Developing professional identities and knowledge: becoming primary teachers

Abstract

This article explores how beginning teachers develop their professional identities and knowledge. It analyses the stories of four student-teachers as they progressed through their pre-service programme and in their first year as primary teachers. During the three-year programme a range of instruments and a series of interviews were used to collect data on their developing subject and pedagogic content knowledge for teaching science, their teaching experiences, their views of teaching and of themselves as teachers. During the visit in school at the end of their first year as qualified teachers they were observed teaching their own classes and a final interview was conducted. The study examined the interaction between knowledge and identities, the extent to which specific subjects may be salient in their identities as general class teachers, and whether those identities were stable and coherent or shifting and conflicting. The stories extend beyond the four years of the study, drawing on the past and imagining futures, and they are analysed with reference to the concept of trajectories as used in relation to communities of practice by Wenger. Some implications are identified for supporting beginning teachers in their identity work and development of knowledge.

Student teachers’ views of practicums (teacher training placements) in Turkish and English contexts: a comparative study

“…One is how effective a practicum school is in giving emotional support to student teachers in a time of emotional stress and political ignorance (Pierce, 2007). Giving support helps them to adapt to the socio-cultural context of the school (Smith, 2007) and develop a professional or pedagogic identity quickly (Beijaard, et al, 2004). Another is how supervisory teachers undertake a range of functions from role model to advisor (Haigh and Ward, 2004), developing relationships with student teachers that range from the directive to the collaborative (McNay and Graham, 2007).…”

Narrar o passado e pensar o futuro: possibilidades na formação inicial de professores através da escrita de si

“…Alcança-se que esse rememorar a partir da narrativa está servindo para começar a construir sua identidade profissional docente, a partir da identificação com o positivo e da rejeição do negativo. Ideias centrais que darão corpo ao conhecimento pedagógico posterior, já vão se formando e se articulando durante a formação inicial -ideia essa que se coincide com o que planteiam Conle (2003), Lim (2011), Clandinin & Cave (2008, Dominicé (2006) ou Knowles (2004) ou Smith (2007) entre outros.…”

(Re)construction of a Teacher´s Professional Identity from his Initial Training: Autobiographical Narration

“…But especially, they provide him with the chance to share ideas and experiences with other teaching professionals and the openness to research and new educational theories in order to try new pedagogical actions. This proves that the Initial Training stage can be key to (re)building the educator's professional identity [1,11,70,71]. This way and according to Knowles [54,72], early teaching models and prior teaching experiences are crucial in building a self-image as a teacher, and something even more obvious at this stage as a university lecture.…”

“…This is an identity which does not only come from the mastering of external knowledge, but from a "developed, and shaped one which is linked to life and to someone who is actually living" [30, p. 63]. And along the whole process, Initial Training is essential, since it works as a reference in training educators able to evolve, learn from experience, reflect upon their practice and learn from it all [Perrenoud, 2010;Smith, 2007].…”