Critical Issues in the Induction of Secondary School Teachers in Business Education, English and Language Arts, Foreign Language, and Mathematics.

N

18

Academic Standards; Articulation (Education); Beginning Teacher Induction; Beginning Teachers; Business Education; Classroom Environment; Computer Uses in Education; Curriculum Development; Diversity (Student); Educational Technology; English Instruction; English (Second Language); Grammar; Higher Education; Language Arts; Mathematics Education; Politics of Education; Preservice Teacher Education; Second Language Instruction; Secondary Education; Secondary School Mathematics; Secondary School Teachers; Student Characteristics; Student Evaluation; Writing Processes

In this paper, four teacher educators present their ideas about some of the critical induction issues facing graduates of their programs as they begin their careers in secondary schools. A business teacher educator focuses on the ecology of the classroom, structural functions and the political environment, and support networks. An English and language arts teacher educator highlights coherence in the literature curriculum, process-oriented approaches to writing, grammar and usage, and media and technology. A foreign language teacher educator discusses academic standards, grammar wars, isolation and problems of interschool articulation, and foreign language instead of bilingual instruction. A mathematics teacher educator looks at teaching to the levels of the students, issues related to student background, and falling into practice. Common themes that emerge from these discussions include the tension between preparing teachers in general for a wide variety of possible school settings and the distinct characteristics of specific schools; the influence of assessment (particularly standardized testing) on secondary school teachers; and the impact of beginning secondary school teachers' own biographies on their induction into teaching. (Contains 15 references.) (SM)

2001

ED448147