Mentoring New Special Education Teachers

This field-tested guide provides everything you need to effectively support and mentor your special education teachers, increase their job satisfaction, and keep your retention rates high!

The authors provide a wealth of research-based tools for professional developers to use in multiple settings, including schools with culturally and linguistically diverse students.

This updated edition presents 18 successful real-world programs, 5 factors for developing a comprehensive mentoring initiative, and new material for mentoring special education, math, and science teachers.

"These two remarkable educators not only document the development of their own relationship from mentor/mentee to professional colleagues, they also draw from their own experiences, research studies, and the real voices of countless new teachers to provide an excellent, hands-on guide for perfecting the mentoring role in multicultural settings. Kudos!" —Lisa Delpit, Eminent Scholar, Executive Director Center for Urban Education and Innovation Help new teachers thrive in culturally and linguistically diverse school settings! The challenges of teaching in a culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) school, including language barriers, special needs, and teacher isolation, can be especially overwhelming for early-career teachers. This unique book on mentoring and coaching new teachers is specifically designed for multicultural school settings, although educators in all settings can benefit. The authors draw from their own experience implementing a highly successful mentoring program for new teachers in a large, urban school district. The book offers practical examples anchored in the current theoretical and research base for the professional development of novice teachers in urban as well as non-urban areas. Filled with vignettes that directly capture the real-life experiences of new teachers and their mentors, this volume: Illustrates how to develop effective teacher-to-teacher mentoring relationships Raises readers′ awareness of issues that might arise from CLD differences and facilitates more effective communication Offers reproducible resources, agendas, and other sample materials for a variety of contexts This timely and practical book helps mentors give new teachers the support they need to survive and succeed in diverse school settings.

Be the best mentor you can be with these state-of-the-art strategies! How can you relate all of your teaching experience to a new teacher? Working from decades of experience, the authors of this guide offer sensible strategies to help mentors help new teachers. The authors synthesize theory and practice to show mentors how to: Increase new-teacher support, success, and retention Guide teachers in their relationships and classroom strategies Improve their own mentoring approach Avoid common mentoring pitfalls

Redesigning Special Education Teacher Preparation describes both challenges and possible solutions to redesigning and restructuring high-incidence teacher preparation programs so graduates will meet the Highly Qualified Teacher requirements and be prepared to teach students with high-incidence disabilities. This powerful new text discusses many possible reforms, including field-based teacher preparation, a focus on evidence-based core practices and teacher moves, collaboration with K–12 school-based partners as teacher educators, interdisciplinary collaboration across university faculty, and a grounding in current expectations for high-stakes accountability and program evaluation.

Compilations of research on teacher preparation often include no more than a cursory mention of the specific roles and needs of special education teachers. Although the work that special education teachers perform does indeed differ from the work of classroom teachers, teacher preparation in the two fields has much in common. The purpose of this seven-part handbook is to expand our knowledge of teacher education broadly by providing an in-depth look at the most up-to-date research on special education teacher preparation. Opening chapters ground the collection in political and economic context, while subsequent sections delve deeply into issues related to the current state of our special education workforce and offer insights into how to best prepare and sustain that workforce. Ultimately, by illuminating the particularities of special education teacher preparation, this landmark handbook addresses the state of current research in the field and sets an agenda for future scholarship.