Enrich Practicum to Cultivate Effective Teachers

To advance systems of teacher education, curriculums must be enhanced with relevant activities aligned with practicum experiences to enhance the value of their education. Acting as a bridge to connect knowledge learned at the university and practical teacher applications in schools throughout the community, a research project involving several constructive activities was embedded within four literacy courses during the last two years of teacher candidates’ undergraduate education. Results of this investigation demonstrate positive effects of infusing practicum experiences with systematic series of components towards becoming effective classroom teachers as well as lifelong learners and researchers.


Introduction
Curriculums for teacher candidates should focus on preparing effective teacher educators by meeting their needs, even though other agendas often guide their development. In the state of Georgia, U.S., all teacher candidates seeking certificates are required to complete 300 hours of practicum plus 600 hours of student teaching throughout four semesters. The three practica cover Practicum I (PreK-1), Practicum II (Grades 2 nd -3 rd ), and Practicum III (Grades 4 th -5 th ). Practica assignments for teacher candidates include observing their students, planning appropriate lessons, and implementing their lesson plans under the supervision of university professors, mentor teachers, and peers (Practicum Handbook, College of Education, Valdosta State University, 2009). Instead of continuing to use prescribed curriculums as is, the author designed the following case-study projects within the four literacy education courses to enrich students' practicum experience by cultivating teacher candidates' passion for teaching (Darling-Hammond, 2012). These projects are designed to expand teacher candidates' professional knowledge and skills and guide them as they develop into lifelong learners and researchers.

Differentiated Instruction in Reading and Writing
Differentiating instructional methods appropriately for all students (Chapman & King, 2003;Walpole & McKenna, 2007;Wong & Wong, 2009) is a challenge within diverse communities with varying needs. Diversity encompasses physical, social, emotional, and cognitive elements (Au, 2006), and teachers must take all of these constructs into consideration when planning and implementing differentiated instructional strategies for reading and writing. During their practicum experience, teacher candidates familiarize themselves with their students' strengths and areas for improvement in reading and writing. They use the knowledge they glean to create a classroom climate conducive to learning and plan lessons that are focused on improving their students' literacy skills. Teacher candidates are also assigned one student from the practicum classroom that performs below grade level in reading and writing to work with individually to practically apply their knowledge. Teacher candidates use the website www.internet4classrooms.com/di.htm among others to determine the student's proficiencies in terms of multiple intelligences. The teacher candidate uses the information to make relevant observations and instructional decisions linked to the student's reading and writing behavior. Interviewing the student about his/her feelings towards reading and writing gives the teacher candidate insight about instructional methods to which the student is most responsive. After gathering and analyzing data related to the student's unique learning style, the teacher candidate creates individualized instructional strategies to improve the student's reading and writing (see Appendix 1).

Graphic Novels
Teacher candidates are encouraged to use graphic novels to help improve their students' writing skills. The exercise is designed for students who have an existing weakness in writing and need to make improvements. The author and teacher candidates instruct early grades students to use depictions/drawings as a prewriting exercise instead of traditional writing. By simplifying the prewriting stage of the writing process, struggling students can express their ideas through a means often viewed as less difficult than writing. As students organize their story line into a coherent panel of pictures (the graphic novel), they are creating a personal graphic organizer to use when they begin writing their stories. Children are invited to use six to eight panels of drawing (Bitz, 2004;Cornett, 2007;Gray, 2006;Short, Kauffman, & Kahn, 2000;Siegel, 2006) to create a sequence of events that occur in their stories (Cramer, 2001). Students also use invented spellings (Gentry, 1987(Gentry, , 2000Laminack & Wood, 1996) to write one sentence below each panel of drawing to transition into standard writing. This bridge from early stages of writing to a more structured, formal approach is necessary to lessen anxiety and increase success of early writers.

Read-Aloud and Think Aloud
Since reading comprehension is based on a series of reasoning processes (Goodman, Watson, & Burke, 2005;Neilsen, 1989;Thorndike, 1977), each teacher candidate is given ample practical experiences with which to begin developing elementary learners' abilities. Each teacher candidate is assigned to tutor one student. The teacher candidate begins by modeling the processes of a read-aloud (Hickman & Pollard-Durodola, 2009) and a think-aloud (Frey, Brozo, Frey, & Ivey, 2006;Oczkus, 2009). Once these strategies have been modeled and the elementary learner becomes familiar with the processes, the teacher candidate invites the student to participate in the read-aloud and think-aloud activities. The student participates in the think-aloud portion of the activity by explaining how he/she used various comprehension strategies throughout the read-aloud. Research-based comprehension strategies of focus include predicting, think aloud, summarization, visual representations of text, text structure, and questions/questioning (Duke & Pearson, 2002). The teacher candidate checks the list of strategies (see Appendix 2) and analyzes the student's thinking processes in three stages: before reading, during reading, and after reading. Afterwards, additional strategies are offered to activate and guide student's thinking before reading, during reading, and after reading, maintaining pedagogical coherence and continuity (Elliot, 2012).

