Richard D. Solomon's Blog on Mentoring Jewish Students and Teachers

Our hope is that this blog will become a forum in which people can exchange ideas on how to recruit, develop and retain exceptional Jewish educators through mentoring and e-mentoring students, teaching candidates, and teachers in our day and supplemental schools. The present focus of this blog is to empower Jewish teachers, administrators, teacher trainers, consultants, and staff developers to integrate web technology (i.e. web tools and apps) into their teaching and teacher training.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

The Role of a Mentee’s Commitment to Teaching as a Variable in Mentoring Teachers

In this section of the blog we are focusing on a body of knowledge about learning to teach that a mentor needs to understand in order to provide constructive assistance to their mentees.

In this post we will discuss the work of *Carl Glickman (2002), a noted authority on supervision, who suggests that the mentor should take into account a mentee’s commitment to teaching as an important variable when assisting a mentee.

According to Glickman's analysis the mentee's commitment to teaching is reflected by these attitudinal indicators: The mentee's:

· degree of concern for students and teaching

· willingness to devote time and energy to students and the school community

· primary focus for becoming a teacher

A summary of Glickman's thinking on the levels of a mentee's commitment to teaching is reflected in the chart below.

Carl Glickman on the Levels of Mentee's Commitment to Teaching

Low Level of Commitment	Moderate Level of Commitment	High Level of Commitment
Mentee shows a low level of concern for students and teaching.	The mentee shows a moderate level of concern for students and teaching.	The mentee shows a high level of concern for students and others in the learning community
Mentee spends little time or energy on students and the learning community.	The energy of the mentee is focused periodically on the students and the learning community. This occurs when a particular student, group of students, or school program captures his or her interest.	The mentee provides extra time and energy on students and the learning community.
The primary focus of the mentee is on self, i.e. retaining his or her job.	The primary focus of the mentee changes according to situations and circumstances.	The primary focus of the mentee is on doing more for others within the school community.

* Glickman, C. D. (2002). Leadership for Learning: How to Help Teachers Succeed.Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

On the next post we will examine the role of a mentee’s ability to comprehend abstract ideas as a variable in mentoring.