Professional Identity is currently receiving increased attention in the field of teacher education. Taking a constructionist perspective (Holstein, Gubrium, 2008), we think that in telling and sharing their narratives, teachers construct and perform their identities. In this light, professional identity is a narrative and discursive construction that takes place within institutions, with the help of the narrative resources available in certain settings. This construction is part of an ongoing process of narrative positioning in the discourse (Davies, Harré, 1990). The research aims to explore how and which teacher identities can be constructed through narrative in an online educational context of discussion about the self and one’s job. Participants were 13 in-service teachers attending the second year of the Teacher Education University Course, who were enrolled in an online workshop. They were required to work individually or in 2 groups divided according to length of school service. They interacted for about three months in an asynchronous website and were engaged in individual and group activities. The data comprised all the writings of the two groups and were organised into 4 corpora of analysis (the individual writings and the collective texts of each group). With reference to Positioning theory (Harré, van Langenhove, 1999) a discourse analysis was carried out using the qualitative data analysis software AtlasTi. The findings show that in this online context the construction of teacher identity can be understood as a process of discursive positioning and negotiation. Five emergent identities are identified: “relational teacher”, “maternal teacher”, “professional teaching”, “teacher as a person”, and “teacher in crisis”. We outline the effectiveness of the specific context in relation to in-service teacher education.

Narrative construction of teacher identity in online community

GRION, VALENTINA
2009

Abstract

Professional Identity is currently receiving increased attention in the field of teacher education. Taking a constructionist perspective (Holstein, Gubrium, 2008), we think that in telling and sharing their narratives, teachers construct and perform their identities. In this light, professional identity is a narrative and discursive construction that takes place within institutions, with the help of the narrative resources available in certain settings. This construction is part of an ongoing process of narrative positioning in the discourse (Davies, Harré, 1990). The research aims to explore how and which teacher identities can be constructed through narrative in an online educational context of discussion about the self and one’s job. Participants were 13 in-service teachers attending the second year of the Teacher Education University Course, who were enrolled in an online workshop. They were required to work individually or in 2 groups divided according to length of school service. They interacted for about three months in an asynchronous website and were engaged in individual and group activities. The data comprised all the writings of the two groups and were organised into 4 corpora of analysis (the individual writings and the collective texts of each group). With reference to Positioning theory (Harré, van Langenhove, 1999) a discourse analysis was carried out using the qualitative data analysis software AtlasTi. The findings show that in this online context the construction of teacher identity can be understood as a process of discursive positioning and negotiation. Five emergent identities are identified: “relational teacher”, “maternal teacher”, “professional teaching”, “teacher as a person”, and “teacher in crisis”. We outline the effectiveness of the specific context in relation to in-service teacher education.
2009
JURE/EARLI Conference “Fostering Communities of Learners” Proceedings
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11577/179348
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