally understood that a music teacher must be
ﬂexible on many levels, including when acting in the capacity of a co-operating teacher.
Sages as co-operating teachers were ﬂexible as classroom teachers as well as with their

student teachers.

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Results from this study supported Kahn’s (2001) study, which listed Speciﬁc
attributes of the co-operating teacher as contributing factors to a successful student
teaching experience. Attributes associated with “sages” as co-operating teachers in this
study included ﬂexibility, positive communication skills, the ability to establish a good
working relationship, and crediting the student teacher for co—operating teacher learning.
In addition this study also determined that the ability for the co-operating teacher and
student teacher to learn from one another was an attribute contributed to teachers as

“sages.”

A key element in determining success in student teaching is the relationship
between the student teacher and the co-operating teacher. The student teacher works in an
apprenticeship of observation (Lortie, 1975), becorrring acculturated to the co-operating
teacher’s classroom. Co-operating teachers agreed that observing their student teachers
allowed them to see themselves and reﬂect on what they were doing as a teacher. It also
provided the co-operating teachers with the opportunity to watch new approaches in
action and decide whether these approaches would be something that they should
consider doing. The relationship between the co-operating teacher and the student teacher
was positive throughout the experience for some student teachers and co-operating
teachers, but not for all, and not for all the practice teaching blocks. The co-operating
teachers who provided the respectful, open-minded, ﬂexible, approachable, and
personable environments in which their student teachers would be set up for success had
student teachers who reacted positively to any circumstance while student teaching and

developed good relationships with their co-operating teachers.

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Co-operating teachers who were “sages” believed that part of their role was to
learn from their student teachers, and they welcomed this learning. The most effective co-
operating teachers thought of themselves as learners. Some co-operating teachers
described as sages by their student teachers saw their co-operating role as a shared

experience between themselves and the student teacher.

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Chapter V
CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS FOR THE PROFESSION:
Conclusions

The theme, “Building a music learning community” included many things.
Student teachers and co-operating teachers demonstrated difﬁculty deﬁning their roles
within the community. While co-operating teachers as a group were able to agree on a
description of the role of student teachers, their major concern was in their own inability
to convey to student teachers the many components of the role of a music teacher in the
community involved. Co-operating teachers expected that student teachers would be
involved in all areas of music education, both inside and outside of the classroom.
However, the student teachers were not able to initiate and engage in, in their view, those
things that are involved in being a music teacher, such as extra-curricular activities,
photo-copying, lesson planning, instrument repair, and fundraising. This frustrated the
co-operating teachers.

Student teachers, on the other hand, expected to be immersed in the experiences
of the music teacher. Perhaps they had not reﬂected on the role of a music teacher,
because they did not seem to know what “behind the scenes” activities were involved. _
However, student teachers wanted to be involved holistically in the school community
and belong to it. More than one student teacher voiced that being immersed in the school
community would be beneﬁcial, because he could learn so many things, not just the one
subject area. Yet, the co-operating teachers did not feel that the student teachers were
ready to be immersed in the entire school community. That student teachers seemed to be
unable to understand the role of a music teacher resulted in the co-operating teachers not

166

offering many of the experiences that should have been offered to the student teachers.
Immersion into the school community, although it may have seemed overwhelming at the
time, could have encouraged the understanding of the complexity of the role of music '
teachers for student teachers and could have alleviated some of the frustration of the co-
operating teachers.

Co-operating teachers have the Opportunity to directly shape and mould the ideas
of incoming novice music teachers. Co-operating teachers must help the student teachers
achieve that “sense of belonging” they desire, while also helping them to understanding
that the role of a music teacher is much more involved than teaching students in the
classroom. The results of this study support that co-operating teachers need to help
students teachers discover and identify with the rich role of a teacher of music and all that
this role entails.

The desire to view themselves and be viewed by others as music teachers in the
community was voiced by the student teachers during both of their focus group
interviews. Student teachers experienced this when they had taught good lessons and
when the students treated them as their teacher. This “pupil given sense of belonging”
(McNally et al., 1994) demonstrated that the student teachers had established rapport with
the students, as well as had begun to identify themselves in the role of music teacher, thus
allowing them to feel more like a part of the school corrrrnunity.

Student teachers also wanted to develop a rapport with their co-operatin g teachers
as well as the other teachers within the school community. They wanted to feel relaxed
with the teachers, which would allow for the conversations about teaching and help them
to think of themselves as teachers. Co-operating teachers could help students teachers

167

accomplish this by allowing student teachers to observe more than just their own
classrooms and by ensuring that they have been introduced to other members of the
music department and other colleagues in the building. They could also introduce student
teachers in a manner that allows them to feel like a teacher (Krueger, 2006).

Most of the student teachers were plunged into the role of teaching music classes,
but, in general, they were grateful for this experience. If anything, student teachers were
disappointed at the limited teaching experiences during their ﬁrst teaching block. Student
teachers wanted to take charge of the classes they were assigned to teach, because they
believed that this would allow them to gauge for themselves their ability to handle
classroom reality and, as a result, help them develop their sense of themselves as a
teacher. Giving student teachers sustained teaching responsibilities, however, demanded
the trust of the co-operating teachers. If the student teachers were allowed to take charge,
it was a sign of their being accepted as a colleague rather than a student.

One of the most persistent issues ﬁom the theme of “musical learning
community” was that the co-operating teachers could not let go of the belief that student
teachers did not understand their jobs. CO-Operating teachers believed that students were
set up for failure by the Faculty of Education, because, when they started student
teaching, they did not clearly understand the many facets of the role of a music educator.
Yet, the co-operating teachers in this study did not have conversations with the student
teachers about their philosophies of music education that would allow them to either
enhance their philosophies or begin to understand their roles. That the co-operating
teachers viewed their own roles as co-operating teachers so narrowly was indicative of
their lack of knowledge of this role, and served as evidence that they misunderstood the

168

expectations of the student teachers assigned to them.

While some co-operating teachers suggested that this lack of awareness was not
the fault of the student, they also indicated in their focus group interviews that this had
been frustrating each time they worked with a student teacher. Co-operating teachers,
when they became aware of this continual ﬁ'ustration, should have made more of an
effort to ensure that, at the very least, the student teachers learned the “behind the scenes”
components of the job, even though they felt that the Faculty of Education needed to
provide more opportunity for student teachers to experience the “real, all encompassing
job” of the music educator.

