Professional Development Site Schools: A Great Place for Training Elementary Language Arts Preservice Teachers

This study examined preservice teachers' self-efficacy beliefs about their elementary language arts teaching after being prepared in a Professional Development School (PDS). Participants were preservice teachers in the first semester of their field-based senior year of teacher preparation, all of whom were placed in one of several PDS clusters. Each attended methods classes, including language arts, on an elementary school campus, allowing university instructors to model lessons using classrooms at various grade levels. Preservice teachers also taught language arts lessons while university instructors observed and provided feedback. Two days per week, student teachers were assigned to the classroom of a teacher, where they were active aides and gradually increased their activities to teaching short lessons. They were required to prepare and participate in various language arts lessons using different methods with small peer groups and elementary students. Participants completed a teaching efficacy belief instrument at the beginning and end of the semester. Results indicated that the PDSs were successful training sites for elementary language arts teachers. Preservice teachers made positive judgments about how well they could execute the necessary sequence of actions toward goal attainment in teaching language arts. (Contains 32 references.) (SM)