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school or decisions about future jobs but work with the Research
Group as well as students
written work suggests that
this dimension
may
productively harnessed throughout the year.
Tutors and
students were shown attempting to work with personal responses but
it was suggested that other priorities and indeed other modes of
working tended to pull away. Sheer time and the acceptance of fixed
quantities and organisation of
teaching practice are
obstacles
and the research showed how the rhyth
Il
of the year cut across the
possibility of smooth progression. Achieving a reflective stance,
working with awareness of one’s changes and directions often seemed
to be achieved in spite of rather than because of the year’s accommo-
dations. Time and organisation are not the only constraining feat-
ures though, for just as staff might find it difficult to respond
to the student’s personal dilemmas or sheer lack of experience so
there is little formal support in the theory and practice of teacher
education which sets a value on the necessity of such work.
Stones
1984 recent work is important in this
regard for in focussing
upon the need for change in the practices of supervision he points
to an area of work in teacher education which is generally seen as
important.
However
its
ications
go much further than
this to
the personal and social contexts within which supervision occurs.
His account of his practices makes it quite clear that for students
to change their views and their performances of teaching, their own
past personal and educational experience must be confronted. What
he fails to explore is the significance of this for the structures
within the training institution and their relationship with the
schools .