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Care and discipline help USU student teachers survive the ordeal running a high school class By
Will Bettmann
The Sky View High School sophomores file into their honors English classroom. Almost every inch of wall space is covered with student projects, and posters that declare things like, "This is a positive thinking area," and "I don't give out the grades, YOU earn them." As the room fills, the volume rises. "Did you finish Macbeth this weekend?" "Yes." "Oops. I forgot." "I didn't understand the vocab review at the end." "We didn't have to do it." "What were you doing in that truck on Saturday night?" Who were you with?" "Ooooohh." The "bell" rings making a sound similar to the noise made in an airplane when the "please fasten your seat belt" sign is turned on or off. The teacher, Katie Butler, asks the class to sit and settle down. Although Butler does not look a lot older than some of the students, the class immediately quiets down. In fact, Butler is just a few years older than her students: she recently graduated from Utah State University's College of Education, and she recently had her last week of her "field experience" required of all would-be teachers at USU. Pat Stoddart, the director of Field Experiences for the Secondary Teacher Education (STE) program, knows that this system works. She was a student teacher herself in 1962 when she graduated from USU. She taught at Logan High School for 27 years before taking her current position six years ago. Logan native Jamie Lishman, who is currently student teaching at Mt. Crest High School, said she tries to model herself after Stoddart. "When I was taking classes with her, I would say to myself, 'I want to grow up and be like Pat Stoddart.' I had her in high school, and then again at USU. I worked so hard for her because I respected her and I knew she cared about us," said Lishman. Care and discipline seem to be the two themes touched on by almost every teacher, student and administrator involved with the STE program. JoAnna Williams, a student in Lishman's 11th grade honors English class said Lishman's care won her over. "At first I didn't like her at all," said Williams. "I thought she was a beast. She called my mom because I'd missed some classes, and I got my car taken away for a week. But she helping me bring my grade up. It's obvious that she cares." Louise Letham, who is Butler's supervising teacher at Sky View, said Butler's success has been partly due to the fact that she has not shied away from maintaining order in the classroom. She said Butler had coached the Sky View drill team last year, and that experience had served her well. "I think coaching the drill team helped her know how to handle herself in the classroom," said Letham. "Some student teachers don't have any experience dealing with discipline. They don't know how to say, 'Sit down. Get to work.' And then, of course, if you don't deal with something, it just gets worse." Butler agreed, saying, "You can't try to be their friend -- it backfires. I found that if I'm just myself, and I smile, and talk to the students like I talk to anyone else, they think I'm cool." Elise Monson, a student in one of Butler's (Letham's) classes, echoed those sentiments. "I like Miss Butler," said Monson. "Some student teachers try to be too nice -- they don't have good control of the class. Miss Butler has a good attitude. She's fun." Anthony Merrill another of Butler's students, said, "I don't even like English, but she makes it really fun. We do a lot activities." Merrill illustrated that point in class along with two peers as he acted out a scene from Macbeth, switching back and forth from a falsetto-voiced witch to a deep and manly-voiced Macbeth. Travis Wood, one of Lishman's Mountain Crest students, said he has had five student teachers in his high school career, and that Lishman is one of only two who were good teachers. "She knows what she's talking about," said Wood. "Some student teachers are scared, and then we tend to mess around more." Mary Ann Johns, another of Lishman's students, said she liked the fresh approach and energy that Lishman, and other student teachers often brought to the job. Another reason for both Lishman and Butler's success is that their supervising teachers have each had many years of experience with student teachers, and knew how to make the experience a positive one. Letham said, "I know some teachers who say, 'Oh, you're my student teacher. Here's the class. See you later,' The supervising teacher needs to lead and show how to do things." Butler said she had observed Letham's class as part of a six-week classroom observation required of STE students, and that Letham gave her responsibilities that helped her when she took over the class. "She had me stand in front of the class and read vocab grades," said Butler. "So when I started teaching, it wasn't my first time in front of those students. Also, she had me make copies so when I had my own lesson plans, I knew how to work the copying machine, which isn't easy." Behind every smooth-running class, there are often hours of unobserved labor. Lishman said she planned exhaustively before her first class. "I was so nervous," she said. "I had lesson plans that covered everything. Before I did this, I really wasn't aware of all the little details that go into teaching. There's so much paperwork, plus the individual problems -- no, challenges -- from some students, the ones who are unmotivated or don't show up. The teachers here have been a great resource. I'd ask them what they did with certain students, and that helped a lot." Letham said she has supervised student teachers for a number of years, and that she wants to know that the person she turns her students over to can effectively run the class. "Pat (Stoddart) and I are good friends, and I tell her. 'Don't send me someone if they're not good.' Because we get a lot of student teachers, at times the kids feel like guinea pigs, and sometimes they resent it or their parents do. I read somewhere that students can tell in the first seven minutes what a teacher will be like. I've gotten to where I know in my first day with a student teacher if I'll have to hover and nurture and remind and help them all the time. I haven't had to do that with Katie (Butler)," Letham said. Stoddart described student teaching as the "pivotal experience," of the three-semester STE program. "The experience is very positive for our students because that's when theory and practice come together," she said. "It's a 200-year-old tradition. Every school that offers teacher licensure does it. But it's hard work. We practically require that student teachers don't take any other classes." Butler said student teaching was more work than she expected. "Your whole life is pretty much devoted to the three or four classes you teach. I'm in bed every night at 10 p.m., just passed-out, exhausted. It's more work than when I had a 19-credit semester. But it's more fun," she said. As school districts across the country struggle to find and retain qualified teachers, programs such as USU's STE take on added importance. When USU President Kermit Hall addressed the Utah State Legislature in January, he spoke about the importance of teachers to Utah's future. "It will be no surprise to anyone in this room that Utah's schools are in critical need of teachers, particularly in math and science," said Hall. "In order to meet current and future demand, we need an expanded staff. Our College of Education, due to limited staff and resources, is forced to turn away more than 400 students each year. Surely we can do better." Stoddart said that close to 100 students graduate from the STE program each semester, with majors from 24 academic departments on campus. Blake Pickett, vice principal of Sky View, said the high school has hired three or four student teachers as permanent teachers in the last few years. "It's good for us because we know what we're getting," said Pickett. "We've had weeks and weeks to see what they're like as opposed to one sit-down interview." Butler is planning to return to her native Los Angeles to work at Placerita Junior High School, from which she graduated. She said when she started teaching she imagined that she would work at an inner-city school with a lot of difficult students, but that she doesn't feel ready as a teacher to take on a challenge like that. Lishman doesn't know where she'll teach next year. She said she doesn't necessarily want to stay in Cache Valley, and that she's applied a number of schools, most of them in Utah. More information about USU's STE program is available at www.coe.usu.edu/seced.
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