Partnerships in Preservice Teacher Education

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Partnerships in Preservice Teacher Education

• Anne Scott Adam Staples (SEDVIC)
• TD grant

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Project Aims

1. To establish structures for welcoming
   international students into the School of
   Education referred to as the Buddy Partnerships
   and,
2. To establish structures for communicating
   supportive feedback about international students
   academic writing referred to as Writing
   Partnerships.

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Buddy Partnerships

• team comprised ACU National staff and preservice
  teachers from the Melbourne campus
• Dr Anne Scott, Mr Adam Staples, Ms Elizabeth
  Murray, Ms Maria Muskovic, Ms Gayanji Amunugama,
  Ms Delphine Lubin, Ms Dominique Smith and Ms
  Julia Ripley (SEDVIC)
• Ms Mary McInerney and Ms Geraldine Butler
  (Mission Engagement)
• Ms Mary Campbell (IACE)

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The pilot project group

• Socialised with international students (ACU
  students and chn in the local commission flats)
• Reflected on their experiences as a group and
  considered implications for themselves as
  teachers and issues affecting learners

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The pilot project group

• listed challenges some international students
  faced
• discussed and offered to implement a series of
  strategies to promote inclusive behaviours with
  international students
• offered to work with International students using
  the WebCT training unit ICT Essentials to become
  familiar with some of the tools and functions for
  example, participating in online discussions
• offered to present summaries of complex aspects
  of coursework such as definitions and examples of
  learning theories and,
• identified related strategies which promote
  inclusivity for use in primary and/or secondary
  classrooms.

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Developments from the TD grant

• given the success of the pilot Buddy
  partnerships, implemented a similar process with
  all preservice teachers enrolled in a core unit
  in BEd3 - EDFX207 Community Engagement in 2009.
• 130 BEd3 working as tutors/learning partners with
  international children in the Homework Club on
  the Atherton Gardens, Fitzroy Estate.
• The activities addressed socialisation,
  inclusivity, and enabled BEd3 preservice teachers
  to learn and use the Reflective Inquiry processes
  for responding to experiences as journal entries,
  similar to those produced in the pilot project.

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Photos of journal entries and workshops
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Writing Partnerships

• team comprised both ACU National staff and
  preservice teachers from the Melbourne campus Dr
  Anne Scott, Dr Josephine Ryan, two ACU National
  international MTch Primary preservice teachers
  and 15 BT/BA secondary preservice teachers
  enrolled in the English Method class (SEDVIC) Ms
  Nancy Reid and Ms Pat Hacker (Academic Skills
  Team).

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Pilot project group

• Secondary English method PSTs gave written
  feedback to international primary PSTs on drafts
  of written assignments

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POSITIVES

• high levels of engagement and interest from all
  participants
• secondary English method preservice teachers
  reported valuing the authentic task.
• international MTch Primary preservice teachers
  appreciated the feedback but would have liked
  more specificity in the constructive feedback and
  the opportunity to resubmit their work again
  after having had another go. Unfortunately, the
  latter suggestion was not feasible given the
  nature of assessment tasks in a 12 week semester.
  

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Developments from the TD grant

• In 2009 Dr Ryan embedded the activity into the
  assessment schedule for the English method unit
  (as an optional activity)