Supporting mentoring and assessment in practicum settings: A new professional development approach for school-based teacher educators

This chapter examines the professional development of an emerging occupational group in the Australian context—a group we call ‘school-based teacher educators’—acknowledging and focusing on their learning about the complex work of teacher education, mentoring, supervising and assessing pre-service teachers.Teachers who work with pre-service teachers in schools—typically known as cooperating teachers or supervisors/mentors in schools—are noted for the vital role they play in the success or otherwise of that experience. The teacher education discourse and research literature highlight, however, that their work is plagued by role confusion, and lack of professional learning and preparation, as well as difficulty dealing with the complexity of making judgements and assessing pre-service teachers (Clarke et al. 2014).