Novice teachers and embracing struggle: Dialogue and reflection in professional development

Abstract

This article explores the challenges shared by novice teachers in a year-long series of professional development workshops, which were designed to help novice teachers notice, unpack, and respond to the difficulties they were encountering in the first three years of teaching. The authors analyzed the data generated during the Oral Inquiry Process workshops to identify common challenges shared by the novice teachers who participated in this study and the nuances within them. Findings pointed to two common categories of struggle: reconciling theory and practice in standardized schools and managing relationships with veteran teachers. Nuances within these challenges included tension flowing from standardization, pacing constraints, and navigating complex relationships with veteran teachers. The authors argue that developing a nuanced understanding of the challenges novice teachers encounter is a vital first step in structuring teacher induction programs to respond to the needs of the teachers they serve. Working from the findings of the study, the authors offer recommendations for structuring professional development programs designed to help novice teachers embrace struggle through dialogue about and reflection upon the particular challenges created by their teaching contexts.