Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1.    A number of terms are used interchangeably in the paper, sometimes in the same paragraph.  These such as novice teacher, new teacher, intern, beginning professional need to be defined and linked.

2.    The literature review and research suggestions should be reworked.  The discussion provides descriptions of dimensions which provide a better context of the reader.  The importance of mentoring and the impact of mentees is needs to be forgrounded prior to consideration of the mentor.

Line 85 – how has the mentor teacher gained the appreciation of the school’s teaching staff?  How is it measured.

Line 97 - No context is provided for the reader of the education system until the end of page 2.  More information is needed. What is the internship – duration, paid, required for certification, have there been prior school experiences? What has occurred in teacher training prior to this point?  See Line 37 – 41 where the paper refers to novice teachers lacking skills etc.

Line 123 – expand on literature and provide specific references

Line 137 – teachers’ lounge is this within individual schools or a collective online lounge.

Section 1.7 – requires an introductory statement regarding mentor motivation.

Line 217 – do mentors get paid and how much?

Line 204 – figure is not referred to in the paper

Line 220 – 223 unclear

Line 235 – what is the between mentoring and coaching?

Section 2. Purposes of the study and 3.2 Research questions are very similar and repetitive.  Use a broad statement or aim for the study overall.

Line 272 – what was the Proteach instrument developed from.  Give details of the other instruments.

Lines 373-383 should be positioned in the literature review as part of the description of the context, hence setting the scene for the importance of the study.

Line 416 – check ‘and to learning’

Line 418 – mentor teachers did not receive suitable training is an important point.

Line 464 Figure 2 holistic mentorship model – Figure 1 does not represent the description in line 197.  This seems to be a departure from the intent on the paper which examines why teachers become mentors.  Indeed the research implications introduces more ideas which ideally should be in the literature review. Then the study, and questionnaire could be linked to the various dimensions discussed.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Some sentences require restructuring for clarity.  The literature review section is difficult to follow.  

Line 4 - 6

Line 40 - remove an so on.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you for the opportunity to read about your research in Israel. It would be helpful to know more about the context of the study in the abstract and introduction. It would be helpful to know what age group of students the mentor teachers and novice teachers are working with - e.g. does this style of mentoring or advice provided change based on the age of the students they are working with? Also, it would be good to name that this study was from Israel in the abstract. 

I have included some feedback on notes I made throughout the paper:

Page 1 line 11 I would suggest referring to them as research participants.

Page 1 line 12 more context required e.g. primary schools in Israel.

Page 1 lines 15-18 I would also note in the abstract that the findings are self-reported, as the novice teachers were not participants in this paper at least!

Page 1 lines 32-34 I am unsure of the basis for the sentence starting "Mentoring consists of..." What evidence backs this up?

Page 2 section 1.3 Can there be more quantifying information here about the mentor teacher being an experienced teacher with typically between x and x years of experience? This description explains the traits, but not the facts behind the reasoning behind some people being MTs and others not. 

Page 4 lines 184-186 this sentence starting "Hillel-Lavian’s..." does not flow well. I suggest re-writing this sentence as I was unsure what you were trying to say here. 

Page 6 line 283 Question three could include the Israeli education system.

Otherwise, the paper looks good, congratulations on this program and research. 

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf