The written feedback mentors give to student teachers

Abstract

This exploratory study investigates the form and substance of the written feedback given by practising teachers acting as mentors to student teachers whilst they are on block school experience. Mentors are becoming the major providers of feedback to students with the introduction of partnership arrangements between higher education institutions and schools. However, little is known about this extension to the cooperating teacher's role, especially the written feedback they provide. Examples of written feedback (47 scripts) were supplied by second year BA(Ed) students after their 4-week school experience. The scripts were analysed to determine the features of students' lessons that mentors in primary schools write about, the style of writing that mentors adopt, how mentors give their students advice, and whether mentors' comments indicate that progress is being made by their students week by week. The results suggest that mentors need to reflect upon the purpose of written feedback and tailor the nature of their feedback accordingly.