A new class of teachers

It’s a hard business. Intellectually demanding, physically exacting, and emotionally full-on.

That’s what a new generation of student teachers at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education has discovered after full immersion in the first phase of their training in the Master of Teaching course.

From the start, these students test the theory of university lectures against the experience of being in front of a school class two days a week. It’s not dissimilar to the way trainee doctors or nurses test their skills in teaching hospitals, hence the term “clinical practice” – the requirement that teachers assess and diagnose the individual learning needs of students.

“The whole experience has underlined for me just how hard teaching can be,” says one of the student teachers, Tara Crivari.