Prior to the ﬁrst practice teaching experience, in individual interviews, student
teachers expressed a desire to have a positive learning experience. Student teachers
deﬁned their roles uniquely; each student teacher had a different interpretation of what
their role as a student teacher should be, even though the four student teachers had taken
the same courses together at the Faculty of Education.

The student teachers and co-operating teachers differed in their ideas about the
desired learning outcomes of the student teaching experience. A study conducted by
McNally, Cole & Stronach (1994) looked at what and how student teachers learned or
failed to learn during extended periods of the student teaching experience through the
perspectives of the student teachers themselves. This “teacher- given sense” of belonging
(McNally et a1, 1994) was stated explicitly. In this study, there was no prolonged
opportunity to teach. Three-week blocks do not appear to be enough time for the student
teachers to grasp as many concepts as. necessary to understand the role of the music
teacher..

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Focus goup conversations among student teachers made me realize that it was
difﬁcult for student teachers to share their experiences. Student teachers’ deﬁnitions of
themselves within this role were complex and divided, and these conversations resulted
more in introducing individual experiences than in allowing them to feel that they were
experiencing student teaching together. Expectations were different for each individual.
Although student teachers had individual needs as future music educators, all of them
were experiencing practice teaching for the ﬁrst time. Some felt that belonging to the
community of the school and feeling a sense of membership with the faculty of the
school from the beginning would have enhanced their experience. They felt that waiting
to teach deterred them from “diving right into” the community of the students and the
school. Other student teachers felt completely removed ﬁom the teaching faculty in the
classroom and in the staffroom. To these student teachers, there was no apparent student
teaching community.

One of the only commonalities that existed among both the student teachers and
co-operating teachers in terms of their expectations was the desire for a positive, learning
experience. A clearer deﬁnition of co-Operating teacher and student teacher roles before
student teaching occurs could beneﬁt both parties.

The “The blame game” theme heightened my awareness of the need for the
development of reﬂective strategies for both the co-operating teachers and student
teachers. Reﬂecting, for student teachers and co-operating teachers, should be seen as an
opportunity for growth rather than for assigning blame. As this study unfolded, I felt that
student teachers and co-operating teachers would have beneﬁted from sharing their
reﬂections on the student teaching experience on a regular basis. Sharing the content of

170

some of the journal entries with the other parties would have been beneﬁcial. Mixed
messages were sent by both the co-operating teachers and the student teachers to one
another, and the opportunity for shared reﬂection did not occur.

Attitudes shape expectations, and it is important for both the co-operating teachers
and the student teachers to learn reﬂection strategies that will promote growth rather than
instil resentrnents. Student teachers and co-operating teachers have an Opportunity to
learn about themselves as teachers while teaching each other as well as their students.

Student teachers expressed a desire to be involved in the evaluation process.
Student teachers felt that this involvement would open up communication between the
co-operating teachers and the student teachers and provide them with speciﬁc areas of
improvement to be addressed. In addition, this involvement would promote growth in
self-assessment and encourage ownership of their teaching experiences. Being involved
in evaluation would help promote self-reﬂection, a characteristic that was only weakly
and occasionally exhibited by the student teachers and co-operating teachers. Learning to
self-assess (reﬂect) could turn student teachers into active participants in their own
development. On the other hand, co-operating teachers must provide feedback to aid in
the reﬂection process of the student teachers and should critically reﬂect on their own
practices as co-operating teachers.

Lack of feedback allowed student teachers to blame their co-operating teachers
for not reinforcing and encouraging them when teaching. Student teachers seemed to
need to rely on their co—operating teachers to conﬁrm or deny that what they are doing
was “good” and were hoping to accomplish this through feedback sessions with the co-
operating teachers. When co-operating teachers did not respond to this need, student

171

teachers felt inadequate, alone, or like a “failure.” Even when student teachers hinted at
their need for feedback, co-operatin g teachers did not always respond. Often when they -
did, it was at the end of the day, or too far away from the experience as it had happened.
This was ﬁ'ustrafing for the student teachers, because they could not always remember to
what the co-operating teachers were referring.

On the other hand, co-operating teachers expressed concern regarding providing
feedback to their student teachers. Most co-operating teachers agreed that they were not
comfortable and did not know how to do it appropriately. Co-operating teachers blamed
student teachers for their inadequate knowledge and skills. Perhaps co-operating teachers
needed to be more aware of what to expect from student teachers. With beginning
instrumentalists, co-operating teachers know what to expect, and they know how to gauge
the students’ progress. However, they may be unaware of the learning process for student
teachers during the student teaching experience. Results of this study indicated that co-
operating teachers continually compared their student teachers to what they believed they
were able to do when they themselves were student teachers. A clearer understanding of
the expectations within student teaching practices in instrumental music may allow co-
operating teachers to be more accepting of student teachers’ weaknesses and help them
learn to work with their student teachers rather than against them.

Finally, the Faculty of Education was blamed by the co-operating teachers and the
student teachers for placing students in music programs for which they were not
qualiﬁed, which set the student teachers up for failure and frustrated the co-operating
teachers. Co-operating teachers voiced concerns regarding those students who had no
background performing in bands or orchestras; they felt that those student teachers did

172

not have the skills to work with such an ensemble effectively. Although all the student
teachers in this study had an instrumental music background, not all of them had 1
performed in school music groups, which are different from community groups or
performing alone. The co-operating teachers believed that teacher education programs
should require that potential music teacher candidates have the appropriate courses on
their transcripts, such as conducting, instrumental techniques, methods classes, and
perfonrring classes including choirs, orchestras and bands, before admitting them. While
it is difﬁcult to believe that those entering the profession of music education would not
have taken these courses as part of their undergraduate work, it did occur. Those wishing
to teach music should not be admitted to the Teacher’s College on the basis of grades
alone, and co-operating teachers should not be expected to remediate during student
teaching.

The “I’m Overwhelmed!” theme involved the fears, concerns, and questions of
student teachers in particular. Student teachers feared being unable to do the job of music
teacher and all that it involves. They found their placements stressful, and also felt that
asking questions was viewed as a weakness rather than a strength. They felt that they
were not encouraged to be creative and try new things with the students in their charge.
Student teachers also voiced concerns that they may not be good enough to be a
successful music teacher.

