Program About Clinical Teaching Training For New Teachers

Over the last six years, Israel has seen a 20% increase in the number of advanced-level physics students that complete 5-unit physics matriculation, from 7,892 students in 2011 to 9,483 students in 2016. This trend is strongly felt in the ORT-Israel school network, where 1,900 students are studying physics in 12^th grade in 2018. ORT-Israel reports that in order to provide for the expected further increase, they will need to recruit 50 additional physics teachers in the coming two years to their schools across the country, particularly in the central district.

Therefore, in consultation with the foundation, ORT-Israel has turned to Tel Aviv University, in order to design a tailor-made training program for the network’s new physics teachers. The university is proposing to use the Residency Teacher Training model as it is practiced in the USA. According to this model, the municipalities and charter networks who will eventually employ the new teachers are deeply involved in the design of the training program and the selection of the candidates. Due to Israel’s small scale, this highly effective model has a similar potential for the larger cities and the big school networks, such as ORT-Israel.

Tel Aviv University is now proposing to develop the teacher-training program in collaboration with ORT-Israel, and to determine its content together. The students in the program will be mostly hi-tech career-changers who  have chosen to become physics teachers. ORT-Israel and Tel Aviv University will jointly create a candidate classification process to select candidates for the program, and ORT-Israel will approach their partners in hi-tech to recruit potential candidates.

The university will develop four new courses, in consultation with ORT-Israel, which will integrate academic and clinical instruction, and emphasize the specific characteristics of the instructional system of ORT-Israel. The trainee teachers will attend ORT-Israel schools one day per week where they will observe expert teachers and gain teaching experience, guided by instructional coaches who teach at the school. In addition, they will receive mentoring by pedagogical coaches from the university once a week.

Upon graduation, ORT-Israel will be responsible for placing these new teachers and providing them with individual instructional coaching once a week in their schools. In addition, program graduates will participate in professional learning communities, which will meet twice a month at the university.

* The text presented above shows the grant as approved by the Foundation Board / Grant 262