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teachers ‘are central to developing student teachers’ cognitions that underlie their
professional knowledge and performance’ (Timperley, 2001 , pp. 111–112). While it
is often stated that within the practicum experience much learning ‘is accomplished
through talk’ (Strong & Baron, 2004 , p. 49), there are relatively few studies that
offer ‘detailed accounts of what that work specifically entails’ (Harris, Keogh, &
Jervis-Tracey, 2013 , p. 34). Furthermore, little research has been reported that anal-
yses these professional conversations and the tools and evidence that are used to
enable them.
Professional Conversations and Feedback
Research that has been undertaken into the conversations between mentor teachers
and preservice teachers has found that while these conversations are valued by par-
ticipants, the dialogue is variable in both quality and frequency (Soslau, 2015 ;
Timperley, 2001 ). Mentor teachers may be apprehensive about providing preservice
teachers with feedback that demonstrates concern or queries about teaching prac-
tice. A study of the simulated oral feedback given by eight mentor teachers to a
single preservice teacher on the same video-recorded lesson revealed vast differ-
ences in both style and content (Hudson, 2014 ), with significant ‘variability in both
[mentor teachers’] positive feedback and constructive criticism, and in some cases
contrasting perspectives’ (p. 71). These findings suggest that ‘universities need to
design feedback tools through research so that mentors can provide feedback in
more informed and objective ways’ (Hudson, 2014 , p. 72). When successful, these
post-observation discussions between preservice teachers, mentor teachers and uni-
versity supervisors are ‘one of the more robust tools for supporting, reinforcing and
reflecting shared ideas and beliefs ... [and] a key component of program coherence’
(Newell & Connors, 2011 , p. 229). They call for the development of structures to
guide mentoring conversations. It is important to consider that if we are to develop
purposeful practice and strengthen mutual competence by developing a way to
guide mentoring conversations, we will also require a shared understanding of how
to use tools designed to facilitate these conversations.
We contend that specific structures and tools are required to facilitate valuable
professional conversations between mentor teachers and preservice teachers. It is
through shared understandings of how to use these resources that quality conversa-
tions are enabled (Hakkarainen, Palonen, Paavola, & Lehtinen, 2004 ; Helgevold,
Naesheim-Bjorkvik, & Ostrem, 2015 ). The development of a descriptive observa-
tion model and the descriptive observation tool are examples of resources that can
assist in the structuring and implementation of these conversations and are based on
the collection and analysis of classroom evidence.
J. Kriewaldt et al.