Section archive - Beginning Teachers

The purpose of this study was to obtain information from a group of beginning teachers regarding how teachers who enter the field through alternative certification programs respond to the induction programs, in comparison to those who enter through more traditional programs. The results indicate that there are more similarities than differences in the experiences reported by 1st-year alternative-and traditional-entry teachers. These results indicate that teacher education certification programs and beginning teacher support programs need to take into consideration the unique needs of alternative-entry teachers because of their previous experiences and expectations.

In this article, the authors tested the hypothesis that first-year teachers could take up forms of ambitious pedagogy under the following conditions: 1) that reform-based practices introduced in teacher preparation would be the focus of collaborative inquiry throughout the first year of teaching, 2) that participants use analyses of their students’ work as the basis of critique and change in practice, and 3) that special tools be employed that help participants hypothesize about relationships between instruction and student performance. Eleven secondary science teachers engaged in tool-supported collegial analysis of their students’ work over two years, spanning pre-service and in-service contexts.

In this article, the authors discuss findings from a case study in which beginning secondary social studies teachers interviewed young adolescents with the goal of unearthing and possibly challenging the teachers' beliefs about middle school students’ capabilities in social studies. The results of this study suggest that the coursework showed potential for shifting teachers’ views of young adolescents’ intellectual capabilities and, in some cases, shaping new commitments to teaching middle school students.

This article explores the experiences of three primary school Newly Qualified Teacher career changers from a PGCE primary programme at a university in England. The experiences of the participants’ first year of teaching in their respective primary schools are explored through a constructive grounded theory methodology. The findings have implications for teacher trainers and NQT mentors in that it offers a perspective on the range of experiences career changer Newly Qualified Teachers bring with them to teaching.