Multicultural Education and Culturally Responsive Pedagogies
In an effort to become familiarized with the learner, teacher candidates select a cultural group related to their one tutee and research the components of the culture: the people, the languages, and the learning behaviors. They use the information to design a lesson plan that addresses the unique needs of the cultural group they researched. This activity helps the teacher candidates develop their cultural awareness and improve their ability to effectively educate students from linguistically, culturally, and ethnically diverse backgrounds. This project was designed to combat xenophobia, the fear or hatred toward people who are strangers or appear to be foreigners at first glance, that was informally observed in a small number teacher candidates.

Culturally Responsive Instruction
Teacher candidates should also be aware of the impacts social, cultural, linguistic factors have on literacy education (Au, 2006;Goldberg, 2001;Opitz, 1998) within diverse rural and urban settings. The author designed an activity that allows each teacher candidate to interview a student from an ethnic background other than his/her own. The interview is used to find out how the student's attitude towards education is influenced by his/her cultural background. A student's cultural influence will also affect his/her beliefs about education and learning styles. The interview is an effective method of gathering important data about the student while building a relationship with the student. The teacher candidate uses the information gathered in the interview to create individualized lesson plans that will improve the student's proficiency in reading, writing, listening, and speaking.

Multicultural Literature
Literature is one of the powerful tools used for combating the ignorance that breeds xenophobia. Students of all ages benefit from reading about other cultures and learning about the people of those cultures. The author designed a research-based project to minimize xenophobia, foster cultural awareness, and expose teacher candidates to the literary traditions of different world cultures and cultural groups represented in the United States. Teacher candidates were required to survey multicultural and international books written and illustrated by the native speakers (Ariza, 2006;Au, 2006;Tunnell & Jacob, 2007) for cultural authenticity in literary groups. They had the opportunity to gain insight about the writing style of the author and gather information about the culture from the literature; it was intended to educate teacher candidates about other cultures and in turn, increase their ability to effectively teach students of diverse backgrounds.

Principles for ELLs
Although current curriculums are heavily skills-based, meaningful literacy strategies from the 1990s can be interwoven into today's classrooms. Since the beginning of the 21 st century, the population of students from culturally diverse backgrounds has steadily increased. Meanwhile, the number of certified teachers specializing in teaching English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) is insufficient, and the emerging needs of these students are not being met. The author encourages teacher candidates with foreign language experience to consider obtaining ESOL or bilingual teaching certification. Teacher candidates may use approved strategies from the Whole Language Principles (Freeman & Freeman, 2004) (see Appendix 3) to teach students from various cultural backgrounds to help develop their social and academic skills. Teaching these strategies can contribute to teacher candidates' foreign language proficiency and cultural awareness as well as promote positive academic performance from ESOL students.

Tutoring and Literacy Assessment
Teacher candidates are required to work with one student who struggles with reading comprehension and fluency for 20 hours throughout the semester, using an intervention program (similar in some ways to Clay's Reading Recovery, 1985) that includes diagnosis International Journal of Education ISSN 1948-5476 2013 and improvement; further, they design individualized lesson plans built on student's interests and motivations as well. This program gives teacher candidates experience using a host of formal and informal assessment techniques to assess students' proficiencies and progress monitor improvements (Cooper & Kiger, 2005). Teacher candidates learn to use data collected from the assessments to plan effective lessons for the tutees.
Teacher candidates are encouraged to use ideas from additional resources when designing lesson plans for their assigned student. The website www.readwritethink.org was created by the professionals from The International Reading Association (IRA) and National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and offers free lesson plans, state standards, and network resources.

Interview and Observe the Mentor Teacher
Mentor teachers are experienced teachers committed to modeling appropriate practice for the teacher candidates assigned to them. They aim to prepare quality teachers by enriching the teacher candidate's experience in the practicum classroom. The author requires each teacher candidate to observe and interview his/her teacher using a specific check list (see Appendix 4) based on characteristics of highly effective reading teachers outlined by Reutzel and Cooter (2008). Teacher candidates learn to use their observations along with the insight they gain from the interviews to gradually shape their educational philosophies throughout their various practicum experiences. Their educational philosophies-value, ethics, and passion for teaching, and reflections on the design of curriculum-should similarly reflect characteristics of highly effective teachers if they are to become successful classroom teachers.

