Keywords

Introduction

According to Day (2002), teacher’s professional identity manifests itself in job satisfaction, changes in levels of motivation, self-efficacy, and occupational commitment. Consequently, in teacher education, several scholars (e.g., Beijaard, 1995; Kelchtermans, 2009; Korthagen & Vasalos, 2005) have emphasized the need for student teachers to explore their professional identity. Recent studies on teacher identity development (e.g., Leijen & Kullasepp, 2013a,b; Leijen, Kullasepp, & Ots, 2013; Ligorio, 2011; Toompalu, Leijen, & Kullasepp, 2016) have argued for the application of dialogical perspectives to better understand and support how the personal selves and professional selves are negotiated when becoming a professional. In the current study, we introduce an intervention developed to facilitate the negotiation and solving of tensions in the context of professional identity development.

Dialogical Becoming

University studies can be considered as a period of transition manifested in students’ socio-psychological development. According to the socio-cultural approach (Valsiner, 2001; Valsiner & Rosa, 2007), the developmental dynamics of psychological functioning take place through the interactions between individuals (e.g., assuming a professional role as a teacher) and their socio-cultural surrounding. In line with this approach, in a curriculum, a period of studies (re-)organizes the subjective experiences of students, affecting the ways they relate to themselves, to others, and to their surroundings. Moreover, from the perspective of cultural development, the transition to an educational institution contributes to the ongoing formation of the students’ personal culture that, during this period, is guided by the specific academic-educational representations of their future professional role (Kullasepp, 2008). However, in addition to the development and improvement of specific professional skills, changes are also assumed to take place in the professional identity construction.

Professional identity construction can be viewed as one of the factors affecting professionals’ (in this case, student teachers’) experiences within work settings, thereby shifting attention to the entry into the professional role as the process of coordinating the expression of different aspects of the self (Kullasepp, 2011). More specifically, the topic that needs to be explored to comprehend the complexity of socialization through the professional role concerns the regulation of two different aspects of the self: that is, I as a person and I as a professional. The importance of investigating and enhancing the coordination (and integration) of the aforementioned positions in teacher education has also been emphasized by Alsup (2006) and Ligorio (2011). The dialogue between these two positions has an impact on a person’s subjective experiences, and thus, plays a part in the adjustment with the professional role through the inevitability of ambivalence in the condition of “a person in a social role.” Furthermore, the social role as a set of socio-culturally constructed expectations that students encounter during their transition in(to) educational institution has the potential to become involved in intra-psychological dynamics and reflect in one’s conduct. For instance, the social messages of teachers, students, the learning process, and values can become integrated into the existing meaning system during the transition in university. These messages act as guidelines, framing students’ professional conduct and their affective responses that can, in turn, lead to a conflict between the two different perspectives (i.e., the personal and professional I-positions; the latter being a type of social position (Hermans & Hermans-Konopka, 2010)) within the same whole, that is, within the self.

More specifically, people’s psychological functioning is shaped by the purposeful dialogical interactions between themselves and their surroundings through the means of semiotically mediated cultural material. According to Valsiner and Rosa (2007), these dialogical interactions result in the creation of new, and/or the adaptation of existing meanings. As a result, a reconstruction of the psychological world occurs through the constant exchange of perceptual and semiotic material with the environment (Valsiner, 2001). Valsiner’s laminal model (2001) describes the person-environment dialogue in terms of constructive processes of internalization/externalization. According to Valsiner (2001), internalization suggests the process of synthesis and analysis of external semiotic material into an intra-personally different form; while externalization refers to the analysis of personal-cultural materials during their transposition into the external environment which, as a result, is modified. The combination of internalization and externalization of professional role expectations (as well as other types of social messages) leads to the formation of the personal meaning system, or the personal culture, that regulate person’s relations with the world and influence the self-construction (Valsiner & Rosa, 2007). The emerging unique – guaranteed by the dual processes of internalization/externalization (ibid.) – personal culture of every teacher-student becomes the base for the meaning making of the professional role related situations.

