ABSTRACT
With the reforms detailed in Circular 9/92 (DFE, 1992), teacher educators in schools and universities are facing a number of ideological and tangible challenges to their current practice and ideologies. The introduction of schoolbased mentoring, which has resulted from these reforms, presents a challenge of some magnitude to mentors themselves and their student protégés. Mentoring itself is not a new concept and, if Homer’s Odyssey bears true testimony, has existed since the ancient world. Nor is teacher education a stranger to mentoring, as Monaghan and Lunt’s (1992) discussion of the history of mentoring indicates. Indeed, some authors have placed mentoring at the heart of the educational process (for example, Moses-Zirkes, 1993). However, we cannot rely purely on historical sources to establish an understanding of contemporary mentoring in School-based Teacher Education Partnerships (STEPs) if we wish to improve, and build upon, its quality. Based on recent research findings and writings which are discussed below, we can begin to build a picture of the challenges and demands which contemporary mentoring in initial teacher education (ITE) offers. Following this overview of the conceptions of mentoring which can be identified in recent literature, we would then like to offer conceptions of mentoring in the context of physical education and dance ITE. These have emerged from our own research which is discussed in more detail in a subsequent section of this chapter.
