“My Goals are Different!”: Music Teacher Socialization Through Peer and Expert Mentorship
Erik Alan Johnson, Colorado State University
One of SMTE’s ASPAs has focused on how pre-service music education majors transform from student into teacher as a result of experiences in teacher preparation programs. One aspect that researchers have highlighted as an important part of the socialization of pre-service teachers is peer-mentorship and the indirect observation of teachers at various stages of development (e.g., Grierson et al., 2014; Lebler, 2007; Le Cornu & Ewing, 2008).
The following themes have emerged from the literature regarding peer-mentorship in teacher preparation programs: awareness of various teaching communities, novices assuming the teacher role, direct and indirect observational learning, mentor training, and reciprocal feedback during field experiences. Additionally, the presence of mutually supportive and diverse socialization structures in undergraduate programs has been highlighted as important to the development of strong teacher identities (Austin, Isbell, & Russell, 2010). Given the recent trend of mentorship being used as a tool to assist teacher development, a community outreach ensemble program was designed specifically to investigate the impact of an interactive feedback community involving pre-service and in-service music educators.
The purpose of this single intrinsic case-study was to better understand the impact of mentorship relationships between members of a teaching community comprised of novice high school students considering music education as a career path, undergraduate pre-service teachers, early career in-service music educators, and expert music educators (retired or with 15 or more years of experience). The following research questions were investigated: (1) how does mentorship influence the development of music teacher occupational identity? (2) how does a student’s perceived career trajectory relate to their approach to feedback and mentorship?
The notion that students would actively embrace, encounter, and negotiate different trajectories provides a unique window into the complexity of music teacher occupational identity development. While Wenger (1998) suggests a sociocultural conception of identity formation by examining how individuals are situated in relationship to various communities of practice, the idea that our identities form trajectories in and across communities of practice implies that the active negotiation of various trajectories highly influences one’s teaching identity and career goals.
Through sustained observation, individual and group participant interviews over two semesters, the development of teacher identity for participants at all levels was seemingly influenced by the opportunities that they were afforded to reciprocally exchange roles. Mirroring what Tharpe and Gallimore (1991) call the Theory of Teaching as Assisted Performance, participants who were the most impacted by mentorship frequently traversed through the four stages of role exchange in what Tharpe and Gallimore identify as a “reciprocal zone of proximal development” (pp. 52-53). Conversely, those who were least impacted or inclined to engage in giving feedback or mentoring others resisted role exchange. Data analysis suggests three primary themes: (1) mentorship through articulation of one’s own teaching goals; (2) development of teaching identity by adopting the goals of another; (3) feedback as revoicing internal teaching obstacles. Implications suggest that multifaceted feedback and mentorship relationships are beneficial to the development of strong teacher identities. Moreover, music teacher educators may be well served in developing formalized mentorship structures throughout teacher preparation programs.
References
Austin, J. R., Isbell, D. S., & Russell, J. A. (2010). A multi-institution exploration of secondary socialization and occupational identity among undergraduate music majors. Psychology of Music, 40(1), 66-83.
Grierson, A., Wideman-Johnston, T., Tedesco, S., Brewer, C. A., & Cantalini- Williams, M. (2014). Teacher candidates' perceptions of participating in a peer mentorship practicum model.Toronto: Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario.
Lebler, D. (2007). Student-as-master? Reflections on a learning innovation in popular music pedagogy. International Journal of Music Education, 25(3), 205-221.
Le Cornu, R., & Ewing, R. (2008). Reconceptualising professional experiences in pre-service teacher education... reconstructing the past to embrace the future. Teaching and Teacher Education, 24(7), 1799-1812.
Tharp, R., & Gallimore, R. (1991). A theory of teaching as assisted performance. In P. Light, S. Sheldon & M. Woodhead (Eds.), Learning to Think (pp. 42-63). New York: Routledge.