Mission Statement for the Office of Laboratory Experiences
In accordance with our school and departmental mission OLE works collaboratively with program faculty to develop and sustain field sites that provide the continuous tie between theory and practice in our teacher preparation work. Teacher preparation school sites provide the context in which our students develop abilities of leadership, reflective practice, research, and scholarship. These experiences also provide authentic contexts for teacher candidates to participate in their respective educational communities.
The conceptual framework which underlies the curriculum of our teacher preparation prog ram is built around 5 core beliefs aligned with the mission statement or our school. This framework addresses the nature of effective teaching and learning:
- Diversity enriches the teaching and learning environment.
- Effective teaching is responsive to the diversity of learners, interpersonal, interactive, collaborative, relevant, interdisciplinary, and it utilizes various contexts.
- Meaningful learning builds on a student's experience and prior knowledge in the construction of new and increasingly complex and sophisticated attitudes, knowledge and skills.
- Constructive and principled change improves the teaching and learning environment.
The education process must be linked to family and community.
This conceptual framework exemplifies a complex view of effective teaching (Murray 1996). In this view teaching is not just an act of presenting information to students with the expectation that they acquire and regurgitate it back. Effective teaching embraces the notion that students construct and synthesize their knowledge through interactive experiences simultaneously building on prior learning to develop more complex schemata (Black & Ammon, 1992). The essence of the teaching act then becomes a democratic process focused on teaching students how to take responsibility for their own learning in flexible environments which nurture and provide interactive learning experiences.
Preparing new teachers for this role requires careful attention to their growth and development. To be competent in facilitative roles, professional educators must come to know themselves as learners and must develop dispositions of respect for inquiry into the larger contexts which embrace others visions of the same phenomena. Thus, preparing future teachers for this level of expertise and professionalism goes beyond imparting the technological foundations for effective teaching. It moves teacher educators toward modeling the processes which lead to teacher empowerment and dispositions toward inquiry. This process is nurtured and developed during clinical components of a teacher candidate's program.
Laboratory experiences during DTPSE teacher preparation programs vary in length, duration, and level of intensity depending on the purpose of the clinical experience and when in occurs in a teacher candidates program. Each graduate program leading to licensure has a sequence of integrated clinical laboratory experiences which are carefully planned and integrated with courses to provide opportunities for teacher candidates to tie theory to practice through observation and practical application of methods and teaching strategies. This sequence begins with field observations followed by focused practicum experiences which lead the teacher candidate into a comprehensive internship experience. Thus, it becomes the essential mission of the OLE to be the administrative support structure for assuring quality in the clinical components of our programs and for providing guidance related to best practices in supervision of the pre-service teacher to the faculty, students and the cooperating/ mentor teachers who participate in the teaching internship.
Cooperating Teachers
Forms & Handbooks
Application Instructions
Liability Issues
Praxis Tests