Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/training-new-teachers-for-success/5024372/
“Training the next generation of teachers and leaders is a gift to our children.”
As the new director and program specialist at the Child Development Center at MiraCosta College, we stood looking out a windowed wall to our outside play area. We were watching what looked like mass confusion. Five community college students, who worked as “apprentices” or paid interns at the lab school, appeared to be chasing 20 three- to five-year-old children around the yard. No one seemed to be enjoying themselves. We observed as one child ran away, while an apprentice chased after him, the child laughing and screeching throughout. Another child ducked into a small space, while two apprentices watched her, looking confused. The last two apprentices tried to herd the remaining children inside, with about as much success as herding cats. It became immediately clear that we needed to quickly increase these apprentices’ knowledge and skills about working with young children. They needed both concrete tools and theoretical knowledge to help them become successful future teachers.
Over the next few pages, we want to share our story. Our lab school had become a school with an inexperienced team of apprentices in desperate need of training and a teaching staff ...