A program for preservice special education students at William Paterson College (New Jersey) offered participants field experience working with minority and disadvantaged students. Undergraduate students in their sophomore, junior, or senior classes spent one and two hours per week engaged in course assignments with pupils at the school under…

This paper describes a pilot project in which interns were clustered in an elementary school in Saskatchewan (Canada) to work in collaboration with the teaching staff toward school goals as well as internship goals. The role of the college supervisor was primarily one of supporter, problem-solver, resource provider, and idea stimulator. The…

Cognitive apprenticeships have three essential characteristics: (1) they make use of the learner's prior knowledge; (2) they allow that learned procedures for solving problems may be modified in new situations; and (3) they acknowledge that individuals generate their own solution paths, often through a collaborative process. Preservice elementary…

The guiding of novices by experienced teachers is a principal component of the practicum in university-based teacher education programs, alternative routes to teacher certification, and programs of teacher induction and professional development. Novices learn by watching an expert teach and by being in turn observed and then receiving feedback on…

This article describes a teacher education program, "Studies in Educational Alternatives" (S.E.A.), at Mankato State University (Minnesota). The program is committed to personalization and practicum experiences as major components of teacher preparation. The document discusses: (1) program design; (2) admission processes; (3)…

The study described here was conducted to examine the impact of reforms made to an elementary education program which include broadened supervised practicums experience for all education methods courses thereby creating a link between theory and practice. Specific attention was given to prospective teachers' perceptions of the usefulness of their…

A three-year training program for bilingual/bicultural program staff development specialists is described. The program, which involves the cooperation of a higher education and six local education agencies (LEAs), seeks to train staff development specialists who can function in two languages, sensitive to the problems and advantages of…

Peer coaching, in which two teachers observe each other's classes with the objective of helping each other improve their instructional abilities, empowers teaching professionals by enabling them to develop their own criteria for evaluation of and responsibility for quality classroom performance. Peer coaching can involve collaborative, expert, or…

Two studies (from 1989 and 1990) are reviewed to illustrate the effectiveness and versatility of "ethnographies of thought" (as described by C. Geertz, 1983) for gaining significant understanding of the meaning perspectives of research participants and the contexts of a variety of educational settings. The methodological implications of the two…

This report describes the implementation and evaluation of a 12-week oral vocabulary development curriculum for use with transitional first graders. The transitional first grade is a class between kindergarten and first grade to provide students with an extra year of academic instruction to learn the skills needed to enter first grade. A natural…

A cost-free counseling model was developed to meet the changing needs of elementary school students in a small college city in California. A training program for graduate students was set up within the public school setting and was clinically supervised. Marriage, Family, and Child Counselor and Licensed Educational Psychologist internships were…

In order to create a computer-literate elementary school, this practicum aimed (1) to provide information about computer-assisted instruction (CAI) to all kindergarten through grade 5 teachers while developing a prototypical classroom in grade 2; (2) to increase community awareness of CAI; and (3) to encourage quality networking among educators…

A program was developed by a nurse/counselor to provide individual education and counseling for mothers having high-risk infants admitted to a Special Care Nursery after delivery. The program begins as soon after delivery as possible and evaluates the mother's skills, attitudes, beliefs, and knowledge of childrearing practices necessary for caring…

A survey was completed by 197 college and university speech communication departments concerning their speech internship programs. Survey items asked about institution size, number of majors/minors in the department, existence of an intern program, general standards, credit hour issues, placement, intern responsibility, and faculty role. The…

Previous research has emphasized the significant negative correlation between counselor effectiveness and dogmatism, or closemindedness. To reduce levels of dogmatism in counselor trainees, a program was developed and tested at Southwest Texas State University. The new course, "Guidance to Meet the Needs of Multicultural Students," gave counseling…