Analyzing Levels of Feedback Delivered By Cooperating Teachers and Supervisors in a Teacher Internship: A Case Study

This research analyzed the feedback delivered by cooperating teachers and university supervisors in an internship, and reports how student teachers perceived the feedback they received during debriefing sessions with their mentors. Hattie and Timperley's (2007) framework for conceptualizing effective feedback was used to analyze cooperating teachers' and field supervisor' assessment of the student teachers' classroom instruction. Findings from two surveys, documents, and interviews revealed a preponderance of feedback that was devoted to instruction and classroom management with a relative paucity of feedback dedicated to the processing of instruction, consideration of student learning, and development of self-reflection in the student teachers. Implications from this study inform the internship experience and the role systematic and focused feedback occupies in fostering the reflective practitioners' dispositions and deeper opportunities learning to teach.