Elementary, Secondary, and Informal Education: The MENTOR (Mathematics Education for Novice Teachers: Opportunities for Reflection) Project

Pacific Resources For Education And Learning, Honolulu HI

Investigators

Abstract

In the Pacific region served by Pacific Resources for Education and Learning (PREL), lack of access to four-year degree granting programs, coupled with a rapidly growing student population, resulted in the increased hiring of inexperienced and under-qualified teachers. The MENTOR Project addressed this problem by establishing a mentoring program for novice teachers aimed at developing in them the knowledge, skills and dispositions necessary to be effective teachers of mathematics, thereby decreasing the length and trauma of their induction into teaching and increasing their commitment to the profession. Based on training led by PREL personnel, Project mentors provide summer institutes as well as in-class nentoring, inquiry group sessions, and lesson study for novice teachers. The Project includes two cadres, one a group of well-trained and effective mentors of novice teachers, and the other a group effective novice teachers who have an understanding of how to implement standards-based mathematics instruction and who exhibit a strong commitment to the profession. Working together these two groups will generate a collection of exemplary standards-based lesson plans, make presentations at three Pacific Education Conferences (in 2003, 2004 and 2005), and prepare for publication a set of narratives describing novice teachers' and mentors' professional growth in the MENTOR Project. The MENTOR Project contributes significantly to the development of culturally responsive and appropraite mentoring models for neo-indigenous cultures characterized by linguistic diversity and geographic isolation. The insights gained inform attempts to establish mentoring and other professional development programs in cross-cultural settings in the Pacific and beyond.