Placement schools as professional learning communities in teacher education

Abstract

This article investigates how schoolteachers’, school leaders’ and college teachers’ involvement affects placement schools as professional learning communities. Norwegian teacher education is used as a case. The first part builds on a survey among schoolteachers and mentors at 111 placement schools in Norway. It documents great variety in the level of engagement. Interviews with mentors, school leaders and college teachers reveal how cooperation between colleges and placement schools, as well as the school leaders’ commitment, influences the quality of placement. The school leaders’ role proves to be important in developing the schools as professional learning communities, and they seem to have a significant impact on the work of the mentors. The data also show that there is a need for a more substantial cooperation between college teachers and mentors about the student teachers’ professional development as well as a need for a more systematic integration of learning in the two learning contexts.

Keywords:

• Teacher education
• placement schools
• professional learning communities
• mentors
• college teachers

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the colleagues at the research group, ‘Professions, knowledge and competence’ at Centre for the study of professions at Oslo and Akershus University College for insightful comments to the manuscript.