Doctoral Students as Co-Teachers in Graduate Courses: An Application of Apprenticeships
in Graduate Education
Katherine McKee, Agricultural & Extension Education, Chloe Ruff, Educational Psychology, Dr. Terry Wildman, Educational Psychology
Virginia Tech
Abstract
Doctoral students have the opportunity to perform some faculty roles in the course of their studies, a practice that is considered essential to the
development of an identity trajectory that leads to seeing oneself as future faculty. As situated learning theories posit that learners who work with
experts and novices in communities of practice are able to develop identities relative to the practice, doctoral student should be given the
opportunity to work with faculty in the development and delivery of graduate level courses. Following the communities of practice model, the
faculty serve as masters or experts, the doctoral student serve as journeymen or near peers, and the other graduate students serve as legitimate
peripheral participants or novices. This is a discussion about the impacts this can have on doctoral students’ professional identity formation.
Literature Review
Reflections on Co-teaching
Doctoral Students:
Doctoral students:
• Now I know how an experienced faculty
•Fear that they are not prepared for the
variety of faculty roles
•May not understand the demands of a
faculty career
member thinks about planning and
teaching a graduate course.
• Developing a course activity and having it
go well made me more confident that I can
be a professor in a year.
• I feel that I’ve had a chance – for the first
time in three years – to sit back and
observe how teaching occurs, as well as
participate in it.
• I love knowing the thoughts that go
behind developing the course and can
reflect on that when I’m designing courses
in the future.
(Austin & McDaniels, 2004; Austin & Wulff, 2004)
(Austin, 2002; Sweitzer, 2009)
Apprenticeships:
•Transfer complex and interrelated
knowledge
•Situate learning in a social practice
(Lave, 1977; Lave & Wenger, 1991)
(Lave, 1977; Lave &
Wenger, 1991)
•Provide access to the tools and language of
a profession
•Address natural ways to learn
(Lave, 1977; Lave & Wenger, 1991)
(Lave & Wenger, 1991; Bruner,
1996)
•Provide access to a community of practice
(Lave & Wenger, 1991)
Important Considerations
• Co-teaching arrangements should be
voluntary.
• Co-teaching should never be considered
as a way to off-load the faculty member’s
responsibilities.
• Students participating in a co-taught class
should be informed of the arrangement
and given assurance that the faculty
member retains responsibility for the
class and for final assessment of student
work.
References
Practices to Continue
• Weekly meetings of collaborating teachers.
Faculty Member:
•It is very gratifying to see students who are
committed to further learning in the target
area, and who are willing to take on a
significant time commitment to take on the
co-instructional role.
• Graduate students providing non-evaluative feedback on
student work.
• Collaboration begins with course planning and carries through•Because advanced courses are often
to a reflection on the quality of the course.
discussion based (in my case always so) it is
• Graduate student participates in selecting readings and
very helpful to have another set of
developing activities.
informed ears, the opportunities to share in
• Graduate student helps to provide support to peers outside ofdiscussion leadership, and the ability to
class time.
share impressions about how the group
• Collaborating graduate student’s participation is NOT graded. and particular individuals are progressing.
• The structure of the experience is flexible and changes with
each partnership.
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Austin, A.E., & McDaniels, M. (2006). Using doctoral education to prepare faculty to work within Boyer’s four domains of scholarship. New Directions for Institutional Research, 129.
Austin, A.E., & Wulff, D.H. (2004). The challenge to prepare the next generation of faculty. In D. Wulff & A. Austin (Eds.), Paths to the professoriate: Strategies for enriching the preparation of
future faculty. San-Franciso, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Bell, R.L., Blair, L.M., Crawford, B.A., & Lederman, L.G. (2003). Just do it? Impact of a science apprenticeship program on high school students’ understandings of the nature of science and
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Bruner, J. (1996). The culture of education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
3rd Annual Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy
Lave, J. (1977). Cognitive consequences of traditional apprenticeship training in west Africa. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 8, 3, 177-180.
Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
Sweitzer, V. (2009). Towards a theory of doctoral student professional identity development: A developmental networks approach. The Journal of Higher Education, 80(1).
Tusting, K. (2005). Language and power in communities of practice. In D. Barton & K. Tusting (Eds.), Beyond communities of practice: Language power, and social context (pp. 36-54).
Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.