Abstract:
Mentoring as part of teaching practicum has emerged as an effective process through
which the professional competencies of trainee-teachers are developed. The practicum
experience of teacher training could be pertinent in the context of distance education
where the mode of delivery is mainly by print, which do not allow the modelling of
acting out ideal examples of teaching. The role of the mentor teacher in the distance
education environments of public universities in Ghana therefore becomes critical in
quality teacher development. The placement of teacher mentors in school locations for
Distance Education trainee teachers during teaching practice helps trainee teachers to
model good teaching skills. Trainee teachers are assisted to plan, teach and reflect on
their lesson delivery with the view of improving their professional competencies. This
paper examines the perception of Distance Education trainee teachers on teacher
mentors placed at their school locations during teaching practice. A structured
questionnaire was developed to collect data, which was analysed quantitatively using
descriptive statistics. The results of the findings based on support for lesson
preparation, teaching skills, coaching, teaching experience, and teacher mentors
feedback, indicated that more attention could be focused on improving the mentorship
of Distance Education trainee teachers at the University of Cape Coast during teaching
practice in order to produce quality teachers for the education sector. It was however
recommended that strategies to improve and strengthen the mentoring system at the
University of Cape Coast, College of Distance Education be planned well to achieve the
expected outcomes to the full benefit of trainee teachers.
