- Title
- Host teachers’ mentoring role towards supporting the development and training of pre-service teacher training: implications for teaching practice
- Creator
- Majiba, Nolonwabo Happiness
- Subject
- Mentoring in education
- Subject
- Teachers -- Training of
- Date
- 2023-01
- Type
- Doctoral theses
- Type
- text
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10353/29625
- Identifier
- vital:78416
- Description
- The focus of the study was on host teachers’ mentoring role towards supporting the development and training of pre-service teachers. Spending time in the workplace and providing pre-service teachers with an authentic context within which they can demonstrate the integration of theory and practice, is a crucial component of the teacher training programme. Teachers who are hosting pre-service teachers in schools during teaching practice sessions fulfil the roles of mentors towards supporting the development and training of pre-service teachers. Despite the different meanings and/views attached to mentoring, the most important role of host teachers as mentors is to guide pre-service teachers in their professional learning development. The study is guided by Vygotsky’s Constructivist theory to highlight the important role of host teachers (mentors) as “knowledgeable others”. The study employed a qualitative approach within the interpretivist paradigm. Purposive sampling was used to sample four urban primary schools in the Buffalo City Education District of the Eastern Cape Province. Eight teachers who had past experience hosting pre-service teachers and third- and fourth-year education students were selected as participants. Semi-structured interviews and document reviews were used to collect data. Thematic analysis was used to analyze tape-recorded data. Despite the importance of this crucial component of teacher training, the findings of the study revealed various gaps in the mentoring process, which are as follows: (i) host teachers are experiencing difficulties with the mentoring of pre-service teachers due to lack of formal and/or informal training; (ii) lack of commitment amongst pre-service teachers who seemed to perceive teaching practice as a matter of compliance to merely get an assessment score to pass the qualification; (iii) host teachers regard pre-service teachers as relief teachers who end up taking full workloads in the absence of host teachers. Based on the findings, the study came up inter alia with the following recommendations: (i) Mutually agreed policies between lecturers and host teachers (mentors) outlining to the roles, objectives and responsibilities of host teachers and the authority to fulfil their roles and responsibilities effectively. (ii) Host teachers (mentors) to undergo proper and goal- oriented induction and orientation workshops to make them more conscious of the complexities of teacher training; pre-service teachers’ needs and their own needs. The study also came up with the following recommendations for further research: (i) the study was concluded on a small scale comprising one district in four schools, future studies may contribute by conducting a similar investigation on a larger scope and even taking a comparative dimension between districts and among schools. (ii) future studies may narrow the focus of the study to a single aspect like time constraints in the implementation of school experience.
- Description
- Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Education, 2023
- Format
- computer
- Format
- online resource
- Format
- application/pdf
- Format
- 1 online resource (312 leaves)
- Format
- Publisher
- University of Fort Hare
- Publisher
- Faculty of Education
- Language
- English
- Rights
- University of Fort Hare
- Rights
- All Rights Reserved
- Rights
- Open Access
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| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details Download | SOURCE1 | Majiba.pdf | 2 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |