Teacher Educator Identity Research Articles

“I felt like I was being judged…”: A duoethnography exploring international language teacher educator identities

“I felt like I was being judged…”: A duoethnography exploring international language teacher educator identities

The Consequences of Changing Curriculum Structures on the Professional Identity and Consciousness of Teacher Educators

The Consequences of Changing Curriculum Structures on the Professional Identity and Consciousness of Teacher Educators

Consumerist discourses on social media and language teacher educator identity tensions

AbstractThis study investigates the impact of social media discourses, espoused by neoliberal and consumerist ideologies, on a language teacher educator's (LTE) identity negotiation. Through a collaborative case study, it examines Hassan's (the second author) experiences with social media in the Iranian English language teaching (ELT) context over three years. The data consist of extensive email discussions and four online meetings between the authors over one year. The analysis of Hassan's narratives reveals dominant social media discourses emphasizing sameness, omniscience, and commercialized luxurious lifestyles. These discourses often equate social media visibility with professional qualifications, pressuring Hassan to conform to trends that conflict with his sense of professionalism and authenticity. Hassan's emotional struggles and identity tensions led to critical reflection and ongoing negotiation of his professional identity. The findings underscore the need for professional development programs that support LTEs in navigating the pressures of self‐branding while maintaining their professionalism. Additionally, the study calls for further research into the long‐term effects of social media on professional identity and well‐being across diverse cultural and institutional contexts.

The (im)possible mission of language teacher educators in Germany: Identity formation, development, and practice in institutionalised settings

AbstractResearch on language teacher identity and its development has shown that it can be crucial for teacher education to understand how identity development takes place. The few findings to date on language teacher educators and their identities show individual negotiation processes and antinomies, particularly due to transitions from teacher to teacher educator, the parallel roles of researcher and teacher educator, and so on. The project presented here examines the language teacher educator identities of 12 professionals within a highly structured training program in Germany through narrative inquiry as a means to allow for the reconstruction of biographies, identities, and practices. The narratives illustrate the normative settings of the structured system, such as set curricular guidelines, which can rarely be fulfilled by the teacher trainees, a lack of trust and professional relationship, or the struggle of the teacher educators between advisor on the one hand and evaluator on the other. The results provide implications and recommendations for other institutionalised settings in which language teacher educators work.

Language teacher educators' identity development through self‐study: A case for collaboration and community

AbstractIn this conceptual feature article, we explore how our language teacher educator (LTE) identities have been shaped through collaboration around practice‐based research as we have engaged in more than a decade of self‐study of teacher education practices (S‐STEP) work. We consider three key aspects of our collaborative identities: (1) we have a shared identity and purpose as LTE researchers; (2) we also have individual LTE identities and so heterogeneity within our group is a strength; and (3) our shared and individual LTE identities are nested within a mutual community of trust. We have found that all three of these components are necessary to develop and sustain our collaborative work, which has a dual goal of contributing to the field while we strengthen our own practices. It is our hope this article can help guide LTEs who are seeking to develop their identities and expertise and searching for communities in which to do so.

Becoming and being a critical language teacher educator: A duoethnography

AbstractLanguage teacher educator (LTE) identity development is an emerging field exploring how LTEs learn to teach and negotiate their identities and how their identity construction processes help teacher candidates learn. The complexity of the issue has prompted researchers to explore their professional journeys and experiences in various contexts from differing perspectives. Still, the field is constantly evolving as LTEs strive to understand the multifaceted nature of the profession and its implications for teacher education. Within this perspective, through a duoethnographic study, in this research the authors aim to explore how they construct, negotiate, and enact their critical LTE identities and agency as two Turkish‐speaking, mid‐career English language teacher educators situated currently in two different higher education institutions in Türkiye. The researchers collected lengthy personal narratives recounting their experiences and thematically analyzed them through iterative coding. Three major themes concerning their meso and micro contexts emerged: their trajectories in becoming LTEs, issues of belonging and marginalization, negotiating their LTE identities, and exercising agency. Their narratives indicate how they followed different trajectories to become teacher educators, were positioned as others in their institutional settings, legitimized their LTE identities in time, and became empowered to practice their aspired identities. Despite being marginalized in different contexts, their narratives show they have consistently created counter‐hegemonic discursive and experiential spaces in their classrooms and institutional contexts as micro‐level policy‐makers enacting their critical LTE identities.

The Impact of the Initial Teacher Education Reaccreditation Process on Teacher Educator Identity

ABSTRACT This article reports initial findings from a research project that focused on the impact of the reaccreditation process and its outcomes on teacher educators in four institutions in England where Qualified Teacher Status accreditation was removed, despite leading successful programmes as detailed in Ofsted inspections and National Student Survey data. Whilst the outcomes of the reaccreditation process were mentioned in the mainstream press, the impact of this policy on teacher educators had only been reported anecdotally. This research fills a research gap to document impact on teacher educator identity and provides an evidence base to inform teacher education policy debates. Data were gathered through focus groups using a triad collaborative enquiry approach, based on the lesson study model, where researchers took on different roles: clarifier, observer, and questioner. This method formed part of a constructed focus group and built on a process of semi-structured and unstructured creative tasks. Initial findings identified the shifting context university educators perceived in relation to policy constraints, including a greater top-down, centralisation that negated the opportunity for teacher educators to provide a contextualised, evidence informed approach to teacher preparation. This contributed to the impact of the reaccreditation process on teacher educators’ professional identity, self-efficacy and agency.

Understanding Vocational Teacher Educators' Role Identities Through Metaphors: A Case Study in Malta

The objective of this qualitative study, that is framed using identity theory (Burke & Stets, 2009), based on semi-structured interviews, is to gain a deeper understanding of the professional role identities of vocational teacher educators (VTEs) through the use of metaphors. VTEs are undervalued in studies and policy in the Vocational Education and Training (VET) context, and misunderstood as an occupational group, despite being essential to maintaining a high-quality vocational teaching workforce and significantly influencing the quality of vocational education. It presents empirical evidence taking Malta as a case study and examines how VTEs synthesise the meanings they assign during an initial teaching education (ITE) programme. In addition, it also investigates how, through metaphors, the role identities of VTEs in Malta change during the ITE programme. Findings indicate that VTEs face various complexities, and it is difficult to express the multiple facets of this professional role identity in a single metaphor. Moreover, within this case study, VTEs' role identity formation does not follow a linear trajectory but unfolds according to the needs at that time.

The Hybrid Identities of Choral Music Teacher Educators in Tier 1 Research Universities: A Phenomenological Exploration

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the “lived experience” of choral music teacher educators (MTEs) in hybrid positions at tier 1 research universities. After interviews with eight choral MTEs from across the United States, three themes emerged from our data: inseparable identity components, reciprocity of selves, and externally derived tension. Inseparable identity components described the ways in which participants sought to align the components of their job with their holistic teacher–researcher–conductor identities. Reciprocity of selves referred to how participants’ teacher, researcher, and conductor selves informed and were informed by each other. Finally, participants maintained security in their own holistic sense of self but experienced externally derived tension as they navigated the structural divide of performance and education in higher education.

Understanding the professional identity of university-based teacher educators: A systematic review of the literature

Despite increasing interest in university-based teacher educators (UBTEs)’ professional expertise and development, their professional identity remains under-researched. This systematic review of the literature on the nature of UBTEs’ professional identity and how it is formed analyses 88 studies published from 2005 to 2023. We found that UBTEs’ professional identity has gained considerable attention in North American and European contexts, and most empirical studies were primarily based on self-reported, small-scale, and qualitative data. UBTEs’ identities emerging from this work include research-, teacher-, expert- and learner-oriented identities. Individual, interpersonal, institutional and national factors shape UBTEs’ identities, suggesting that UBTEs’ identity formation is complex and contested. Future directions for research are discussed.

Language Teacher Identity in TESOL, Teacher Education and Practice as Identity Work

Although identity is something that every language teacher has, language teacher identity (LTI) has been established and researched as a concept recently, in the past two decades. Language teacher identity has a critical role in language teachers’ professional and personal lives as it portrays how they position themselves and how others (i.e., colleagues, students, and other professionals) perceive them within the field and the work they do. Thus, LTI has the potential to drive the language teachers’ transformation into the teaching professional they want to become. Language Teacher Identity in TESOL, Teacher Education and Practice as Identity Work, edited by Bedrettin Yazan, Associate Professor of Educational Linguistics at the University of Texas at San Antonio, and Kristen Lindahl, Associate Professor of TESOL/Applied Linguistics at the University of Texas at San Antonio, USA, is a much-needed book that showcases ways of using language teacher identity to inform language teacher education practices.