' Student teachers believed that their co-operating teachers had higher expectations
of them than was reasonable at this stage of their development. One student teacher felt
dismissed when he asked questions that resulted in his feeling he was failing. As a result,
this particular student teacher ceased to ask questions of the co-Operating teacher and

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survived the practice teaching placement, but experienced much stress while doing so.

Co-operating teachers could not accept the fact that student teachers did not
understand the breadth of their jobs. This realization should have provided the co-
operating teachers an opportunity to educate the student teachers. However, what the co-
operating teachers interpreted as a lack of understanding on the student teachers’ parts
could have been the student teachers’ lack of knowledge’. Co-operating teachers missed
the opportunity to educate the student teachers as to what their future as music teachers
would include. This resulted in student teachers feeling inadequate.

It appears to be crucial to teach instrumental music student teachers that calling
on resources for help and asking questions can support their learning. This could prevent
them from feeling overwhelmed. Further, co-operating teachers should encourage
student teachers to ask questions and express their needs during practice teaching. This
could help to lessen the overwhelming sense of “too much to do and learn” experienced
by student teachers in an instrumental music setting. Co-operating teachers should be
offered training or orientation that includes information regarding effective supervision
and provides an opportunity to have conversations with each other within this role.

The theme of “Do as I do, not as I say” focused on the mixed messages that were
being sent to student teachers. On the one hand, the Faculty of Education offered courses
that ostensibly prepared student teachers for their student teaching experiences. These
courses involved learning to write effective lesson plans, engaging in mock teaching
experiences, learning classroom management strategies, teaching to speciﬁc ways of
student learning, and reviewing instrumental techniques that are necessary for success in
the music classroom. On the other hand, co-operating teachers felt that student teachers

174

came to the student teaching experience unprepared. While student teachers looked
forward to developing their own style of teaching and being creative in the classroom, co-
operating teachers consistently encouraged them to continue doing things the way that
they were already being done in their classrooms. Student teachers ended up conforming
to the styles of the co-operating teachers in order to survive the student teaching
experience, rather than learning about themselves and developing themselves as teachers.
Even though co-operating teachers told the student teachers that they wanted them
to be creative, they worried that a new style of teaching within their classrooms would be
too disruptive to students and their learning. Their claim of “too little time” to allow the
student teacher to “try new things” was as ﬁ'ustrating for the co-Operating teachers as it
was for the student teachers. New creative methods of teaching that could potentially
have reached students who were experiencing difﬁculty as well as the opportunity to
teach the co-operating teacher new methodologies of music teaching were lost because of
time constraints in respect to the student teaching block and the co-operating teachers’
unwillingness to try. '
The Assessing versus assisting theme perhaps was among the most widely
discussed themes during focus group interviews and in journal writings. The
interpretations of both the student teachers and the co-operating teachers concerning the
evaluation process were complex. Both the co-operating teachers and the student teachers
agreed that the evaluation form required by the Faculty of Education was inadequate, as it
did not allow for subj ect-speciﬁc evaluation. Student teachers and co-operating teachers
alike expressed a desire to be able to evaluate as well as be evaluated in musical rather

than generic terms. Co-operating teachers and student teachers agreed that the required

175

evaluation form did not allow for growth and progress to be appropriately documented.
Musical items, such as rehearsal skills, knowledge of instruments, conducting and so
forth, are areas critical to the assessment of a future music educator. These areas are in
need of individual evaluation in addition to the generic issues that are transferable to all
subjects.

Co-operating teachers’ evaluations of student teachers’ abilities to perform in
context should be a fundamental component of assessment. The ability to perform in
context combines content (knowledge) with process (pedagogy) and provides an
opportunity to evaluate effective student music teaching. Collaboration between co-
operating teachers and student teachers must occur during this process in order for
evaluation to be effective, which did not occur regularly with the student teacher/co-
operating teacher dyads in this study.

All of the co-operating teachers expressed concern about the process of evaluating
or assessing their student teachers. Some co-operating teachers were reluctant to say “bad
things” about the student teacher or point out weaknesses, as they did not want to be
responsible for preventing these student teachers from getting a job or for keeping them
out of the profession. They also did not want to damage their relationships with the
student teachers, which would make them less able to assist them in their growth as
teachers. On the other hand, one teacher voiced that when she had experienced an inept
student teacher, and her concerns went unnoticed, even when conﬁonting the university
supervisor. The teacher felt frustrated when this student was employed as a music teacher
the next year.

A music-speciﬁc evaluation sheet could open up communication between the co-

176

operating teacher and the student teacher. Identifying speciﬁc areas for improvement
followed by suggestions on how to improve from the co-operating teacher could improve
the way feedback is initiated and conducted. Also, subject-speciﬁc evaluation sheets
could serve as guidelines for both the co-operating teacher and the student teacher during
student teaching and could, in turn, allow for a more positive, productive learning
experience for both the co-operatin g teacher and the student teacher and for shared
expectations.

The second concern of the co-operating teachers was the grading process itself.
They believed that student teachers were unable to recognize the developmental nature of
learning to teach. Co-operating teachers agreed that some of the teachers expected to be
rated excellent on each placement in all areas. One co-operating teacher worried that
providing her student teacher with the evaluation sheet threatened their relationship if it
was not as strong as the student had expected. Co-operating teachers suggested that
student teachers needed to Show progress in terms of grades ﬁ'om the outset of the
placements. Some co-operating teachers felt that the student teachers expected or were
used to being rated higher than they deserved to be. Further, co-operating teachers found
that, when they assisted their student teachers with advice concerning delivery, methods,
and other issues, student teachers did improve their skills. However, two co-operating
teachers felt that, despite the fact that their student teachers improved, they could not
provide them with high ratings on the ﬁnal evaluation form. In these cases, the co-
operating teachers provided appropriate comments for the student teachers that spoke to
their positive response to feedback and hoped that these comments would warrant more
strength than the actual rating.

177

The third concern focused on the student teachers. Student teachers voiced
concerns that they were being evaluated based on personality matching with their co-
operating teachers and that the expectations of the co-operating teachers were not clear.
Common or similar methods of evaluation and assessment among co-operating teachers,
except for the generic evaluation sheets, were virtually non-existent.

