Preparing Mentor Teachers to Ensure the Future of Effective Agriculture Teachers

摘要

When I taught high school agriculture, I never imagined I would go to graduate school full time to pursue a doctoral degree. One of my goals was to get a master's degree and I figured I would accomplish that goal while teaching. When the opportunity came to go to Ohio State to pursue both degrees, I had no idea about research. I did not know what research was or how to conduct a study. I quickly learned the process and discovered one of my research interest areas related to teacher mentoring and induction. I mentioned in a previous article of The Agricultural Education Magazine titled, "Serve as a Principle-Centered Individual" that I was not a good teacher my first year. However, I feel that in the five years I spent in the classroom, I got bettereach semester. There were many times my first year when I looked for different jobs, including teaching different subjects. One of the major reasons I continued teaching high school agriculture was because of the great support system I had in my mentors,including my cooperating teacher from my student teaching experience, Tom Paulsen, who is now a faculty member at Iowa State University. Tom is a documented master teacher, and that definition goes beyond teaching high school students, it includes serving as a cooperating teacher mentor, and now as a teacher educator. Tom's belief in me as a future agriculture teacher is one of the principle reasons I continued to teach.