This document summarizes a study on mentoring practices for pre-service teachers during their practicum placements. The study found that mentoring experiences varied greatly between placements. Fewer than 25% of pre-service teachers experienced a "high quality" opportunity to learn teaching. Effective mentoring was characterized by shared planning, observation, feedback and reflection between the mentor and pre-service teacher. The study highlights the importance of well-prepared mentors for providing quality learning experiences for future teachers.

1. Mentoring to enhance the learning of pre-service teachers on practicum Dr Ngaire Hoben Faculty of Education, University of Auckland January 2008

33. After a lesson in which the kids weren’t that interested and were mucking around, Sam asked me “why do you think they weren’t engaged with this, What do you think you could have changed to make this more interesting for them? Is there a different approach you could have made with the same material?”, that kind of stuff, which was really good because it made me think, “well, maybe it’s not the lesson that’s totally crap, but the way I approached it” or “maybe the lesson was bad and the approach was OK”. I had to kind of think, “well, which is it?” (Interview with pre-service teacher Kate)