The ﬁnal theme that emerged from the data was “The co-operating teacher as the
sage.” Co-operating teachers deemed to be sages were described by their student teachers
as teachers who possessed the will and passion in their own teaching styles that was not
only that of an expert musician, but was that of a teacher who wanted his or her own
student teachers to feel good about teaching music. Co-operating teachers who were
willing to mould student teachers by allowing them the opportunities for trial and error,
while acknowledging weaknesses and strengths, built conﬁdence in their student .
teachers.

Most important however, co-operating teachers described as “Sages” were also
willing to admit that they were learners. Co—operating teachers learned, partly through
this study, that acting in this capacity allowed them to re-examine themselves as teachers
in a new light. What some may have thought would be a “break” actually rejuvenated
them. They gained new energy and learned new techniques and ideas from their student
teachers. Talking with other co-operating teachers in focus groups also played a role in
allowing co-operating teachers to see themselves in a different way. Co-operating
teachers began to realize the importance of issues like feedback, and that it was up to
them to improve this skill. Their taking responsibility for irnprovin g the experience of
student teaching for the student teachers also improved it for themselves. Characteristics

178

deﬁning the Sage included being approachable, being respectful to the student teachers,
being ﬂexible, being open-minded and, being considered expert teachers by the student
teachers. Student teachers believed that sages knew why they were acting in the capacity
of a co-operating teacher and whether they had the characteristics that would allow for a
positive experience to occur for the student teacher.

Creating “sages” is important to the success of student teaching. I believe that this
process begins with the willingness to act as a co-operating teacher and to view training
for that role as an important part of the process. The Faculty of Education should provide
both the co-operating teachers with speciﬁcs of the teacher preparation program with
which they will be involved. This information should include three areas: the goals and
expectations of the teacher education program, the roles and responsibilities of both the
co-operating teacher and the student teacher, and critical aspects of the supervision
process including conferencing or consistent contact, observation strategies, and -
guidelines for providing effective feedback. Some of this information, such as the roles
and responsibilities of the co-operating teacher and the student teacher, should be given
to the student teachers as well.

In a study conducted by Richardson-Koehler (1 98 8), both the co-operating
teachers and student teachers ranked the quality of their relationship at or near the top of
factors contributing to student teacher success. Explicit conversations about respective
roles and expectations would assist in clearing up existing misconceptions and open the
door for effective mentoring to occur. If, as Richardson-Koehler suggests, the co-
operating teacher is the most inﬂuential player in the co-operating teacher, student
teacher, and university teacher educator triangle, then teacher educators must take

179

seriously the particular and unique role of co-operating teachers as they contribute to
student teachers' successes or failures.

Providing opportunities for participants to be well informed about the goals and
expectations, the roles and responsibilities, and the supervision processes used during
practicum experiences produces effective relationships between co-operating teachers
and student teachers, regardless of personality styles (Giebelhaus, 1997). Student.
teachers need a guide, teacher, and mentor to help them as they struggle to navigate the
often ﬁightening—distance between their university preparation and the beginnings of
their teaching career. Co-operating teachers also need a guide as they navigate the waters
of providing effective supervision. The support for and modeling of effective supervision
and co-operating practices by the teacher instils conﬁdence in the outcomes of the student
teaching experiences and builds partnerships and excellence in the process of preparing
tomorrow’s music teachers.

Recommendations for Practice

This study identiﬁed a number of areas in which the student teaching experience
and the co-operating teacher experience in instrumental music education may be
improved. Co-operating teachers and student teachers need to realize that, for some co-
operating teachers and student teachers, the ﬁeld experience will substantially alter their
actions, intentions, beliefs of teaching and expectations.

1) The results of my study indicate that co-operating teachers discovered through
taking part in this study that they wanted more knowledge and preparation for being co-
operating teachers. Universities could provide this education by sharing research ﬁndings
on student teaching and practical course work. Rather than having the Faculty of

180

Education dictate the allotment Of time that a student teacher is allowed to teach, the co-
operating teacher and the student teacher should be allowed to collaborate on what
structure is best suited for the student teacher to learn the most in instrumental music
classes during each student teaching block. Longer ﬁeld experiences, more time built into
daily schedules to spend reﬂecting as a co-operating teacher/student teacher team as well
as time to share experiences with colleagues are some suggestions that would entail
shifting priorities and would demand a re—organization in the current practices of the
Faculty of Education that might be helpful in better preparing co-operating teachers for
their roles.

2) Schools and universities should work collaboratively to identify music
programs in which student teachers can be placed that can give the student teacher a
successful experience. Additionally, co-operating teachers should be chosen by the
standards of their work in instrumental music programs, rather than by their willingness
to volunteer to act as co-operating teachers. Research involving the selection of co-
operating teachers in instrumental music, based on a speciﬁc selection criteria, could
result in enhanced student teaching/co-operating teaching experiences. The Faculty of
Education would beneﬁt from the identiﬁcation of exemplary or “sage” teachers based on
the past experiences of student teachers and recommendations from their colleagues in
the schools. This selection committee of sages cOuld include in-service teachers who
have recently graduated from Teacher’s College and can provide ﬁrst-hand insight into
the needs they felt when practice teaching. Even though this practice could result in
situations in which colleagues are forced to confront the shortcomings of fellow music
educators, it could also result in student teachers with strong placements with co-

181

operating teachers who are both qualiﬁed and successful as music teachers. There is no
simple solution to the screening process; however, it is something that must be
considered. Collaboration at all levels of education could beneﬁt all parties involved.

3) Student teachers in this study identiﬁed “sages” as co-operating teachers who
were ﬂexible in allowing the student teacher to try new things in the classroom, who
provided resources, who established a good rapport with the student teacher, who
provided the student teacher with numerous opportunities for teaching in various
instrumental music settings, and who learned from their student teacher. These
characteristics should be part of co-operating teacher orientation when learning to work
with student teachers.

4) Time or lack thereof, was a recurring theme. Participants in this study
collectively agreed that more time in the practice teaching experience would improve the
experience overall. More time should include one-on-one reﬂection time between co-
operating teachers and student teachers, more time to reﬂect with other instrumental
music co-operating teachers, and a longer time for the student teaching experiences as a
whole. Time is a limited resource and will always be identiﬁed as a limitation; however,
the length of the experience currently offered through this Faculty of Education is not
enough. The elimination of the block system of student teaching and replacing it with
either one 12-week experience or two six-week experiences could potentially establish
better instrumental music teachers who would get to know the methods of their co-
operating teachers, as well as establish their own teaching styles more effectively.

