Listening and Learning

AUTHOR: MAX SMITH, Region 10 Digital Marketing Specialist

COLLABORATE and listen. If one had to sum up what the duties of a mentor teacher are, those two words would be a good place to start. Few mentor teachers have done this better than Braiden Foster, who has been a source of support for first-year teacher Nicole Lotts at Mt. Peak Elementary in Midlothian ISD.

Foster, who is in her fourth year of teaching fifth grade, took on the role of being a mentor teacher at the suggestion of Principal Adam Henke.

“We were scoring my campus involvement during my summative review at the end of last year. I don’t remember my score, but Principal Henke said, ‘I think you can get something higher than that. I really want to see you take on some more leadership roles. How do you feel about maybe taking on a mentor position next year?’” Foster recalled, “I was like, ‘Sign me up! That sounds great!’ I was excited to be offered the position.”

When new teachers were matched with mentors at New Teacher Orientation, Foster was excited to be assigned to Lotts since they had prior experience working together.

“She student-taught here last year, and ended the year as a Pre-K aide. When I saw her at the New Teacher Orientation…I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh, you're here!’” Foster shared.

Foster’s background as a Special Education aide, along with her prior experiences addressing behaviors while teaching, have helped her to empathize with some of the issues Lotts has encountered as a first-year teacher.

“My experience working with younger children who are working through big emotions has definitely helped me when working with Lotts because she's had quite a few students in her room who needed additional behavioral support and different things,” Foster shared. “I am able to reassure her that you just have to keep trying - you're going to find that thing that will work.”

Through trial and error, Foster believes Lotts’ classroom management strategies have grown tremendously throughout her first year.

“Lotts has gained some amazing strategies throughout this year in regards to classroom management,” Foster explained. “I think classroom management is such a daunting task as a new teacher, because it truly takes time and trial and error to figure out what is going to work best for each group of kids. She has been very willing and motivated to serve her students by changing and evolving management skills that work best for her and for them.”

One of those strategies is a dedicated space in Lotts’s classroom called the “Calm Down Corner” where students can go when they are working through their heightened emotions.

“This is a safe place for my students to go when they have big feelings so they can self regulate.

There are tools and strategies in this space to allow them to choose a technique that is going to best help them,” Lotts shared. “If they need additional support while calming down, I am able to go over and help model for them and give them ideas on how they can choose to calm down.”

Aside from the “Calm Down Corner,” Lotts has also been intentional about building selfregulation strategies and problem solving strategies into daily lessons so that her students learn how to appropriately work through difficult situations.

“I am also constantly evaluating the needs of my students and making changes to my strategies that I see are necessary in order to effectively handle each new scenario,” Lotts explained.

When Lotts finds herself fresh out of new strategies to address the unique needs of her students, that’s when she turns to Foster for collaboration and support.

“Foster is always more than willing to help me with anything I need, and she does it in a way that my experiences in my classroom and my knowledge of my students is validated,” Lotts shared. “She asks questions and listens first before making suggestions to know what I’ve tried, and then we can work through ideas together. Our time together is very much collaborative, and I think that speaks volumes about Foster as a mentor.”

According to Shari Dawson, Region 10 Mentor Teacher Consultant, these qualities allow Foster to work effectively with virtually any mentee.

“The thing that really stands out to me about Foster is that she has a servant’s heart and she's a very good listener,” Dawson shared. “In my opinion, those are the top two things that any mentor teacher needs to have. I don't care what grade they teach or what content they teach. I think you can partner those kinds of teachers up with any teacher.”

Foster has felt supported by Dawson and the Region 10 Mentor Teacher program. For her, the program’s professional development sessions have given her a space to work with teachers she doesn’t normally work with. She also appreciates the one-on-one check-ins with Dawson, who visits a select cohort of 60 mentor teachers at their campuses twice in both the fall and spring semesters.

While Foster initially felt unqualified to be a mentor, she received plenty of encouragement from Holly Rogers, her Lead Teacher, and the rest of her teaching team. Now that she has been working as a mentor teacher, she encourages younger teachers to try their hand at it as well.

“I always try to remind people that experience doesn't always equal truth,” she shared. “It’s not always about how many years you've been doing something. It's just, are you willing to even try?”