At some point in your career as a band director you may be asked to take on a student teacher to give them hands-on experiences in the classroom under your supervision. Your goal as a Cooperating Teacher is to provide the best possible experience for this individual so they will be better prepared when they obtain their first teaching job. I have supervised many student teachers over the past 30 years and have found that one way to enhance their experience is to have them create a portfolio containing evidence of several projects they can complete during their time with you. These items are listed below with a brief explanation.
Video Recording Evaluations – Record the student teacher on several occasions and have them view the video and critique themselves focusing on what techniques or methods seemed to be most effective and which ones might need to be revised.
Impact on Learning Project – Have the student teacher select a concept, topic or skill they feel the students need to meet their educational needs. Have the student teacher develop a pretest to check the student’s current familiarity with the topic/skill and have them prepare and teach three lessons on this topic or skill. This would be followed by a posttest to check the level of improvement. The student teacher would then evaluate the level of improvement in achievement and suggest ways that the lessons could have been modified to improve that level based to the posttest results.
Technology Project – Incorporating technology into the student teaching experience can be valuable. Have the student teacher develop one or more lessons to familiarize them with how the computer can enhance their student’s learning or their administrative tasks. This project could include teaching with software, introduce students to sites on the internet, create instructional videos, using free music notation software to compose or develop spreadsheets to assist with instrument rentals or uniforms. There are many possible ways to use technology in music education and your student teacher should demonstrate how to utilize this.
Student Background Project – If student permanent records are available to you and your student teacher, select two students for your student teacher to evaluate by gathering background information from those records. Have the student teacher observe those two students (perhaps one that seem to thrive in band and one that is more challenged by the work or skills). Investigate their background information and discuss them at length. Have the student teacher write a short profile of each student and indicate how they might modify their instruction in light of this information.
Along with other items such as a Professional Essay, Performance List, Cover Letter, Recommendation Letters and Resume this portfolio can be a valuable tool when the student teacher begins interviewing for teaching positions. Some of my student teachers would actually provide a copy of their portfolio to Principals during the interview process and this document may set them apart from other applicants who rely only on the resume.
These projects are designed to give your student teacher a broad range of experiences while they are with you and provide them with a valuable resource as they leave their academic life and venture into the job market.
