HTML Preview Recommendation Letter Teaching page number 1.
Teaching Job Recommendation
May xx, 20xx
To Whom It May Concern:
It is my sincere pleasure to write this letter recommending John Lerner for elementary school teaching
positions. Mr. Lerner recently participated in an innovative, field-based teacher preparation program that
culminates in a year-long internship at a professional development school (http://www.ed.mu.edu/pds).
The internship program is a central feature of an ongoing partnership between the Mythic Area School
District and Mythic University. As part of this program, I served as one of Mr. Lerner’s university
supervisors and co-taught the concurrent science methods course, SCIED 458: Teaching Science in
Elementary Schools, in which he and the other interns were enrolled during Fall 20xx. I also co-taught
web-based portfolio workshops in which he participated. Because of my close and various associations
with him, I feel qualified to comment on Mr. Lerner’s potential as an elementary educator. Mr. Lerner
will make a valuable addition to your staff—he is an outstanding candidate for elementary teaching
positions.
Within the professional development school context, Mr. Lerner had the opportunity to work closely with
his mentor teacher, school and university faculty, and other interns to explore issues of teaching and
learning for understanding, and to consider connections between educational theory and practice. As part
of the elementary science methods course, Mr. Lerner collaborated with another intern to design and
implement a series of lessons aimed at helping students investigate concepts associated with the principles
of flight—thrust in particular. The development of his mini-unit required extensive background research,
as well as the comprehensive assessment of students’ prior knowledge of the content. The learning
experiences he crafted included a variety of opportunities for students to participate as young scientists
(e.g., making predictions, gathering and recording observations/data, and developing evidence-based
explanations).
Throughout the year, Mr. Lerner continued to develop a progressive approach to science teaching, and has
become very proficient at planning and teaching developmentally appropriate, hands-on, investigation-
based science lessons. For example, I recently observed him teaching a lesson on electricity in which
students explored basic circuitry. Mr. Lerner challenged his class to find multiple ways to make a bulb
light using only one battery, one bulb, and one wire. Patterns in students’ discoveries were used to
generate evidence-based explanations for how circuits work. Mr. Lerner not only demonstrated a
command of the subject matter, but also interacted with students and facilitated class discussion in a
manner consistent with an experienced teacher. Students clearly respect him and respond to his proactive
approaches to classroom management. It was truly a pleasure to observe this lesson!