Ain't Nothin' Like the Real Thing: Preparing Teachers in an Urban Environment

In her first journal reflection, Stephanie, a preservice teacher, described her initial impression of the urban institute in which she was working. She wrote "To be totally equitable my first impression was that I have not at any time seen so many black nation in my entire life!" While this annotate may be surprising and jarring, Stephanie was being upfront about what many of my pupils were feeling in their first days of the Urban Semester Program at Ball State University.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics (2000) almost 40 percent of the total U public institute population is made up of learners of color; in many metropolitan seminary districts, that number exceeds 80 percent However, as the demographics of place of educations in the United States are changing, the population of preservice teachers remains plenteous the same. As Roman (1999b) states:

The scholar body in the United States is becoming more diverse than at any time while the teaching population is becoming les thus Teachers of European American background have had actual little experience with bicultural pupils and they may in fact harbor negative or stereotypical ideas about them. Further, many teacher education programs have a poor record of educating teachers for diversity. (p 97)

With a growing number of African American learners as well as those from other agricultures who will teach the children in large urban schools? greatest in quantity likely, it will be young, white, females who are novel out of college, with little experience and with little knowledge about those children's tillages

Colleges and universities are neared with the problem of preparing teachers for diverse classrooms upon a daily basis. As educators, we realize the importance of teaching preservice teachers about diversity. We tender courses in multicultural training, we teach about black history, and we flat teach students about using appropriate classroom materials that are not biased or prejudiced. However, the majority of this education is proffered in small parts and isolated courses. According to Abdal-Haqq (1998):

Isolated courses in multicultural education are unlikely to equip teachers for of the like kind work [work with diverse populations]. Many of the like kind courses appear to take the "music appreciation" approach to diversity. They encourage acceptance, tolerance, and even think highly of for diversity, but they do not necessarily affirm it. (p 68)

The lack of preparation for teaching in urban settings is single problem. In addition, research indicates that many of recent origin teachers in urban schools will leave within their first years of teaching. Since "as many as 50% of beginning teachers [are] leaving urban seminarys within the first five years" (Allen, 2003 p vii), bodys and universities must prepare preservice teachers to work with scholars of various races and agricultures Teaching future educators to survive in a variety of settings is a lock opener factor in their success or failure as urban educators. According to Watzke (2003):

"Survival" has been characterized by means of many researchers as an initial stage in teacher unfolding marked by stress and issues of classroom management, an obstacle that must be rout in order to advance in teaching practice. Veenman (1984) described this stage as single of reality shock-new teachers must adapt to the realities of classroom teaching from which they have been sheltered from one side traditional teacher education programs. (p 223)

At Ball State University, we wanted to make this "reality shock" les rigid for our preservice teachers, and better prepare them for the children they would someday teach. We knew that something had to be done to place preservice teachers in an alternate environment where diversity training occurr upon a daily basis. Thus, the Urban Semester Program at Ball State University began.

The Urban Semester Program

The Urban Semester Program is an immersion program for junior horizontal students. In this immersion experience, participants take a semester of classes while spending all day, five days a week, working in individual of two elementary schools in the Indianapolis Public gymnasiums System. The populations of the sum of two units elementary schools are largely poor (96 percent and 94 percent at liberty and reduced meal eligibility) and largely African American (89 percent and 88 percent) in sharp contrast to the university population of preservice teachers, who are for the greatest part European American (95 percent). The Indianapolis place of education system was chosen for this collaborative throw out because it represented a actual urban setting, had a diverse population of learners and was located only an hour from the Ball State campus. The goals of this partnership were to debunk the myths about teaching in an urban location while also promoting positive attitudes about teaching in like a setting. The ultimate goal was to recruit pupils for job openings in the urban environment by dint of preparing them through field placements in diverse surroundings.

By working side through side with experienced urban teachers, the guild students learn about real-life issues teachers face while completing processs classes. The students are able to apply what they have learned with the children in the classrooms while obtaining immediate feedback about their task plans. The classes the preservice teachers out and out in the Urban Semester include Math manners Science Methods, Social Studies rules Introduction to Special Education, and Classroom Management. community students attend all of these classes in their elementary buildings, and the professors travel from campus to teach and supervise field experiences. When they are not in guild classes, the students participate in each aspect of teaching while assigned to single elementary classroom. They teach exercise s create teaching materials, attend teacher inservice sessions, and learn to manage the classroom upon their own. Most important, they learn about children in urban settings and in what manner to become more empowered in reaching and teaching them upon a daily basis. Opportunities to exhibit relationships with families are another focus of the semester Preservice teachers participate in parentteacher conversations and extracurricular and community incidents where, for the first time, they have the opportunity to dialogue with children's families and members of the urban community.