Conference Agenda

Institutions of formal education in Europe are characterised by increased cultural and linguistic diversity when it comes to the student population. Considering that such a trend is only expected to grow due to transnationalism and globalisation, teacher education programs must be continuously re-evaluated and redesigned in order to remain relevant and responsive to sociodemographic changes. More specifically, teacher education programs must be able to prepare teacher candidates to work effectively with heterogenous groups of students in ways that support the learning of all students and affirm their identities within growing neoliberal and neoconservative discourses (Alford, 2014). In Norway, classroom composition has also become more diverse, primarily due to a higher number of students of a transnational background, whether through forced or voluntary immigration (Hilt, 2017). Indeed, this and other pressing trends have been identified by the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research (2018) in a report titled Teacher Education 2015: National Strategy for Quality and Cooperation in Teacher Education that includes key areas for the improvement and development of teacher education in Norway.

This paper explores teacher candidates’ experiences of preparation for the changing nature of the teaching profession that is informed by increased student diversity. The guiding question for this paper is as follows: What are teacher candidates’ perceptions and experiences of the preparation they receive from their Norwegian teacher education programs in relation to teaching in diverse classrooms? To answer this question, this paper draws on a case study with four teacher candidates from a teacher education program at a Norwegian institution of higher education. A conceptual discussion of some of the fundamental tenets of a socially responsive teacher education program will be presented by considering Darling-Hammond’s (2006) conceptual work on teacher education. This includes two main areas: the “what” and the “how” of teacher education.

In the first area, the focus lies in knowledge on the part of (future) teachers that is tied to the improvement of the learning experiences of students. This includes knowledge about learners, how they learn in different contexts, what the curriculum constitutes of in terms of content and expectations, and what teaching skills should be prioritised to teach the content to students of diverse backgrounds, in diverse situations, and with different needs. The second area goes beyond simply the design of a teacher education program in terms of course selection and sequence. Opportunities for teacher candidates to integrate, reflect upon, and apply their knowledge continually and meaningfully in the classroom are of great consequence for how and why teacher candidates become teachers.

This paper will also present a review of the Norwegian context of (teacher) education. Subsequently, the methodological design of the study will be introduced. This paper is concluded with a discussion of the findings and their implications for teacher education programs in Norway and similar contexts.

Even though the notion of disadvantaged schools or schools in disadvantaged areas is widely used in educational research and administration, the ways in which disadvantaged schools are characterised as well as the indicators that are used to classify them as disadvantaged differ largely by theory and between education systems (McCoy, Quail & Smyth, 2014). Once a concrete notion of disadvantaged schools is established within an education system, it is possible to conceptualise remedial educational policies. In this regard, teacher education is a prominent policy area consisting of different fields of action (Hall, Lundin & Sibbmark, 2020). One of these fields is providing professional support for novice teachers through adaptive mentoring (van Ginkel et al., 2016). However, novice teachers only have inadequate access to mentor support in many education systems (OECD, 2018). The lack of structured mentoring for novice teachers seems to contribute to high attrition rates among teachers in the first five years of their careers. Supporting novice teachers who work at disadvantaged schools is especially relevant. Teachers are more often placed at disadvantaged schools at the beginning of their career (Allen, Burgess, Mayo, 2018; Long et al., 2012) and their academic teacher qualification often does not adequately prepare them for the teaching challenges at disadvantaged schools. Therefore, they can be expected to benefit even more than others from a mentoring approach that is tailored towards their needs.

In this paper, we aim to establish a basis for the design and further development of mentor training programmes aimed at supporting novice teachers to deal with challenges they face at disadvantaged schools and to facilitate their remedial efforts. To this end, we explore the multifaceted nature of disadvantage and how it is perceived by different stakeholders. To set up any pedagogical measure it is important to understand the terminology used in the specific context, especially if the context is possibly socially tabooed. In the development of a mentor training programme tailored to the specific needs of novice teachers at disadvantaged schools it makes sense to consider the perspective of different stakeholders. We hope to gain a deeper understanding of teacher professional development needs in these settings, ensuring that the specific needs of the school community are met and the various challenges faced by teachers are addressed.

Three main objectives guide our study:

First, we examine the perspective of policy makers in education by studying the terminology used to characterize disadvantaged schools and the indicators used to classify a school as "disadvantaged" in the respective education systems. Through a comparison of the indicators used in the various education systems, we show different vantage points of disadvantage and consequentially different potential approaches of how to set up pedagogical measures such as an adaptive mentoring programme.

Second, we investigate the perspectives of novice teachers who work in schools that are classified as disadvantaged and gather insight on their perception of these school contexts. This perspective allows for a better understanding of the challenges novice teachers face in disadvantaged school contexts.

Lastly, we discuss how these analyses can inform the development of pedagogical interventions such as mentoring programmes tailored to the disadvantaged school context

Social-emotional competencies are increasingly recognized as vital for children’s positive development, for their well-being, positive relationships, academic and future career success, and ability to cope with changes and related challenges (Lang et al., 2017). Consequently, Social Emotional Learning (SEL) efforts are increasingly entering classrooms (CASEL, 2013), with positive impacts increasingly noted (Jennings & Greenberg, 2009).

