Band Director Reflection on Change from Student Teaching Through the Initial Years of Teaching

The purpose of this investigation was to understand how teachers' perceptions of how they changed during the initial years of teaching. Three middle and three high school teachers viewed thirty minutes of their internship video and answered seven open-ended teacher related questions during a telephone interview. All participants had at least three years of teaching experience, and represented North, Central, and South Florida. After the telephone interviews, the researcher transcribed the conversations which served as the principal data used in this study. Findings indicated that participants changed the most in dealing with classroom management, diagnosing and fixing classroom pedagogical tasks, and confidence in their teaching ability. Additionally, the directors had changed by performing administrative tasks more efficiently. Directors also suggested that preservice teachers could develop into effective teachers by participating in real-life teaching activities before and during the student internship.