Hosting collectivity: ‘We’ as a person reference in interactional reflective practice in peer observation sessions

Abstract

Personal pronouns are a common linguistic element in the construction of teachers’ identities. Teachers often articulate their reflections through a collective personal reference, as it is in the use of the personal pronoun ‘we’, which emerges in the construction of the arguments that are used as the basis for reflective practice. The study presented here examines the use of ‘we’ as a personal pronoun to construct teacher identities in interactional reflective practice in post-observation feedback sessions. More specifically, aim to understand how teachers express their identity as a group through the use of the personal pronoun ‘we’. Findings demonstrate that teachers actively identify with the group to which they belong. The reference to collectivity is established along a continuum that stretches from teachers in general to teachers of the school in question to individual practitioners as teachers of a class group. The article contributes to a better understanding of how teachers’ identity is constructed in peer observation feedback interactions.