Mentoring a Student Teacher

Mentoring Your Student Teacher

Mentoring your student teacher is among the greatest of your responsibilities.  This young teacher has likely not spent much time in an authentic classroom operating in a real-life school district.  They will have not had the opportunity to experience navigating the realities of working with other educators and the myriad of other adults that come in and out of your classroom so frequently that you barely notice that you deal with them on a regular basis. They will be trying out all sorts of techniques and skills that they have read a lot about, but not really tried in an authentic context. A significant part of your job is the function as the tour guide on their journey. This section will highlight some of the opportunities you will have to mentor your student teacher.

Integration into the local educational community

Even though your student teacher may only be with you for eight weeks, they will interact with the educational community on a daily basis. They will have to learn how to function within your department (both within the building and throughout the district), within the building community and with the district community.

  • How will you facilitate your student teacher’s integration into the music department?

    It is important to introduce your student teacher to all of the members of the music department. These people can be a valuable resource for your student teacher beyond the wisdom you will provide. If your department meets monthly and your student teacher comes in a week after your department meeting, consider finding a way to introduce them before the next meeting.  As an alternative, communicate with your student teacher about coming to the department meeting before they formally start. This will give them a chance to build some relationships and find other people they might be able to observe.

  • How will you facilitate your student teacher’s integration into the building?

    While in their placement, your student teacher will have to interact with the other adults in the building. In an elementary school, it is uncommon to confuse a student teacher with a student, but in a high school placement it is much more common. 


    Therefore, it is important to introduce your student teacher to the rest of the faculty as soon as possible after they begin student teaching. This is often done at a faculty meeting, although if there is not a meeting for a month, you might consider sending out an email to let people know there will be a new adult in the building.


    It is important that your student teacher start developing relationships with administrators, as these will be the people that may sit across from them in future job interviews. It can be very helpful for your student teacher if you personally introduce them to the building administrators. It would also be helpful to encourage the student teacher to ask the administrator if they would be willing to conduct an informal observation while they are student teaching.


    Lastly, but by no means least, it is important to introduce your student teacher to the support staff in the building. They will interact with aides, custodians, office staff and cafeteria personnel on a daily basis and it is important to introduce them and set the tone that the support staff are as integral to the successful operation of a school district as the instructional staff.

  • How will you facilitate your student teacher’s integration into the district?

    Depending on the size of your district, it may be impractical to introduce your student teacher to all of the adults working within the community. However, it can be beneficial to introduce them to some of the more prominent players (superintendent, director of personnel, director of transportation, curriculum supervisor, director of athletics, etc…). These are people that can provide them with important information about working in a school district and may also give them useful contacts as they conduct their job search. 


Integration into the larger music education community

Beyond your district music department, it is important to help your student teacher to connect with the members of the area, county, state, regional and national music educator associations. If your area or county music educator association has a regular meeting, invite your student teacher to join you. This will help them to develop additional professional relationships. It may also get them the inside track on potential future job openings. If there is not a regular meeting, introduce your student teacher to this community via email. Additionally, if there is a regional or state conference during their placement with you, encourage them to go along. If you can get the release time from your administration, make it a trip you do together.

Opportunities to observe other educators

Your student teacher will learn a great deal from observing you interact with your students. However, they can also learn a great deal from your colleagues both in the music department and outside of the music department. While the primary purpose of student teaching is for the student teacher to get time practicing the art of teaching, there will be times when you need to be in front of your students. Consider using those times to encourage your student teacher to observe other teachers. Ask yourself the following questions:

  1. Are there other music educators in your building/district/area that your student teacher would benefit from observing (they do not have to be the same specialization)?
  2. Are there any high quality examples of non-music educators that your student teacher would benefit from observing?

Coaching (not evaluating)

As a cooperating teacher, one of your functions is to evaluate your student teacher. You will have to fill out formal observation documents and write a reference letter. These requirements can sometimes put the student teacher on edge when they are in front of the students because they are afraid of how the things they are doing might impact your eventual observation. 

This is where deliberate coaching can be very beneficial. Coaching is like evaluation in that you observe the student teacher. The difference is that after the observation, you do not fill out a form, you have a conversation with the student teacher where they might share what they felt went well, and ask you to suggest how they might have done it differently. Coaching can involve a pre-conference where the student teacher asks you to focus on a particular part of the lesson (such as talk time). 



You may formally evaluate your student teacher three or four times throughout the semester, but you can coach them everyday. Coaching is a very different relationship that evaluation. In a coaching environment, your student teacher can feel open to making mistakes because they trust you are not writing an evaluation afterwards. However, in order for this to work, you have to clearly delineate when you are coaching and when you are evaluating.

Ways to support the job hunt

Part of the purpose for student teaching to prepare the student teacher to secure a position when they are done. It is likely that your student teacher will either be actively job hunting or applying for graduate programs while they are in your classroom.  There are a variety of ways that you can support them as they prepare for life after student teaching.

  • Offer to look at their resume
  • Offer to look at their ePortfolio
  • Conduct a mock interview
  • Let them know about job openings
  • Offer to hear their graduate school audition
  • Support the time they need to attend auditions/job interviews
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