Formação de Docentes. Narrativa de Una Estudiante en Formación la Identidade Negra

Student-teachers’ Black identities have barely been documented in initial teacher education. Although some studies have focused on their cultural experiences, their identities are still unexplored to understand teacher education. This is why this study adopts a narrative perspective to address, through life story interviews, the identity formation and experience of a Black woman and student-teacher at a public university in Bogotá, Colombia. By dwelling on her experience, this study reflects upon how, although Black students deny their identities when learning a foreign language and becoming teachers, their personal and historical backgrounds work to position themselves politically and ideologically. Race and body become intersectional categories to comprehend their processes of resistance. This exploration also discusses how discursive representations have a stake in the constitution of Black identities in teacher education.

Investigating science teacher educator identity through the politics of domestication and critical positional praxis

AbstractThe focus on identity in the field of teaching and learning continues to grow, especially when it concerns equitable outcomes for students. While most attention is placed on students' identities and increasingly those of teachers, lesser addressed are the identities of the teacher educators and researchers broaching the issue of identity. Additionally, identity research is not often linked to relationships between self, others, and transformative action. We recognize these as gaps to be addressed and offer critical positional praxis (CPP) as a response. CPP is the public manifestation of the insights gained through our sense of identity and reflexivity. More specifically, CPP is the actions (or inactions) that express who we are in response to an event in any given social context—especially oppressive ones. In this article, we draw from our own critical autoethnographies, as a context for putting CPP into practice in identity research. Our collective analysis of these critical autoethnographies revealed how our identity development was inseparable from the ways in which we have each resisted the politics of domestication. Our autoethnographies further point to the role of dissent as central to our experiences of becoming critical science teacher educators committed to equity, diversity, and anti‐racism in education. We draw from this analysis to offer recommendations for how identity and positionality can move beyond theoretical constructs toward transformative personal and collective change in science education.

Language Teacher Educators’ Identity Construction through Teaching and Supporting Action Research: A Trioethnographic Study

Action research is a form of inquiry that allows language educators to understand and improve their own practice. The literature suggests that language teachers can employ it as a self-led and self-directed source of professional development and enhancement of their professional identity and agency. However, little is known about its impact on the development of identity of language teacher educators who teach and support action research. Against this backdrop, this article aims to explore the experience of three language teacher educators regarding the influence of action research on the construction of their professional identity. Drawing on verbal and visual data sets, findings show that when teacher educators teach and mentor action research in language teacher education programmes, they can become guiding knowers, reflective practitioners and agents of change. The roles that teacher educators enact may lead to a reflective process that enhances their professional development. These identities connected to agentic growth demonstrate the relevance of including action research in language teacher education programmes as it can help teacher educators nurture their professional identity, particularly concerning their professional knowledge. This study suggests that teaching and supporting action research can become a meaningful entry point for language teacher educators to reflect on their own practice and to carry out action research themselves in language teacher education programmes.

A study on the identity of teacher educators: traits revealed by a Mathematics preceptor of the Pedagogical Residency Program

This study presents partial results of the repercussions of the performance of a mathematics preceptor in the Pedagogical Residency Program (PRP). For this, we chose to use semi-structured interviews as an instrument of data production. After transcription, the analysis was performed in light of the characterization of the professional identity of the teacher who teaches mathematics, proposed by our main theoretical reference. It was found that participation in the PRP enabled the school teacher to play a new role (preceptor), which mobilized a shift towards the constitution of their identity as a teacher educator.

Who do they think they are? Professional identity of Chinese university-based teacher educators

ABSTRACT University-based teacher educators (UBTEs) are critical to teacher education quality. Studies have mainly explored the professional identity of UBTEs who were previously schoolteachers, whereas less is known about those who followed academic pathways. This study examines how UBTEs perceive their identities in the Chinese context, where academic pathways are common. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 34 purposively sampled participants from two university types: first-class normal universities, and provincial normal universities. Five identities aligned with previous research: teacher in a higher education institution; researcher; teacher of teachers; collaborator; and coach. Three new identities emerged from the data: teacher of tradition; questioner; and doctoral student. Similarities and differences in identity perception were also discovered between university types. This study suggests the complexity of being a UBTE is shaped by institutional context, national and cultural milieu, and the nature of teacher education work, and concludes with recommendations for teacher education programmes.

