Cooperating Teacher Roles and Responsibilities

The cooperating teacher mentors the teacher candidate through the field experiences. Cooperating teachers are chosen because they model effective practices, are willing to talk about their decisions, and will provide specific feedback about developing practice. Through the co-teaching model, a teacher candidate and cooperating teacher will work together to plan, organize, deliver instruction, assess student learning, and share physical space.

The cooperating teacher work with a clinical faculty member to support the teacher candidate’s learning. This will include collaborative conversations, shared feedback, and documentation of evidence of the standards of the Performance Based Pedagogy Assessment (PPA) and the Teacher Candidate Dispositions.

A cooperating teacher will fulfill the following responsibilities:

1. Locate a workspace in the classroom for the teacher candidate
2. Exchange contact information with the teacher candidate and clinical faculty
3. Direct the teacher candidate to the school calendar and invite him/her to appropriate professional days, Open Houses, parent conferences, etc.
4.  Help the teacher candidate with identification for access to staff areas, parking, ID badge, computers, and keys
5. Introduce the teacher candidate to the classes
6. Establish a regular meeting time each week and periodic shorter check-in times at least daily
7. Introduce the teacher candidate to school staff       
8. Direct the teacher candidate to staff and school policies
9. Discuss long term and daily plans, and the delegation of responsibilities through the co-teaching models
10. Review any lesson plans before they will be taught by the teacher candidate. Have a pre-conference to give feedback.
11. Provide periodic written feedback when a teacher candidate takes the teaching role. Give a copy to the teacher candidate and keep a copy. Written feedback helps teacher candidates reflect on their progress and provides a record for cooperating teachers to write a final letter of reommendation.
12. Hold post-conference meetings with teacher candidates to ask for reflections, give positive feedback, and offer suggestions for improvement.
13. Relate any questions or concerns to the clinical faculty as early as noticed or expressed.
14. Establish a schedule to phase into the full time student teaching responsibilities
15. Establish a schedule for the submission of all unit and daily plans. (Note: Even if a teacher candidate is using established curriculum, he/she is expected to document their own decisions about connections, adaptations, examples, timing, closure, etc.) A typical schedule is to submit plans by Friday morning before the next week so that there is time for revisions.
16. Complete the September Experience evaluation. 
17. Observe at least once with the clinical faculty during Autumn quarter and once during Winter quarter.
18. Complete the Teacher Candidate Disposition Form with the clinical faculty and confer about evidence of standards of the PPA.  These will typically be reviewed mid term and at the end of each quarter, but they may be used for evaluation at any time. The teacher candidate must successfully complete the Autumn field experience courses to proceed to the student teaching quarter.
19. Write a letter of recommendation to document recommendation for certification and employment. Provide a signed copy to the teacher candidate with contact information for future telephone, mail, or email references.