A Promising Practicum Pilot - Exploring Associate Teachers' Access and Interactions with a Web-based Learning Tool

Abstract

This paper explores how a small group of associate teachers (i.e., the classroom teachers who host, supervise, and mentor teacher candidates during practicum placements) accessed and interacted with the Associate Teacher Learning Tool (ATLT), a web-based learning tool created specifically for this new group of users. The ATLT is grounded in web-based learning and discipline-specific research and conceptualized within a framework of reflective practice and constructivist learning theory. The ATLT was created specifically for associate teachers, as an affordable and flexible alternative method of providing support for these critical community members who partner with the Faculty of Education at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT), a university in the Greater Toronto Area in Ontario, Canada. Through analysis of associate teachers’ usage patterns and emerging themes via the ATLT’s internal tracking system, the findings of this work revealed that although associate teachers accessed and interacted with the ATLT in diverse ways, several commonalities emerged. The findings of this exploratory work suggest that continued and expanded implementation and research of using a web-based form of learning that is grounded within a body of research, is warranted.