Similarly, social-emotional skills have been recognized to be highly important for teachers (Nias, 1996; Anastasiou, 2020), contributing to teachers’ overall professional effectiveness (Mérida-López & Extremera, 2017); wellbeing; their ability to cope with work-related stress (Fernández-Molina et al., 2019) and with classroom challenges (Poulou, Bassett & Dunham, 2018); positive teacher-student relationships (Brackett et al., 2011); and a positive and psychologically-safe classroom climate (Harvey et al., 2012). These, in turn, impact students’ emotions, behaviors, learning capabilities, academic outcomes (Lang et al., 2020) and social-emotional skill development.

Teachers can cultivate social-emotional skills in their students both informally, by establishing positive teacher-student relationships (Brackett et al., 2011), promoting a supportive classroom climate (Harvey et al., 2012), modeling emotionally intelligent behaviors, and using daily interactions and everyday classroom events as learning opportunities (Jennings & Greenberg, 2009; Morris et al., 2013), and formally, through SEL programs.

It follows that teachers, and in particular pre-service teachers, should be provided with suitable SEL training and with opportunities to practice newly-gained SEL knowledge, skills and tools in real educational settings, in order to improve learning and internalization processes.

In particular, most SEL programs to date do not take into consideration cultural diversity among students )Jagers et al., 2018). Yet the complex task of developing pedagogies and programs that support and sustain individual cultural competencies while offering access to dominant ones is fundamental to the social and emotional well-being of children and youth in the education system (Mahfouz & Anthony-Stevens, 2020). In order to implement and facilitate effective SEL programs within diverse and multicultural settings, policies and practices related to SEL school programs need to consider the backgrounds and needs of the children, families, and communities that are being served (Hayashi et al., 2022).
In the absence of culturally sensitive SEL programs in Israel and given the diversity and multi-cultural nature of Israeli society, guided SEL practice may allow students to better implement SEL in diverse cultural settings.

The current qualitative study followed education students of diverse backgrounds who participated in a semester-long SEL training program, as part of their third-year academic studies. The program was aimed at developing students’ social-emotional skills as well as their ability to integrate EI into their educational work. In line with this latter goal, the students were asked to practice their newly-acquired SEL knowledge, skills and tools as they engaged in a year-long internship program in their respective communities, in parallel with their academic studies.

Ways by which they applied their newly-acquired SEL knowledge to their work in diverse cultural backgrounds were examined.

Several Norwegian studies show that the number of youths with suicidal thoughts is increasing, and that there has been an increase of 28 percent in referrals to treatment for psychological health problems (Helsedirektoratet, 2022). To meet these challenges, dialogue and relationship building are seen as vital (Spurkeland, 2011).

The approaches and techniques used in communication are important when it comes to dialogues with vulnerable students and their families. The quality of such dialogue is to a large extent dependent on the teachers’ ability to ask questions, listen actively and to use other communication methods to build and nourish crucial relationships (Spurkeland, 2011). Indeed, it is widely accepted that relational competency an important factor that contributing to learning in school, and that communication is one of the key competencies of social and relational competency.

Teacher education in Norway consists of both lectures on campus and student teaching in primary and secondary schools. All teacher education is carried out in 5-year programs resulting in a master’s degree. Mentor teachers at schools are considered an important part of teacher education, as they provide supervision during the student teaching, and the students must pass both practice periods at schools and the exams on campus to become teachers.

Some schools have applied to become teacher training schools, which means that all the teachers at these schools become mentor teachers and supervisors for student teachers during their final student teaching practice. Regulations Relating to the Framework Plan for Primary and Lower Secondary Teacher Education for grades 1-7 and grades 5-10 require that mentor teachers have at least 15 (ECTS) credits in the field of guidance and supervision (Bjerkholt, 2017). This is a quality assurance to ensure that students receive professional supervision. Supervision- competency is referred to as professional skills in teaching, observation, methods, and analytical competency while also including certain personal prerequisites (Mathisen & Høigaard, 2021).

The University of Agder offers courses in mentoring to all mentor teachers on teacher training schools that receive student teachers. The education comprises three semesters. The second semester focuses on methods, strategies, and structures in communication. More specific: question types, body language, listening, strategies that provide progression in supervision, reflection, paraphrasing, interruption, and feedback. All education takes place in the teacher training schools, not on the university campus.

A large part of teachers’ work is communication within the school, and with parents or guardians and external collaboration partners. Despite the importance of this topic, there is little focus on this during the lectures on campus. Rather this is knowledge the students acquire during school practice. Subsequently, the teachers are dependent on learning how to interact and communicate with both children, youths, parents/- guardians and other collaborators at different schools during their teacher education. The students are, so to speak, at the mercy of each mentor teacher’s skills.

The aim of this study is to gain insight into whether education for mentor teachers in guidance and supervision can affect crucial communication with vulnerable students, their families, and other collaborators. The diversity of pupils in school will be taken into consideration with respect to which students might be considered vulnerable at any given point in time.

Our research question is: How can education in supervision and guidance theory, methods and strategies strengthen the mentor teachers’ communication skills when interacting with vulnerable students and their parents/ legal guardians?