5) Results revealed that reﬂection strategies were considerably lacking among co-
operating teachers and student teachers. Promoting critical thinking and reﬂection among

182

student teachers and co-operating teachers could enhance the success of the experience
for both the student teachers and co-operating teachers. Using co-operating teachers who
practice reﬂection on an ongoing basis in instrumental music could result in student
teachers becoming reﬂective practitioners and might change the outcome of the student
teaching experience and ultimately the co-operating teacher experience.

6) Results of this study revealed that neither the co-operating teacher nor the
student teacher credited the university with the success of the student teaching
experience. The university supervisor’s role is unclear, but it could have a positive impact
on the practice teaching experience if the supervisors were more aware of the curriculum
of the co-operating teacher’s classroom, rather than expecting the co-operating teacher to
be aware of the curriculum of the Faculty of Education classroom. The university
supervisor must serve as a bridge between the teacher education program at the university
and the practices of the co-operating teacher in order to end the mixed messages that
were received by both the student teacher and the co-operating teacher from the
university supervisors in this study.

7) A need exists to prepare co-operating teachers to supervise student teachers.
Preparation will help co-operating teachers provide speciﬁc and objective feedback and
can prevent them from having unrealistic expectations of their student teachers. Informal
meetings or conversations with university supervisors and clinical faculty training are
both methods of co-operating teacher preparation. When the four co-operating teachers in
this study were asked if they had participated in any of this preparation, they all
responded no. However, they all felt the need for some kind of preparation for serving as
a co-operating teacher.

183

8) Co-operating teachers should be trained professionals who are able to model
clinical competence, build a supportive and nurturing environment, and demonstrate
professional qualities. Future instrumental music teachers must be provided the support
necessary to encourage them to continue to be life-long learners.

Recommendations for Future Research

My study shares the perspectives of the co-operating teachers and student teachers
investigating the expectations of one another during instrumental music student teaching
placements. Findings from this study are not intended to represent the beliefs and
practices of all student teachers and co-operating teachers, but they do add to the body of
knowledge regarding the expectations of student teachers and co-operating teachers in a
speciﬁc setting. There is still much to be studied, as there remain many unanswered
questions concerning this topic. Some of these rrright include the following:

1) Establishing a concurrent music education program modelled after the
concurrent science program at the University of Windsor should be considered. The
concurrent program would offer student music teachers an opportunity to be in school
placements earlier in their undergraduate degrees as well as experiencing longer
placement internships upon completion of that degree. Rather than participating in block
placements during one year of teacher’s college, they could participate in block
placements throughout their degree, including during their year at teacher’s college. A
future investigation of the differences between the two types of teaching internships and
the beneﬁts of instrumental music student teaching experiences is warranted.

2) Despite the inconsistencies reported as to the positive or negative experiences
that occurred during this study, one can conclude that co-operating teachers and student

184

teachers have expectations of each other, although these expectations differ between the
co-operating teachers and the students teachers. Further research needs to be done to
continue that documentation of such expectations of the student teachers and co-
operating teachers during instrumental music placements.

3) A follow up study of the participants in this investigation, would be useful to
determine whether expectations of the co-operating teachers and student teachers have
changed because of their involvement in this study or, for the student teachers, as a result
of their experience as in-service teachers. 1

4) Student teachers should be taught to effectively reﬂect or evaluate themselves
daily on a formative basis. This particular practice is viewed as critical to all teachers and
should be an ongoing process throughout every teacher’s career. It was not only
important that student teacher’s determine their own strengths and weaknesses, but that
they also identify speciﬁc behaviour changes to improve their teaching. Student teachers
should then be expected to implement those changes. Further research involving
reﬂective practices, how to improve and deepen these practices, and their effects on
teaching is warranted during the student teaching experience in instrumental music.

5) The University of Windsor’s Faculty of Education handbook (2004) suggests a
percentage of the co-operating teachers teaching load as a guideline for student teachers.
However, it appears that some student teachers are eager to begin teaching and welcome
more than one class to teach at the beginning of the student teaching experience. Other
student teachers may indicate that a small number of classes to begin their experiences is
more appropriate. Since co-operating teachers do not have a sense of the student teacher’s
comfort level with class assignments, it is difﬁcult to determine what workload is

185

efﬁcient as a start. Student teachers not only mentioned needing a comfort level with
classes assigned, but also expected that the co-operating teacher would orient the student
teacher to the school procedures, facilities, students and educational community. There is
a need for the Faculty of Education to develop more speciﬁc guidelines for a progressive
student teaching workload. Future research is necessary to determine differences in
readiness levels of the student teachers and what these levels Should mean for the
induction process into student teaching.

6) The current non-subject speciﬁc formative and summative evaluation forms
were repeatedly criticized by both the co-operating teachers and student teachers. There
is a need for further studies to explore more in-depth assessment outcomes using a
subj ect-speciﬁc evaluation form and how such a form can be used most effectively to
promote student teacher learning.

7) Some of the student teachers experienced differences in expectations from one
co-operating teacher to another. From the student teachers’ descriptions during focus
group interviews and joumaling, some of those differences affected the outcome of their
experience and other differences the student teachers adapted to the differences. Some
co-operating teachers had higher performance expectations than did other co-operating
teachers. Some co-operating teachers had different assessment expectations than did
other co-operating teachers. Future research should be conducted into the effects of
maintaining the same co-operating teacher for'more than one teaching block to see if this
builds a better relationship and results in more consistent assessments of student teachers.

8) On a professional level, during this study, the co-operating teachers had the
opportunity to share their ideas and techniques about working with student teachers with

186

one another in a relatively constructive and positive environment. Despite the number Of
years that these co-operating teachers had acted in this capacity, all agreed that part of
why they did this was to give back to the music education community, build conﬁdence
among student music teachers and update, and improve upon their own teaching
techniques. Researchers should investigate whether regularly participating in a discussion
group with other co-operating teachers enriches the student teaching experience of the co-
Operating teacher and, consequently, the student teacher.

