FULLERTON : Cal State Teachers to Teach Teachers

Cal State Fullerton has launched Project Teach, a two-year program that gives the university’s top teachers an opportunity to share their classroom experience with their colleagues and prospective elementary school teachers.

Under the program, nine senior faculty members will spend a year analyzing their own teaching methods, studying the methods of others and then educating prospective teachers about how they do their jobs.

“One of the things we know about teaching is that teachers tend to teach as they have been taught,” said project director Carol P. Barnes, professor and chair of elementary and bilingual education. “This project is designed to see if we can have an impact on the kind of teaching prospective teachers receive at the undergraduate level.”

In the second year of the project, the nine faculty members will serve as mentors to 27 junior faculty members.

“I think we’re going to find out a lot of information about how good teaching occurs and what good teaching is and complete the circle on teaching and learning,” said Kenneth L. Goodhue-McWilliams, a professor of biology who is helping direct the project.

Project Teach is funded by a $78,194 grant from the U.S. Department of Education.