School-Based Mentoring for Professional Development of Inclusive School Teachers

• Authors: Ženija Bērziņa
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Because of the importance and the complexity of inclusive education, the implementing of a new teaching method in fifteen schools of four regions of Latvia was integrated with school-based teacher mentoring in a two-year project. A new method of teaching basic concepts for children with learning disabilities was a crucial part of in-service teacher training mentoring programme. This paper illuminates mentors' and teachers-mentees' perceptions on the impact of mentoring on their teaching at the primary school level. Data collected by the means of self-evaluation includes teachers' and their mentors' views on the role of mentoring and teachers' collaboration in teachers' professional development and inclusion of children with special needs. The results of the study show that mentoring and collaboration are pre-conditions for successful teachers' professional development, which creates, in its turn, a favourable basis for enhancement of inclusive education programmes.

Keywords

EN

mentoring; professional development; inclusive education

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Journal of Teacher Education for Sustainability
• Year: 2011
• Volume: 13
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 72-83

Dates

published

2011-01-01

online

2011-07-12

Contributors

author

Ženija Bērziņa

• Daugavpils University, Latvia

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Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/v10099-011-0006-0