“. . .I owe it to myself and to the profession of music teachers to take student

teachers. I think part of me blamed them for their inadequacies and I used that as

my excuse not to be bothered. But now I know they were my inadequacies too. I

didn’t think I could do a good job for them. It’s my responsibility. Now I feel as if

I can, and more importantly, I Should” (Leo, focus group interview #2, May,

2005)

The four co-operating teachers in this study found humour and education when
sharing their experiences with each other. All commented on the fact that no-one had
ever asked about their experiences in a manner that caused them to really think about the
answer. All agreed that participating in this study was cause to reﬂect on how they would
act as co-operating teachers in the future, because focus groups allowed them to reﬂect
on, and verbalize those things that contributed to their strengths as well as their
weaknesses as music teachers.

Co-operating teachers also agreed that they came to recognize the contribution
that their student teachers made to their understandings of their own roles. This
observation is important for two reasons. The ﬁrst is that co-operating music teachers

187

rarely get to speak with each other about their reﬂections regarding the role of co-
operating teachers, and this reﬂection is a wonderful mechanism that should be used for
improvement. The second is that cO-operating music teachers have a lot to share as
professionals with one another and with teacher education as a whole. The voices of the
co—operating teachers and student teachers contributed profoundly to this study in
developing a more accurate picture of the student teaching experience in instrumental
music speciﬁcally, and of the foundations of successful music teaching experiences in
general. These voices must continue to be heard and taken seriously if music teacher

education is to move forward.

188

Appendix A
PRESENTATION

COOPERATING TEACHERS’ AND STUDENT TEACHERS’ EXPECTATIONS
ABOUT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC STUDENT TEACHING
M. Bernadette Berthelotte, M.M., M.Ed.
1. INTRODUCTION: WHY I’M HERE
2. PRACTICE TEACHING EXPERIENCES: GENERAL EDUCATION

0 People often perceive the expectations of their jobs based on what others
communicate to them

0 These are the expectations that people within organizational systems
communicate to each other about the deﬁnition of jobs and roles.

o The cooperating teacher and the student teacher each have roles that are not
clearly deﬁned.

a A lack of congruence between expectations can create conﬂict and tension

0 Cooperating teachers determined that having student teachers in the classroom
could have beneﬁts and drawbacks. These beneﬁts and drawbacks were often
dependent upon the relationship that the student teacher had with the cooperating
teacher.

0 A study by Farbstein (1965) listed 700 expectations voiced by student teachers of
their cooperating teachers.

0 The process of becoming a teacher involved the ability to interpret the behaviour
of the students, the cooperating teacher and the wider school community.

a Student teachers needed to know the expectations of the cooperating teacher and

189

adjust their teaching behaviour accordingly.

0 Student teachers feel dominated by concerns such as classroom management,
fulﬁlling the expectations of others and simply surviving the student teaching
experience.

0 Among the most salient factors causing stress was the lack of clarity of
expectations from cooperating teachers.

0 The vast majority of literature supports the belief that cooperating teachers play a
critical role in the professional growth and successful process of student teachers.

0 Some studies suggested that cooperating teachers themselves felt that they have to
learn much on their own during their student teaching days and that the student
teachers they were in charge of would have to do the same. Issues such as
providing feedback, a lack of observation time, and a lack of willingness to
engage in reﬂection with the student teacher were all issues researchers suggested
cooperating teachers would face.

0 A number of studies have reported problems encountered by both student teachers
and cooperating teachers, and most of these problems were a result of differences
in expectations as a source of the problem.

0 Cooperating teachers identiﬁed that an important coping strategy when having
student teachers in their classroom was the establishment of communication

. strategies that would enable the student teacher to understand the speciﬁc
expectations of the student teaching experience.

3. PRACTICE TEACHING EXPERIENCES: MUSIC EDUCATION

0 Studies on cooperating teachers and student teachers focusing on instrumental

190

music subjects investigated areas such as stress factors for the student
teacher/ cooperating teacher during the student teaching experience. A lack of
interest in music programs on behalf of students, parents, colleagues and

administrations was amongst the salient factors.

0 The inﬂuence of the cooperating teacher 0 student teachers’ beliefs about and skill
development for becoming a music teacher was investigated (Gordon, 2000).
There were no statistical differences between the student teachers’ before and
after student teaching beliefs and skills. Brand (1985) suggested that the lack of a
cooperating teacher with superior classroom skills and unclear expectations could
have contributed to this result.

a The study of relationships within music classrooms has also been investigated.
Student teachers determined that their relationship with their cooperating teacher
was shaped by the perception that their relationship with their cooperating teacher
was strong.

0 Relationship is an important issue for both the cooperating teacher and the student
teacher.

- Expectations of cooperating teachers and student teachers during instrumental
music student teaching experiences warrant investigation. Studies discussed
within the literature review shed light on the diversity of issues faced by both the
cooperating teacher and student teacher in a variety of classroom settings and
subject areas. The ﬁndings of these studies have implications for this study.

4. THE PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

0 The purpose of this study is to investigate and compare co-Operating teachers’ and

191

student teachers’ expectations about instrumental music student teaching during
instrumental music teaching blocks.
5 THE SPECIFIC RESEARCH QUESTIONS.
0 How do co-operating teachers and student teachers describe their
expectations of the other in an instrumental music placement?
0 How do co-operating teachers and student teachers describe the role of the
other?
0 What kind of relationships do the co-operating teachers and student
teachers expect to have with the other?
0 What factors cause stress for co-operating teachers and student teachers
when working with one another?
6. DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURES.
1. One—on-One interviews.
2. Two Focus Group interviews.

3. J oumaling

192

Appendix B

RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE PARTICIPANTS
Agree to Si gn the consent forms to participate in this research.
Agree to sign the consent form giving permission to audio-tape both the one-on-
one interviews and both focus group interviews.
To journal as close to the experience as possible in order for the reﬂection to be
honest and real.
A commitment to the study that will allow you to participate within the focus
group interviews, one-on-one interviews and joumaling, honestly, reﬂectively and
open to leaming.
A willingness to look at or learn to look at the practice teaching experience not as

a conclusion to your education, but rather a beginning to your teaching career.

