How to Use the Book and Website

A Field Guide to Student Teaching in Music, 2nd Edition is designed to guide the student teaching experience. The text is designed to promote thoughtful discussion by addressing the primary issues with which music student teachers often struggle. It is intended to “bridge the gap” between pre-service course work and the practical experiences encountered during the music student teaching process. To encourage active involvement, this text is two-fold and consists of a textbook and accompanying online materials. The text is not meant to be used in the traditional "chapter-by-chapter" order. You are encouraged to used chapters and materials in the order that makes the most sense to you.

The primary purpose of A Field Guide to Student Teaching in Music is to provide music student teachers an opportunity to reflect on the student teaching experience and to gain insight into the multiple skills needed for successful, career-long teaching. Each chapter focuses on a specific topic, and each topic stands alone, allowing specific issues and concepts to be discussed as they becomes relevant to the student teaching experience. Within each chapter there are several activities to encourage reflective thought and the sharing of experiences. The activities include the following:

• Scenarios – The scenarios provide examples of situations students may find themselves dealing with during their student teaching experience. The scenarios often provide typical though somewhat perplexing situations that will require student teachers to determine the best possible outcomes to remedy the presented problems. The scenarios could be discussed as a group or given as a reflective assignment.
• Discussions – The discussions consider particular questions and issues which questions may be addressed individually as students read the text, or may be a point of large group discussion in the student teaching seminar.
• Discussion with Cooperating Teacher – These are issue-specific prompts that provide a starting point for initiating conversations between the student teacher and the cooperating teacher.

In addition, the website offers the following content:

• Worksheets – This text has multiple worksheets that are available on this website. These worksheets will guide observations, class discussion, and conversations between student and cooperating teacher, and provide activities relevant to student teaching. Worksheets are specific to topics within each of the chapters.
• Video Discussions - The video discussion are interviews with a variety of educators about a wide range of topics student teachers may encounter during their student teaching. These videos could be used as a reflective assignment or in a student teacher seminar group discussion.
• Resumes & ePortfolios - This tab offers two example student teacher ePortfolios as well as some additional resources for creating effective resumes.