Abstract
This article explores how university learning and the period of school placement can contribute to identity development understood as a dynamic and evolving process. From this perspective, we understand the teacher’s professional identity as an ongoing process of interpretation and re-interpretation of experiences that are shaped in professional spaces of relationship with others, where each person makes different processes of identification, representations, and attributions, creating a spiral of continuous construction or reconstruction. It is thus a phenomenon of social interaction. Data collection involved eight students, their school tutors, and university teachers within the framework of 4th-year school placements. Data analysis was organised around three dimensions of the research project: the teacher him/herself, the bond between students and the educational community, and the relationship between the school and the university. The results highlighted the need to improve the practicum, especially at the university level. Both school and university tutors are crucial in promoting and guiding dialogical processes of knowledge construction with oneself, others, and the world. However, the university has an added responsibility in this key relational process; university tutors must improve their role as mediators between students and school tutors to contribute to the development of the teaching identity in a complex and dynamic way.
Highlights
This article stems from the results of a competitive research project that took place during the 2016/7 and 2017/8 school years in the Faculty of Education, Translation, and Human Sciences (Facultad de Educación, Traducción y Ciencias Humanas, FETCH) at The University of Vic–Central University of Catalonia in Spain
Regarding the key elements identified in the analysed data, we would like to highlight three results that contribute to the teacher identity learning process: a) Supporting the learning of the ‘teacher self ’ during the work placement
The university tutor should encourage the students’ development of reflexive strategies that can shed light on educational events from different points of view: first, the sense a student makes of their intuition; second, the sense the school teachers have given them from their performances; and what they have been able to share from the educational experiences that have presented them with challenges, conflict, uncertainty, surprise or even joy
Summary
This article stems from the results of a competitive research project that took place during the 2016/7 and 2017/8 school years in the Faculty of Education, Translation, and Human Sciences (Facultad de Educación, Traducción y Ciencias Humanas, FETCH) at The University of Vic–Central University of Catalonia in Spain. The UVic-UCC is a university with public vocation and private management located in Vic (Spain) and has a current total of 8,353 students. The research objective is to study how the university learning process and the work placement assignments at schools may contribute to the development of the teaching identity. Eight school tutors, and eight university tutors took part in the research. During seminars, tutoring sessions, and school visits, data were collected using work placement memoirs, individual interviews, written observations, field notes, meeting records, and a discussion group
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