193

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Appendix D

One-on—one Interview Questions for the Student Teachers
How do you deﬁne your role as a student teacher in an instrumental music
placement?
What characteristics and responsibilities do you think a cooperating teacher
Should have?
What factors do you think will cause you the most stress during the student
teaching experience?
Describe the music program you would like to have when you become a music

teacher?

195

Appendix E

One-on-one Interview Questions for Cooperating Teachers
How often have you acted in the role of cooperating teacher in an instrumental
music capacity?
How do you deﬁne the role of a student teacher in an instrumental music
placement?
Describe your previous experiences as a cooperating teacher. Please discuss both
positive and negative experiences.
Why did you agree to take a student teacher?

What factors cause you to feel the most stress when you act as a cooperating

teacher?

196

1’"

Appendix F
Focus Group Interview Questions for Student Teachers
How does the personality of the cooperating teacher affect your perception of this
block ﬁeld experience?
In the one-on-one interview, you were asked to deﬁne your role as a student
music teacher. How has your perception of that role changed during this block
teaching experience? q

A student teacher causes an additional workload for the cooperating teacher in

-. ..
3C" ‘F

any subject matter. Can the same be said about a cooperating teacher causing an
additional workload for the student teacher? How?

Describe the expectations you had of your cooperating teacher speciﬁc to your
instrumental music experience. How were these expectations met during this

placement?

197

Appendix G

Focus Group Interview Questions for the Co-operating Teachers
How does the personality of the student teacher affect your perception of this
instrumental music student teaching experience?
In the one-on-one interview, you were asked to deﬁne your role as a co-operating
music teacher. Could you elaborate on this as it pertains to your last experience as
a cooperating teacher?
A student teacher causes an additional workload for a co-operating teacher. What
does this statement mean for instrumental music student teaching?
Describe the expectations you had of your student teacher in your music program.
Describe one thing you feel you did well, one thing you feel you need to continue
working on, and one thing you would like to change in your role as cooperating

teacher during this last experience.

198

Appendix H

Student Teaching J oumaling
Week #1: Reﬂect on the type of feedback you are receiving, how you respond to
it and how it is delivered to you. This reﬂection can be as short or as long as you
like.
Week #2: Reﬂect on the developing relationship you are having with your co-
operating teacher and how it is affecting your thoughts about yourself as a future
music educator.
Week #3: Reﬂect on the rapport you have developed with your students as well as
the school community. How does this affect the way you practice teach?
Week #4: Reﬂect on the improvements or lack of, that you feel you have made as
a student teacher. In your mind do you think you have accomplished any major
improvements, progressed beyond your wildest dreams, still have a ways to go or
any other comments you may have. Have you developed a teaching style of your

own?

199

 

Appendix I

Co-operating Teachers Joumaling
Week #1: Journal about the type of feedback you are providing your student
teachers. How is this feedback delivered? How are student teachers responding to
this feedback?
Week #2: Reﬂect on the developing relationship you are having with your student
teacher and how it I affecting your thoughts about them a future music educators.
Week #3: Reﬂect on the rapport you have observed that the student teacher has
developed with both the students they are teaching, as well as the staff/community
in the school they are placed.
Week #4: Reﬂect on the improvement or lack of, that your student teacher has
made. Have they accomplished any major improvements, progressed beyond your
wildest dreams or still have a way to go? Have they developed a teaching style of

their own?

200

 

Appendix J

Student Evaluation Form, Faculty of Education, University of Windsor

 

 

 

.. FACULTY OF EDUCATION :
WINDSOR STUDENT TEACHING PROGRESS REPORT
STUDENT TEA- ASSOCIATE TEA.-
SCBOOI. Gm DATES OF EVALUATION

 

 

INSTRUCTIONAL AREAS AND STRATEG‘

 

 

 

m:C-Coasinsnly U— Usully S-souuh- I-lsnly N-NosAppEssbh
HEPAIA‘HON AND INSI'IUCTIONAI. PLANNING:

"MORALANDPEISONALIACTOIS:
WWW

 

(AssocissssuscSI-nssivsstadopr)
__FORMATWE SUMMATIVI
chain
bureaus-soups!) ' italics
buss-s breve-“Wisp.
Wills-yams
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I‘M-«buy»,
new.

 

Whit-Sim Copy ' Pink-Associate Copy ' Yellow-Funky Copy

201

Appendix K

Consent Form

CONSENT TO PARTICIPATE IN RESEARCH

Title of Study: Co-operating Teachers’ and Student Teachers’ Expectations About Instrumental Music
Student Teaching in an Ontario Placement.

You are asked to participate in a research study conducted by Mary Bernadette Berthelotte
(student), and Dr. Cynthia Taggart (advisor) from Michigan State University at the University of Windsor.
All data collected ﬁom this study is part of the requirements for a dissertation project in completion of a
Dr. of Philosophy Degree in Music Education. If you have any questions or concerns about the research,
please feel ﬂee to contact Dr. Cynthia Taggart, School of Music, Michigan State University, East Lansing,
Michigan 48824. Dr. Taggart can be reached at (517)355-7555. Her email address is:

tag gart@,msu.edu

The purpose of this study is to investigate the similarities and differences between selected co-
operating teachers and their student teachers regarding the participants’ expectations of the student teaching
experience during instrumental music teaching blocks. The speciﬁc research questions are:

1.. How do co-operating teachers and student teachers describe their expectations of the other in

an instrumental music placement?

2. How do co-operating teachers and student teachers describe the role of the other?

3. What kind of relationships do the co-operating teachers and student teachers expect to have

with the other?

4. What factors cause stress for co—operating teachers and student teachers when. working with one

another?

This qualitative study involves eight participants. It is a descriptive case study. There will be four
co-operating teachers and four student teachers of instrumental music. Co-operating teachers and student
teachers will describe their expectation of each other before, during, and after teaching blocks on two
separate occasions.

If you volunteer to participate in this study, we would ask you to do the following things. You will
be asked to participate in one, one-on-one interview with the researcher where the following questions will
be asked.

1. How do you deﬁne your role as a student teacher in an instrumental music placement?
2. What characteristics and responsibilities do you think a co-operating teacher should have?

202

3. What factors do you think will cause you the most stress during the student teaching

experience?

4. Describe the music program you would like to build when you become a music teacher?

The following are one-on-one interview questions for the co-operating teachers:

1.
2.
3.