Article Review
The author assigns each teacher candidate an article from newly released professional journals like The Reading Teacher (IRA), Language Arts (NCTE), and Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy (IRA) to read and critique. Teacher candidates present their articles and critiques to the class. This assignment updates teacher candidates' knowledge in current issues and trends in literacy education. Reading relevant research-based articles expands teacher candidates' instructional knowledge base and their ability to enact these strategies into practice, and even conduct research of their own in the future (see Appendix 5).

Professional Conference and Workshops
The teacher candidates are offered opportunities to attend school-, county-, state-, and national conferences held by leading research organizations, such as the International Reading Association, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, National Council of Teacher of Science, and National Council of Teachers of English. Conferences and workshops are offered throughout the year and are designed to further professional development. Teacher candidates are encouraged to join at least one research organization and stay updated on the conferences and workshops they offer. ISSN 1948-5476 2013

Conclusion
The assignments described in this article create opportunities for teacher candidates to incorporate constructive research data and innovation into their lesson plans. Teacher candidates have the opportunity to learn from one another when they present their lesson plans during class time and when they complete peer evaluations of lessons taught in the practicum classroom. Mentor teachers consistently give positive evaluations of teacher candidates and affirmative feedback for the program. These assignments give them an opportunity to update their own lessons with new techniques from the teacher candidates and make additions to their methods of planning and assessment. University professors are required to supervise teacher candidates' instruction during practicum, which gives them the opportunity to spend time in the field and gain authentic experience of "critical literacy" (Powell & Davison, 2005).

Recommendations
Staying abreast of current research in teacher education is critical not only for pedagogical quality but also reflective inquiry. Moving forward is adjusting what one has done in the past with new directions and ideas; thus, careful reflection is necessary for meaningful change to occur. Teachers must continually adjust their instruction as well as their means of professional development to maintain their own interest in advances in the profession. To be teachers is to be learners first. The nexus between teaching and learning is reciprocal, and teachers must observe the learning experiences that their students offer. These principles developed in teacher education programs become instilled within teacher candidates so they begin their worthy careers prepared for today and with the knowledge and skill set for success in the future.

SUBJECT
You have to work with one struggling learner (Grades 1-5) to complete this assignment.
If you are a Classroom Teacher, you will pick up one struggling learner in your class, Or you will request your mentor teacher to refer you a struggling learner if you are a Teacher Candidate. INTRODUCTION (1 point) You will introduce the child (to protect the child's privacy, use Adam for a boy, and Eve for a girl) about his/her age, interest, favorite books, favorite movies, favorite food, favorite sports, life goals, family background, etc. Please survey www.internet4classrooms.com/di-htm to find out the leaner's strength in terms of multiple intelligences.

PROCEDURES
(You may use the handout as a guideline for your observation, the child's feeling & your prescription)

Reading (4 points)
Observation (1 point): You will invite the child to read a book which is 1 or 2 levels above his/her current reading level. You will write your observation describing his/her reading behavior.
Interview (1 point): You will invite the child to share with you his/her feeling about reading.
Your Prescription (2 points): You will offer your prescription to help the child improve his/her reading

Writing (5 points)
Observation (2 points): You will Invite the child to write for 10 minutes with the topic like a family story, feeling, or anything he/she is interested in (you have to include his/her writing sample -type it).You will write your observation describing his/her writing behavior.
Interview (1 point): You will invite the child to share with you his/her feeling about writing.
Your Description (2 points): You will offer your prescription to help the child improve his/her writing.

Graphic Novel (5 points)
You may invite the same child to tell you a family story or his/her feeling by drawing 6-8 panels of graphic novel (comic strips) and writing one sentence below each panel.
*The observation, learner's feeling and your prescription should be aligned with one another.
Format for Differentiated Strategies for Reading in the Content Areas (Chapman & King, 2003) International Journal of Education ISSN 1948-5476 2013

Feelings of the Reader Suggested Prescription
Reads very little Reads a few words on grade level Exhibits poor comprehension skills Does not like to read Struggles with word attach skills His limited language ability I feel lost when I read I will never learn to read, so I will be in this grade the rest of my life I cannot read this assignment I am embarrassed to read, so please do not call on me This is boring and frustrating I will misbehave, so I will not read  ISSN 1948-5476 2013  Post-Reading Discussion "What pictures did you create in your mind as you read?" "Were there any confusing passages?" "How did you handle them?" ………………………………………………. Post-reading discussing strategies help students respond to clarify their use of strategies & learn how others process text.

International Journal of Education
Appendix 3. Language Principles by Freeman and Freeman (1994)