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Lessons · Teaching · the mentor a first-year teacher is assigned

The mentor: the person in the building whose job is you

A first-year teacher in a Texas district is assigned a mentor teacher from the same campus or field, for the first year, with scheduled meeting time; this is a district duty and it is separate from the field supervisor, who comes from your preparation programme.

Hone is a place to practise a career, one idea a day. This is one of its lessons, written out in full and free to read without an account.

What it is for

A first-year teacher spent October assuming that the person from her university and the experienced teacher down the hall were the same support, and asked neither of them about a parent she could not reach. The field supervisor judges her preparation. The other one knows which parent that is, which office to ring, and where the photocopier codes live. Two people, two kinds of question.

How to think about it

Write the two names down on day one and label them. Take practical, local, urgent questions to the mentor. Take anything that touches your file to the field supervisor. If nobody has been named to you by the second week, ask the campus, because the assignment is the district's duty and not a favour somebody is doing you.

Worked example

Two names written down on day one, each with a label beside it
The single habit that stops six months of asking the wrong person.
Local and urgent: this parent, this pupil, this form, this deadline
Knowledge no preparation programme can supply, because it is about this building.
Anything touching my file: the observations, the recommendation, the certificate
That is the supervisor's side of the line.
Nobody named by week two, so I ask the campus rather than wait
An assignment that is owed to you is not a favour to request quietly.

Your turn

Name who is responsible for assigning a first-year teacher's mentor.

The mentor is assigned by the ; the field supervisor comes from the programme

The trap

Waiting to be given a mentor before using one. If the formal assignment is slow, the experienced teacher next door is still the fastest answer to most first-year questions, and asking early is not an admission of anything.

Practise the mentor a first-year teacher is assigned on HoneA question on it now, a real problem where there is one, and it is remembered for review. Free, no email needed.