Keys to Healthy Mentoring Programs: December Newsletter

Keys to Healthy Mentoring Programs

Issue 8, December 2014

Dear reader,

Welcome to the November/December issue of our newsletter focusing on Keys to a Good Mentoring Program. These articles were generated from hosting 2 three year seminars with different sets of 25 experienced colleagues from around the NW region. We explored a lot in these sessions and developed a deeper understanding of just what it takes to build and manage a mentoring program in a school. Included in these articles is a collection of other related resources in our resource library. We are already working on the next newsletter, to follow up and explore the Art of Mentoring itself - how to observe, how to have fruitful mentoring conversations and how to help someone develop.

We hope you enjoy these articles and the related resources.

The LeadTogether community is still growing and we appreciate your participation. Please contact us if you have any questions or ideas that you would like to share or explore.

In service,

Michael Soule

Mentoring: Key Aspects for a Successful School Mentoring Program

Mentoring is essential to a school’s success. After leading seminars for 6 years on mentoring, we have identified some key aspects that will help everyone:

1. Assign a person to coordinate the mentoring work in the school.
Like in any activity in the organization, without a person leading and coordinating it, it has a slim chance of being effective or successful. Choose someone who has successful teaching experience, some experience with mentoring, and leadership skills.
2. Get clear about the difference between mentoring, peer support and evaluation.
Mentoring is a professional relationship where an experienced teacher coaches a less experienced teacher to help them improve their teaching, collegial and parent work.

Mentoring an Untrained Teacher

In a recent conversation about mentoring with my long-time colleague Nettie Fabrie from Sound Circle Center who is the Pedagogical Dean of the Seattle Waldorf School, I posed a question about mentoring a new and untrained teacher and she shared with me an important thought about mentoring new teachers in general.
She asked me, “Has this teacher gone through a teacher training or preparation course? If not then one needs to take a different route in mentoring this teacher. One needs to develop a support program for the teacher that looks more like training than mentoring.”

School Mentoring Program Assessment Form, Sound Circle Mentoring Seminar 2008

This form is intended to help schools develop their capacity for assessing the mentorship program in their school and identify strengths and areas where improvements are needed. This form is a tool in development.

1. The Mentoring Program + - +/- Successes & Areas Needing Improvement
a. The mentoring program at the school is one part of a complete professional development plan, which includes mentorship, peer mentorship and evaluation.

b. The program provides mentoring for new teachers.

c. The program provides mentoring for all teachers, appropriate to their level of experience.

Mentoring and Evaluating Terms: Definitions and Clarifications, D Gerwin, M Soule AWSNA

The following descriptions attempt to clarify the uses of the terms relating to mentors and evaluators of individual teachers, as well as terms referring to the mentoring and evaluation of schools as a whole.

Mentoring - In-house Mentor – appointed by the school

In-house mentors are experienced teachers assigned by their schools to support a colleague (often a new teacher) in the improvement of his or her teaching. It is necessary for mentors to visit regularly to observe the students and teacher in the classroom, to meet with the teacher regularly, be available for questions and provide support to the teacher. These relationships are confidential and non-evaluative.

More Mentoring Resources

In 2005, after participating in a national mentoring colloquium sponsored by AWSNA, Nettie Fabrie and Michael Soule initiated a symposium for experienced teachers in Waldorf schools in the NW. The training was three years long (six weekend sessions) and involved 25 experienced teacher from 10 NW schools. After completing two three-year seminars with different participants, Nettie, Holly Koteen and Michael gathered their experience into a collection of resources to help teachers become more effective in school mentors. Here are a few of the resources we found helpful. (Just click on the title to find the resource in our library.)