Getting Experience in Computer Science Education - Guide to Teaching Computer Science: An Activity-Based Approach - page 244

ministrations, subject-matter teachers, and the teacher preparation institute, and are
designed to advance the mutual interests of all partners. The building of a learning
community is based on the sharing of disciplinary and pedagogical knowledge, re-
flective processes, research on the teaching of the discipline, bridging theory and
practice, construction of teaching-learning activities, planning long-term projects,
and encouraging initiative implementation (Teitel 2003 ). According to the PDS ap-
proach, the collaboration enhances change and mutual development in both systems
(schools and academic institutions) and minimizes the gap between them (Kortha-
gen and Kessels 1999 ; Levine 2003 ). In particular, this framework empowers the
prospective teachers and gives them a broader and deeper base for their future work
as teachers.
The objectives of the student-teachers' practicum within the PDS in a specific
school are defined on three levels (Klieger and Oster-Levinz 2008 ):

1. Social-institutional collaboration: exposing the prospective teachers to the
school as an active institution and involving them in the school activities. Exam-
ples of such activities are: facilitating a volunteer project, coping with challenges
of special-needs pupils, and collaborating with teachers in their routine tasks
during recesses throughout the school day.
2. Collaboration in the teaching field: actively involving the prospective teachers
in various teaching activities, such as: establishing and running online learning
programs at the school, guiding pupils' research and projects, providing weaker
pupils with individual assistance, integrating student-teachers into teaching, and
into exam writing, assessing, and marking.
3. Professional advancement: developing a professional learning community in the
school that comprises student-teachers, pedagogical supervisors, and mentor-
teachers. In general, this level is considered to be the most important one since
it cannot be easily achieved by other frameworks in which prospective teachers
gain experience with the profession of teaching.

13.3.2 Training Computer Science Prospective Teachers

Within the PDS

Each student-teacher practices at a specific school for 1 day a week throughout the
entire academic year. At the beginning of the academic year, a meeting is held be-
tween the student-teacher, the school mentor-teacher, and the academic pedagogical
supervisor with the objective of constructing a schedule for the student-teacher's
practicum day at the school. Each student has an individual daily schedule that is
flexible and can be changed during the year according to specific needs that emerge
and ask to include various experiences.
A typical practicum day at the school consists of a combination of the following
activities:

Observing Lessons The student-teachers observe lessons that the mentor teacher's
teaches in the different classes, including lab lessons.