Mentoring Teachers Course

Overview

Grow your educational leadership skills.

Seeking the next step in your education career? Whether you’re looking to become a mentor teacher for the first time, or want to boost your existing educational leadership skills, gain the tools you need to effectively support and mentor the people in your kura | school.

With our Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha | University of Canterbury education experts, you’ll learn more about education and leadership, including how to facilitate positive outcomes, te ao Māori mentoring principles, and growing empowering mentor-mentee relationships.

Whether you’re in early childhood, primary or secondary education, you can use these educational leadership skills to support Pre-service, Tōmua | Provisional and Tūturu | Full Practising teachers, as well as laying the foundation for your future in education management.

This course is ideal for

• ECE, Primary and secondary teachers
• Educational leaders and managers
• People interested in beginning a career in educational leadership or management

Course outline

The course is divided into five modules that you'll work your way through over the nine weeks of learning. Each module includes specific learning objectives, educational content across a range of media, activities to apply what you've learnt, plus a 'temperature check' survey to make sure you're getting what you need as a learner.

Module 1: Te Pakiaka o te tōtara
Explore the differences between coaching and mentoring and the importance of establishing mentor relationships.

Module 2: Te Taitea o te tōtara
Explore a Māori worldview of mentoring principles in your current practice. Evaluate how the principles of Te Tiriti influence relationship building in a mentoring context.

Module 3: Te Taikaha o te tōtara – Ako 
Develop a range of ‘Listening for Learning’ skills to create a learning environment that benefits a teachers' perceptions and responses to teaching and learning.

Module 4: Te Taikaha o te tōtara – Wānanga 
Develop an understanding of different types of feedback and using an educative mentoring approach with your mentee. 

Module 5: Te Karamatamata o te tōtara
Facilitate difficult learning conversations based on a framework that promotes productive dialogue and empowers teachers for positive outcomes. Formulate SMART goals to help teachers build their professional capability.

Assessments

• 2 module quizzes = 15%
• 2 forum posts = 20%
• Final reflection assessment = 65%
  

Your final assessment is a reflection on a mentoring conversation. To complete this, you have to record a mentoring session, analyse this, and write-up the analysis. 

Your course total grade is calculated based on the weighting of each assessment. To pass the course you need a course total of over 50 out of 100.

Requirements

To take this course, you must:

• Be a qualified teacher
• Have a teaching degree and/or extensive and relevant previous teaching experience 

Technology requirements 

• We recommend a laptop or desktop computer and a reliable internet connection.
• A PDF reader (like Adobe Acrobat Reader DC) to download PDFs with assessment instructions.
• Word processing software (like Microsoft Word or Google Docs) to complete your assignments.

Course fees
Course fees must be paid before learning can begin, either via online credit-card payment, or by contacting info@uconline.ac.nz to request an invoice. Please note: fixed invoice payment dates apply, so we recommend getting in touch with us as soon as possible to request an invoice, as this option is subject to availability.

Withdrawals and refunds
Once learning begins, you are eligible for a withdrawal with refund up until the end of week 2. After this date, refunds may be available if your circumstances are exceptional, for example if you've experienced a serious medical event.

Cap & minimum enrolment threshold
A minimum number of learners is needed for effective interaction and feedback, while a maximum cap of learners ensures high quality learning and support. If the minimum number of enrolments required for a course isn’t met, or the maximum cap is exceeded, learners will be given the option to defer their study or receive a refund.

Crediting this course towards a degree
In certain cases the points from this course can be credited towards further study with UC. Learn more about cross-crediting and recognition of prior learning.

Our people

Please note: our academic team develop and present video content within their courses, but are not always the course facilitator. The course facilitator will engage with learners in the course forums, answer queries and mark assignments.