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Mentoring

Teachers can learn through both formal and informal mentoring. Bransford, Brown and Cocking (1999) make links between mentoring and apprenticeship, where a more experienced master craftsperson provides instruction, guidance and support to relative newcomers to the practice. The newcomers gain mastery in their chosen practice by engaging in legitimate, peripheral participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991). Mentoring can occur in both pre-service and in-service periods. In a positive mentoring culture, people of all levels of training can act as mentors to others. This latter point can be illustrated by a comment from Jay, a childcare student at a South Australian TAFE.

And he [her mentor] always says to me, you know, 'How are you doing? Are you sure you're alright? And do you need any help in anything?' Yeah. I actually do that in the class now with my friends. Like this one girl says, 'Oh I'm just so behind in the assignments.' I said, 'Oh come and sit down and I'll help you - what you need is to be put on the track. I won't do your work because I won't do it, but I'll help you out.' (Askell-Williams, 2004, p. 189-190)

Bransford et al. (1999) explain that mentoring can be both formal and informal.

Formal mentoring occurs when an experienced teacher takes a new teacher under his or her wing to provide insight and advice … Informal mentoring occurs through conversations in hallways, teachers' rooms and other school settings. (p. 179)

New practitioners can be aware that the opportunity for them to take the initiative and 'have a go' is only made possible by the safety net provided by their mentors. As Sally says:

And you come here, you get thrown in the deep end with a big watchful eye on you. (Askell-Williams, 2004, p. 143)

Roxy also explained how mentors can provide new perspectives.

I just find it really interesting, is like, where people put emphasis ... the points that he drew out of it that were obviously of significance to him were important to me … because I wouldn't have necessarily made the link. Like it brings up issues for me.

It is important to reflect on how relatively inexperienced teachers (and student teachers) are conceptualised in the workplace, both by the newcomers themselves, and by more experienced staff, particularly regarding who should take the responsibility for training the newcomers. Wineberg and Grossman (2001) discuss the absence of an adult-to-adult mentoring mindset by experienced workers, as if training and work are two different functions rather than a continuous pathway. From another angle, Resnick (1987) explains that simply placing a newcomer in a work environment was insufficient to ensure that he or she would be exposed to the required learning opportunities in a structured and meaningful way, or be capable of benefiting from such exposure without the knowledge of how to learn from such experiences. Hargreaves and Fullan (2000) also lament that:

Mentoring practice may fall short of its ideals not because of poor policies or program design but because we fail to regard mentoring as integral to our approach to teaching and professionalism. Mentoring of new teachers will never reach its potential unless it is guided by a deeper conceptualisation that treats it as central to the task of transforming the teaching profession itself. (p. 50)

Hargreaves and Fullan (2000) propose that teaching has become more complex over the years, moving through four stages, from pre-professional, through autonomous professional and collegial professional to, finally, post-modern professionalism, where 'teachers deal with a diverse clientele and increasing moral uncertainty, where many approaches are possible and more and more groups have an influence' (p. 52). New developments in teaching, such as constructivism, cooperative learning, assessment strategies, information technologies and curriculum differentiation, pose challenges for all teachers. As such, 'the old model of mentoring, where experts who are certain about their craft can pass on its principles to eager novices, no longer applies' (p. 52). Hargreaves and Fullan argue that, if the school community considers that the mentor always knows best, then:

Mentors may seem more like tormentors, and the process of induction into the profession may amount to seduction (from the Latin 'seducere', to lead aside) of the new teachers away from the purpose and practices they recently acquired in their teacher preparation experiences. (p. 53)

An alternative approach to the 'mentor as expert' model is that of establishing a community of practice. Bransford et al. (1999) propose that developing communities of practice is:

... an approach that involves collaborative peer relationships and teachers' participation in educational research and practice … [which encourage] shared experiences and discourse and data about student learning and a necessity for shared decisions. (pp. 185-187)

Bransford et al. point out that what is known about learning for students must surely apply to learning for teachers, and with this perspective, the value of mentoring and communities of shared practice cannot be overlooked. Hargreaves and Fullan (2000) extend the concept of community to include communities that exist beyond the school boundaries, but which nevertheless interact with teachers' daily lives. Thus 'good mentorship involves helping teachers work effectively with adults - being sure (as a professional community) of their own judgments while also being open and responsive to the opinions of others' (p. 53).

Hargreaves and Fullan introduce another issue: the changing demographic of the teacher population. Whereas the novice teacher was once a relatively unusual occurrence in a school of experienced teachers, with the ageing teacher workforce, relative novices will form large groups, compared with teachers with substantial experience. 'The challenge [for leadership] will be to bring together [the energies of] youth and [the wisdom of] experience.' (p. 54)

Hargreaves and Fullan propose that if mentoring is to reach its potential it must go beyond restructuring (adding formal roles) and progress to reculturing (altering the capacity of teachers). To do this will require:

explicitly conceptualising mentoring programs as instruments of school reculturing, as not just a way of supporting individual teachers but also a way of building strong professional cultures dedicated to improving teaching, learning and caring
connecting mentoring programs to other programs that meet the needs of all teachers
everyone involved realising that they have an opportunity to redefine the teaching profession and, in doing so, influence social change and social justice (pp. 54-55).

Hargreaves and Fullan suggest that mentoring should progress in four new directions.

From involving pairs to becoming an integral part of professional cultures in schools.
From focusing only on classroom work to developing the ability to form strong relationships with colleagues and parents as well.
From hierarchical dispensations of wisdom to shared inquiries into practice.
From being an isolated innovation to becoming an integrated part of broader improvement efforts to reculture schools and school systems (p. 55).

References
Askell-Williams, H. (2004). Teachers' and learners' knowledge about teaching and learning. Unpublished PhD thesis, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia.

Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L., & Cocking, R. R. (Eds.). (1999). How people learn: Brain, mind, experience, and school. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Hargreaves, A. & Fullan, M. (2000). 'Mentoring in the new millennium.' Theory into Practice, 39, 50-56.

Lave, J. & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Resnick, L. B. (1987). 'Learning in school and out.' Educational Researcher, 16(9), 13-20.

Wineberg, S. & Grossman, P. (2001). 'Affect and effect in cognitive approaches to instruction.' In S. M. Carver & D. Klahr (Eds.), Cognition and instruction: Twenty-five years of progress (pp. 479-492). Mahwah, NJ.