Student teaching internships go virtual

By Maddie Garvis//

Hood education majors are coping with changes in their student teaching internships this semester, as Frederick County Public Schools have switched to virtual learning. 

Paula Gordon, Hood’s professional development schools director and liaison, who works with administrators and teachers in FCPS to place students with teachers who will be their mentors, said this semester Hood students are working with their mentors to deliver instruction to students virtually instead of face-to-face. 

“The administrators and mentors hosting our interns have been so welcoming and supportive,” Gordon said. “Teaching is about flexibility and we are all learning how to be flexible in this virtual world of teaching.”

Each semester, education majors at Hood are required to spend half a day per week in a FCPS classroom with their mentor throughout their sophomore and junior years. 

In their senior year, students must complete 100 days of field experience in a classroom over the course of two semesters. 

Gordon said that this semester, there are 14 secondary education students and 23 early childhood and elementary/special education students in teaching internship positions. 

There also are 20 early childhood and elementary/special education students and 12 secondary education students completing the first semester of their 100-day internship.  

Danielle Casey, a junior double major in elementary and special education, is completing her internship this semester with a fifth-grade class from Monocacy Elementary via the video meeting service Google Meet. 

“It is a different dynamic, but it’s going well,” Casey said. “I’m impressed how well the students are able to navigate their online assignments.” 

Gordon said that so far, most of the education students seem to be doing well with the change. 

“The interns seem to be doing great,” Gordon said, “They are, of course, disappointed they are not able to meet their students face to face, but they are learning so much from their mentors about how to teach and how to forge relationships with their students no matter what the forum.”