TITLE:
Mentoring as a Tool for Development of Preservice Early Childhood Music Teachers: A Pilot Study Using the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS)
AUTHORS:
Hélène Boucher, Jennifer Y. M. Lee, Catherine Tardif
KEYWORDS:
Classroom Assessment Scoring System, Early Childhood, Mentoring, Professional Development, Music Teacher
JOURNAL NAME:
Creative Education,
Vol.15 No.11,
November
28,
2024
ABSTRACT: This article focuses on mentoring as a learning tool for the music specialist teacher in early childhood. The purpose of this pilot study was to assess the development of three early childhood preservice music teachers in a 7-week mentoring experience and to analyze the feedback provided by the mentor and its influence on the development of the mentees. Using a multiple-case study methodology, this research incorporated the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS) to observe and evaluate interactions. Results were compared with published studies on early childhood educators to assess CLASS’s potential for broader application with music specialists. Our results indicate that two of the three participants improved significantly on some of the dimensions studied. The greatest amount of feedback the mentees received concerned the Instruction Learning Format. No significant association was found between categories of feedback and improvement. Finally, when compared to published results, a significant correlation was found between music teachers in this study and early childhood educators from previous studies using the CLASS. Therefore, the tool has the potential to be used with music specialists in the future. More resources should be attributed to investigating mentoring as a useful supplement to the formal training of music teachers.