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Mentoring in a Swiss Secondary School

by Christine Gabor

Mentoring has been a topic at our school for several years.  Different groups of teachers have tried out different methods.  Some groups have worked with external supervisors, this is what we call supervision, others have worked within their group, supervising and mentoring each other.  We call that intervision.  Whatever the method was or is, the basic aim is to have an opportunity to talk about one’s general teaching situation and everyday problems in the classroom and to develop strategies to deal with them in a better, more positive and efficient way.

This article is about a supervision and mentoring group we started two years ago.  We were twelve teachers and we worked with an external supervisor.  (The money to pay him was provided by the government).  We met every two weeks for a year.  We discussed many different topics such as discipline problems, classroom management or self-confidence.  But for me the most interesting idea was that we formed groups who observed each other’s lessons.  Each group consisted of three people.  Preferably, each member of the group taught a different subject as our aim was not to talk about methodology but about our behaviour as teachers.

We  decided that both the observers should always come to watch the same lessons together.  
This way there were always two points of view and two opinions.  Some days before the visits we gave the visiting colleagues a specific observation task lesson?, something we were interested in knowing about, such as:  Where in the room do I stand during the lesson? What does my voice sound like?
How do I give instructions?  Do I pay attention to all my pupils? Etc.  It was important for the observers that they did not have to pay attention to everything that was happening in the classroom but only to one specific aspect.  After the lessons we exchanged our feelings, thoughts and opinions.  For me this was a very rewarding process.  I got a lot of important feedback, new ideas and help from my colleagues.  We established a feeling of mutual trust and positive team-work.  I felt accepted and supported.  I could be open and frank and admit my problems and fears as we had agreed to keep silent about everything that was said in these feedback sessions.

Last summer our school got involved in a so-called “self-evaluation project” in which we wanted to think about and improve our school and our teaching.  Within this project it would be compulsory for all teachers to form groups of three, visit each others lessons and talk about their experiences in much the same way as we did two years ago.  I am looking forward to this and I wonder how it will change the way we work together at our school.