Can Cooperation Be Part of the Culture of Teaching?

Each year, the Association of Childhood Education International (ACEI) publishes an Annual Theme Issue of Childhood Education. The theme for 2004, “The Culture of Teaching” outlines the many facets of teaching in the current cultural, social, and political environment, especially those concerned with pre-service and novice teacher education. In their introductory remarks, the co-editors, Lauren Ventimiglia and Thomas Reed, comment on the critical need to “train future educators in a highly supportive and facilitative environment.” 

In recognizing the economic and geographic diversities in the field of education, which can often be compounded by high-stakes testing and standards, the authors offer a solution, “The collaboration of educators can bridge the gap between teacher education, novice teachers, mentors, administrators, and educational frameworks.” Throughout the journal, readers are reminded of the numerous ways in which collaboration and cooperative learning make education a process of high- quality learning and teaching. Following are a few examples.

In the article “Excellence in Teacher Education,” Laura McDonald Hooks and Linda Randolph give details of a teacher training program that involves Professional Development Schools (PDS). Conceptually, a PDS is a functioning school which has among its main goals the development of pre-service, novice and practicing teachers. The authors identify three factors that are necessary for a PDS to become effective—successful communication, equitable roles for all participants, and mutually agreed-upon goals.

A well documented example of school-university collaboration can be seen in “Authentic Learning: Intercultural, International, and Intergenerational Experiences in Elementary Classrooms” by Tata Mbugua, Jean Wadas, Mary Ann Casey, and Jessica Finnerty. Their brief description of the challenges faced during the planning and implementation of the collaboration will resonate among many readers—time constraints, scheduling and travel logistics, technological breakdowns, and the stress on lead people.

“The Culture of Teaching and Mentoring for Compliance” by Paula Weaver, analyzes the ramifications of undue emphasis on compliance with the mandates of testing and standards in classrooms in the United States, “As the high-stakes paradigm becomes a focus for teaching content as opposed to teaching children, the culture of teaching will be drastically affected.” Consequently, the author sees a harmful pattern of teachers resorting to providing limited educational possibilities for their students, tracking and making ill-advised placements, and failing to set conditions for cooperative learning and collaborative problem solving.