From the beginner to the mentor

Abstract

In the Czech Republic, the common current policy does not provide support and guidance to teachers throughout their career. After graduation, they are left to the mercy of the headmaster and colleagues in the school where they start their professional life. There is no official system to help them in the start and further development of their teaching competences. In reaction to this situation, the project "From the Beginner to the Mentor" was developed and carried out at the Faculty of Humanities, Tomas Bata University in Zlin, and supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic. It is intended for teachers at various school levels, from kindergartens to secondary schools, and deals with a wide scope of issues teachers face -along the path from novice, through advanced beginner and competent, to proficient teacher. In 16 modules it provides a theoretical background and applications of topics like adaption support for the beginning teacher, project and cooperative teaching, teacher's self-regulation, team work support, preparation of the mentor, work with children with disorders, possible research at schools, strategies to improve the teacher's memory, cooperation of school with parents, or specific conditions of few-class schools, just to name some of them. Individual modules are aimed at teachers with various levels of experience. So far, several of the topics have been the content of the Faculty's life-long learning courses for teachers from the region, while the remaining are being made publicly available as e-books for those who participate in the project. The following paper reviews the modules and documents experiences from their practical application. Thus it can help teachers and managers in a similar situation to adopt or be inspired by the best practices.