Section archive - Beginning Teachers

This case study aims to identify the extent to which beginning teachers believe they are prepared for their careers through their teacher training. The study also examines what teachers have learned as practicing teachers. The findings indicated that the internship period was believed to be of most use and benefit in the preparation of pre-service teachers for entering the profession. The findings suggest that the practicum also leads to an awareness of the participants’ vocational identity as teachers, where values as educators are reasserted and they become more conscious of their transition from being university students to being ‘teachers’.

This study aimed to examine the specific problems of beginning teachers in Dutch urban primary schools. The findings reveal that beginning teachers encounter several challenges in urban primary schools. The authors found that most prominent challenges were common problems that teacher encounter at schools, such as a high workload, stress and inadequate guidance and support. The participants also mentioned that they had difficulties handling with parental involvement. They had Interactions with highly educated and critical parents as well as interactions with parents from cultural minority groups. They found both types of interactions as difficult to handle.

This longitudinal study investigated four secondary social studies teachers, who identified as being constructivist teachers, during their student teaching practicum through their first year of teaching in the classroom. Specifically, this study focused on the relationship between the teachers’ constructivist-oriented beliefs and their use of related practices in their history classrooms. The findings showed that issues of classroom control were major barriers for the implementation of constructivist-oriented practices. Furthermore, the analysis showed that the participants had a limited development of practical tools. The author argues that although their teacher preparation program exposed them to many different types of instructional techniques and their methods course included the teaching of a model lesson to the class, the participants desired more practical tools as they entered their first year.

This study examined how primary school teachers were trained to teach early reading and mathematics in six Sub-Saharan African countries (Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Senegal, Tanzania and Uganda). The authors found that Tanzanian primary teachers were most inclusive. They found that newly-qualified teachers saw various explanations for their learners' difficulties. It was found that the participants had positive overall attitudes towards their learners. These positive feelings seemed to include all, with little evidence of teachers potentially marginalizing learners through low expectations of their ability to learn.