Быть, становиться и принадлежать: профессиональная идентичность педагогов высшей школы

Teacher education plays an essential role in shaping the quality of education, and teacher educators are central to this process. The paper explores the personal and professional aspects that constitute the professional identity of teacher educators, shedding light on their journey from classroom teachers to facilitators of fellow educators' growth. This article delves into the intricate model of professional identity of teacher educators, examining the dimensions of being, becoming, and belonging within this dynamic role. The concept of ‘being’ a teacher educator encompasses the multifaceted roles and functions these educators undertake. The aspect of ‘becoming’ a teacher educator focuses on the transition from classroom teaching to teacher education. The paper examines the two prominent pathways into this role: the academic pathway, driven by advanced academic pursuits, and the practitioner's pathway, chosen by experienced educators seeking a shift from schools to training institutions. The concept of ‘identity shock’ during this transition is explored, along with the heightened intellectual engagement that emerges as teacher educator’s grapple with new challenges and opportunities. The theme of ‘belonging’ uncovers teacher educators’ affiliations with various communities, each shaping their professional identity. The paper highlights the role of collective affinities in shaping teacher educators' teaching methods, research endeavours, and leadership approaches.

Neo‐Nationalist Discourses and Teacher Identity Tensions in a Telecollaboration for Teachers of Minoritized Language Learners in Türkiye

ABSTRACTIn this paper, we focus on the situatedness of teacher identity and agency within sociopolitical contexts dominated by neo‐nationalist discourses and rely on data from online conversations among preservice and in‐service teachers of English in Türkiye and the United States (US). We report on data constructed in a telecollaboration (a.k.a., virtual intercultural exchange) that we, four TESOL teacher educators, designed for teachers to discuss issues of social justice (particularly for minoritized immigrant students) and to have a discursive and experiential space in which to negotiate their language teacher identities (LTI). Gathering 117 teachers from five universities (three in Türkiye, two in the US) and underserved school districts in both contexts, this telecollaboration is our pedagogical, agentive response to dominant neo‐nationalist discourses in the two countries. To make quantities of data more manageable, we analyze interactions from one‐third of those 117 participants (five of 15 small groups) to address this research question: How do preservice and in‐service teachers from Türkiye construct their teacher identities in response to neo‐nationalist discourses in their sociopolitical context? In particular, how do they engage in this identity work through asynchronous small‐group discussions in a social justice‐focused telecollaboration with teachers from the US? Findings indicate that participants from Türkiye discussed teacher agency, conservatism and cultural difference in the society, and discrimination/xenophobia against refugees as important factors that shape their work with minoritized English language learners. They experienced tensions in their identity construction between their desire to advocate for their students and the external forces coming from meso‐ and macro‐level policies that impact their instruction and assessment procedures. We discuss our findings in relation to previous research on language teacher identity and social justice in sociopolitical contexts shaped by neo‐nationalist discourses. We also share the implications of our study for pedagogizing identity in teacher education.

What do we know so far about the research‐teaching nexus in Initial Teacher Training? Findings from a systematic review

AbstractInitial Teacher Education (ITE) Programmes comprise campus‐based teaching sessions and school practice. This article carries out a systematic review from the context of Initial Teacher Education programmes in Higher Education, using the term ‘nexus’ to summarise the various ways research is integrated into campus‐based teaching, and the various forms of research‐informed teaching in school placement within ITE programmes. The review focused on empirical studies, written in either English or Spanish between 2015 to 2022, that report on this nexus—17 articles written in English met all the inclusion criteria, but none written in Spanish. The nexus is manifested on three levels: the intended level (related to courses), the implemented level (concerning campus‐based teaching), and the impact level (among pre‐service teachers). The nexus appears on the intended level through how courses and associated focal points for pedagogical practice are engineered and systematically designed to integrate research and teaching. On the implemented level, the nexus emerges in teacher educators' emphasis on epistemic connections between research and current school practice, and this highlights the identities of teacher educators and their professional development needs. On the impact level, the nexus means achieving harmony between, on the one hand, what pre‐service teachers have learnt from researching and, on the other, real social contexts—cognitively, affectively and self‐efficaciously. Discussion of these results provides a working definition of the research‐teaching nexus: for both teacher educators and pre‐service teachers to use the products and processes of research to enhance the effectiveness of teaching, either in campus‐teaching or school placement practice.

Researcher or teacher-of-teachers: What affects the salient identity of Chinese university-based teacher educators

University-based teacher educators' (UBTEs) identities impact their work, engagement, and professional development. While a deeper understanding of UBTE identity is emerging, how UBTEs value and reconcile different elements of professional identity is under-researched. This study examines 34 Chinese UBTEs' salient aspects of their professional identity. Two salient identities emerged and were distributed differently: a “teacher-of-teachers” identity prevalent in provincial normal universities and a “researcher” identity prevalent in first-class normal universities. Four ways these two identities interact are presented, describing how UBTEs negotiate a tension between “researcher” and “teacher-of-teachers” identities. This tension shapes UBTEs’ work and how teacher education programs function.