Creating an in-school pastoral system for student teachers in school-based initial teacher education

Abstract

Recent developments in initial teacher education (ITE) have produced a number of school-centred models. These mean that student teachers may now spend more of their time in schools than has historically been the case. In some of these models, student teachers are more clearly part of the school as an institution than might be the case in more university-led models. This change of ‘home’ location for student teachers means that schools may have an increased responsibility for their pastoral needs. This paper reviews existing academic literature on student teacher stress, anxiety, emotions and identity in relation to ITE school placements to consider what recommendations have been made about how these pastoral needs should be responded to and who should make that response. It finds that recommendations mostly relate to universities developing student teachers’ skills and emotional and personal resilience before they begin school placements. Where in-school responsibilities are considered, this either stops at the level of individual mentors or there is no detailed consideration of how schools as institutions should organise their response. The paper then considers the small body of existing literature on how schools should meet the pastoral needs of teachers to suggest principles for planning a pastoral care system for student teachers in school-based ITE.

Keywords:

• pastoral care
• student teachers
• emotions
• identity