Date of Award
2001
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Programs for Higher Education
Advisor
Robert Esenberg
Committee Member
Charles L. Faires
Keywords
beginning teachers, Chicago Public Schools, classroom observations, educational evaluation, elementary schools, first-year teachers, high schools, interviews, Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, mathematics achievement, preservice experience, program evaluation, reading achievement, self-efficacy, self-evaluation, student achievement, surveys, teacher education, teacher effectiveness, teacher interns, Teachers For Chicago, teaching ability, Urban Teacher Interview Protocol
Abstract
This practicum involved an analysis of the relationship between preservice experience and the self-evaluation of teaching ability of 1st-year teacher interns in the Chicago Public Schools (CPS). The preservice experience was part of the Teachers For Chicago (TFC) program. The practicum took place at an elementary and a high school in the CPS that implemented the program between July 2000 and June 2001.
As part of the practicum, a survey was developed by the researcher and the program's independent evaluator. The 110 selected teacher interns in the practicum were a heterogeneously mixed group of aspiring educators with common beginning teaching needs and perceptions. The selection of these interns was based on an extensive process that included the copyrighted Urban Teacher Interview Protocol by Haberman (1 995). The TFC interns are placed in classrooms with little training and little experience. Interviews and surveys conducted previously showed that teacher interns were highly stressed during the 1st-year of the internship. It was hypothesized that providing preservice experience to TFC interns would reduce their stress levels and improve their effectiveness in the classrooms.
This report details the impact of the preservice experience on the efficacy and teaching ability of TFC interns after the 1st year of their internship. Evaluation of the effects on their self-concepts and teaching ability were based on intern pre- and postsurvey data, classroom observations, interviews, and student achievement scores in reading and math as measured by pretreatment and posttreatment administrations of the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills. Results indicated that there were no significant differences in intern efficacy and teaching ability for TFC interns who participated in the preservice experience and those who did not.