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The Middle Level Internship Program: Thinking together about teaching
Abstract
This case study examinee the effects of a one year induction program, known as the Middle Level Internship Program, on selected beginning middle level teachers. This cooperative program between the Lincoln Public Schools and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln serves as an induction process into the teaching profession for six beginning middle level teachers each year in Lincoln, Nebraska. Within the educational community, there is recognition that teaching the early adolescent successfully in the middle level setting requires a specially prepared educator. Three components identified by the program advisory committee as contributing to that special preparation are the provisions of a full-time mentor, graduate course work that specifically addresses the needs of the early adolescent, and the experience of full-time teaching in a middle level classroom. Embedded within those components are the processes of support, knowledge acquisition and reflection. This study was conducted over the 1991-1994 years at two participating middle schools. There were seventeen interns during that period of time. Each of them contributed their perspectives on each of the components and embedded processes as it impacted their first year of teaching at the middle level. The findings of this study supported the theoretical proposition upon which the internship was developed: that a supported teaching environment would assist new teachers to understand and address the needs of middle level students and in doing so, create and enhance their own sense of empowerment and professional identity; that working in a supported teaching environment would assiat new teachers to become more collaborative in their approach to and reflection about teaching; and that a supported teaching environment assisted new teachers to quickly move beyond personal concerns of survival to student concerns. Challenges continue to exist for new teachers as they negotiate their way in the professional world as neophytes. The Middle Level Internship Program provides a safe and supported teaching environment in which program participants can think together about teaching and work together towards the development of effective middle level teachers.
Subject Area
Teacher education|School administration
Recommended Citation
Parente, Kay D, "The Middle Level Internship Program: Thinking together about teaching" (1995). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9614996.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9614996