4.
5

How often have you acted in the role of co-operating teacher in an instrumental music
capacity?

How do you deﬁne the role of a student teacher in an instrumental music placement
speciﬁcally?

Describe your previous experiences as a co-operating teacher. Please discuss both positive
and negative experiences.

Why did you agree to take a student teacher?

What factors cause you to feel the most stress when you act as a co-operating teacher?

The interview will be audio-taped for all participants and transcribed by the researcher for data collection.

Additionally, you will be asked to participate in two focus group interviews at the end of each
instrumental teaching block. The co-operating teachers and the student teachers will meet separately in
groups. During these focus group interviews the following ﬁve open-ended questions will be asked of the

students teachers.

1. How does the personality of the co-operating teacher affect your perception of this block ﬁeld
experience?

2. In the one-on-one interview, you were asked to deﬁne your role as a student music teacher.
How has your perception of that role changed during this block teaching experience?

3. A student teacher causes an additional workload for a co-operating teacher in any subject
matter. Can the same be said about a co-operating teacher causing an additional workload for
the student teacher? How?

4. Describe the expectations you have of your co-operating speciﬁc to your instrumental music-
experience. How were these expectations met during this placement?

5. Describe one thing you feel you did well, one thing you feel you need to continue working on,

and one thing that you would like to change in your role as student teacher during this last
experience?

The following ﬁve open-ended questions developed by the researcher will be asked of co—
operating teachers during focus group interviews at the end of each instrumental music block teaching

experience:
1 .

2.

How does the personality of the student teacher affect your perception of this instrumental
music teaching block?

In the one-on-one interview, you were asked to deﬁne your role as a co-operating music
teacher. Could you elaborate on this as it pertains to your last experience?

A student teacher causes an additional workload for a co-operating teacher. What does this
statement mean for instrumental music teaching blocks?

Describe the expectations you had of your student teacher in your music program. How were
these expectations met during this placement?

Describe the one thing you feel you did well, one thing you feel you need to continue working
on, and one thing you would like to change in your role as co-operating teacher during this
last experience?

These focus group interviews will be audio-taped and transcribed by the researcher for data
collection.

203

Finally, each participant of the study will be asked to journal during their instrumental music
teaching experiences only. These unstructured journals will be analysed by the researcher for data .Both the
one-on-one interviews and focus group interviews will be conducted in a classroom at the University of
Windsor’s school of music. Journals will be collected by the researcher at the end of each instrumental
music teaching experience, and returned to the participants before the next teaching experience will occur.

I am unable at this point to foresee any circumstances that would cause any of the participants
discomfort during the course of this study. There are however direct beneﬁts to this study. The direct
beneﬁts to the student teachers and the co-operating are of a collaborative nature. Student teacher
participants have the opportunity to learn the art of reﬂection during their practice teaching experiences,
and voice these reﬂections with their peers in a focus group interview setting. In addition, it is crucial to
note that these student teachers of instrumental music may one day act as co-operating teachers of
instrumental music student teachers. This experience can provide them with an opportunity to better learn
and understand the role of a co-operating teacher, discussion of the role of the co-operating teacher, the
expectations and so forth can only lead to better educated co-operating teaches for future music education
student teachers. Both current co-operating teachers and student teachers could change the way they
approach co-operating teacher roles based on this experience. No participants of this study will receive any
kind of compensation.

Any information that is obtained in connection with this study and that can be identiﬁed with you
will remain conﬁdential and will be disclosed only with your permission. Conﬁdentiality will be ensured
through the following procedures. All participants in this study will be consistently referred to by
pseudonym during the transcription of their interviews, and any references to their journal entries. During
data collection all data will be contained in a locked container. Only the researcher and her advisors will
have access to this data. At the end of this study all data collected through audio-taping, transcriptions of
audio-tapes and journals will be destroyed.

Participants of this study will be involved in data analysis through member checks. This will
ensure that what the researcher has derived from interviews and journal writings, are interpreted by the
researcher as the participant meant them to be.

You can choose whether to be in this study or not. If you volunteer to be in this study, you may
withdraw at any time without consequences of any kind. You may also refuse to answer any questions you
do not want to answer and still remain in the study. The investigator may withdraw you from this research
if circumstances arise which warrant doing so. If for some reason, you choose to remove yourself from the
study, you will have the option of allowing the researcher to use data collected thus far, or taking your data
out of the study.

All of the participants of the study will each receive a copy of the results upon its full completion.
These results will be distributed to the co-operating teachers and student teacher participants accordingly,
and distribution type decided upon where they are residing at the time.

Based on the results of this qualitative study, further research regarding expectation of co-
operating teachers and student teachers may be warranted. I agree that this data can be used in subsequent
studies.

You may withdraw your consent at any time and discontinue participation without penalty. This
study, Co-operating teachers’ and student teachers’ expectations about instrumental music in an Ontario
placement has been reviewed and received ethics clearance through the University of Windsor Research
Ethics Board. If you have questions regarding your rights as a research subject, contact:

Research Ehtlrics Coordinator Telephone: 519-253-3000, ext. 3916
University of Windsor E-mail: lbunn@uwindsor.ca
Windsor, Ontario

N9B 3P4

204

I understand the information provided for this study as described herein. My questions have been answered
to my satisfaction, and I agree to participate in this study. I have been given a copy of this form.

 

Name of Subject

 

 

Signature of Subject Date

These are the terms under which I will conduct research.

 

 

Signature of Investigator Date

205

Appendix L

Permission to Audio-tape

CONSENT FOR AUDIONIDEO TAPIN G
Research Subjects’ Name:

Title of Project: Co-operating Teachers’ and Student Teachers’ Expectations About
Instrumental Music Student Teaching in an Ontario Placement

ID# Number:

Birth date:

I consent to the audio/video-taping of interviews, procedures, or treatment of

 

I understand these are voluntary procedures and that I am ﬂee to withdraw at any
time by requesting that either the taping be stopped or the viewing be discontinued. I also
understand that my name will not be revealed to anyone and that taping and viewing will
be kept conﬁdential. Tapes are ﬁled by number only and store in a locked cabinet.

I understand that conﬁdentiality will be respected and the viewing of materials will be for
professional use only.

 

 

(Signature of Parent or Guardian) (Date)
Or
(Signature of Participant) (Date)

206

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