In this study, we applied the Dialogical Self theory (DST) (Hermans, 2001; Hermans & Hermans-Konopka, 2010) to better understand intra-psychological dialogues when internalizing and externalizing the professional role. According to the DST, the self is a system consisting of relatively autonomous I-positions that pertain to the person himself/herself (i.e., personal positions) and to the roles one has in life (i.e., social positions). The self-shifts between these different I-positions shaped through different historical, social, and institutional events. Placing students in a new social environment (e.g., a classroom) can be considered an experience forming a new I-position (e.g., I as a professional). The emergence of different I-position result from any kind of professional teaching practice (e.g., attending classes, joining teacher-parent meetings). I-position can also be formed by informal factors such as friends’ or parents’ expectations. DST provides a method to explain formations of identity specifically focusing on the emergence of different I-positions in fields of tension (Hermans, Konopka, Oosterwegel, & Zomer, 2016) that arise in the context of professional and institutional practices, and how these emerging I-positions relate to other I-positions.

According to Hermans and Hermans-Jansen (1995), personal continuity of self is assured by self-narration. In other words, meaningful experiences are organized in a narrative structured system through dialogue with oneself and with others. Self-narration is possible due to meta-positioning (Hermans & Hermans-Konopka, 2010). An I leaves a specific or a variety of positions that can be observed through self-reflection. Meta-positioning has three functions: unifying, executing, and liberating. Hermans and Hermans-Konopka (2010) argue that “coalitions of conflicting or opposing positions have the potential of creating strong motivation that surpasses the interests of positions in their isolation. Such coalitions create forms of ‘integrative motivation’ emerging in a field of tension between centering and de-centering movements in the self” (ibid, p. 373). This integrative motivation supports the development of organizations, teams, and individuals. This suggests that the integration of personal and professional identity should be supported by the meta-positioning of self-reflection and the creation of coalitions between different positions. Alsup (2006) suggests creating borderland discourses. She stresses that the role of metacognition and critical consideration of the conflicting positions is a prerequisite and students experience tension before forming these discourses. Alsup (2006) identified three types of tension: tension between being a university student and a school teacher; tension between personal beliefs, skills, and role expectations; and tensions between university teaching and professional teaching at the practice school. She pointed out that “the result of borderland discourse was neither the repudiation of one discourse nor the subsuming of one discourse into another; instead, the result was a new discourse with characteristics of both of the earlier ones as well as new characteristics unique to the pre-service teacher herself” (ibid., p. 37).

Following this theoretical framework, Leijen and Kullasepp (2013b) developed seminars to support students enrolled in initial teacher education programs aiming to facilitate: the voicing of personal positions in the context of a prescribed professional context; identifying tension between personal and professional positions; and solving tensions between different positions. The results of their small scale study suggested that seminars were useful for voicing tensions and to some extent helped to solve tensions; however, the presentation of coalitions was very rare. In the current study, we use an assignment from the support seminar with a larger group of student teachers to further understand:

  1. 1.

    Which tensions between positions did student teachers point out?

  2. 2.

    What characterizes the solutions created by student teachers?

Methods

Context

At this university, several changes were implemented in the teacher education curricula in 2013. The main aim of the changes was to achieve a better connection between theoretical studies and fieldwork. More specifically, this general aim was addressed from two dimensions, as suggested by Grossman, Hammerness, and McDonald (2009). Firstly, the traditional divide between foundations and methods courses was challenged by developing larger courses taught by teams of teacher educators from different faculties and institutions. Secondly, the common gap between theoretical subjects and fieldwork was bridged by carrying out the fieldwork in schools belonging to a network that is aimed to reach four dimensions of collaboration between schools and universities: traineeship, professional development, team teaching, and research and development. School-based mentors become important and it was expected that these mentors will help support the professional development of individual student teachers. It was expected that these changes will make teacher education more realistic and meaningful.

Participants

The sample of this current study consisted of 50 student teachers from different subject teacher education curricula in the second year of their Master studies. Since some curricula only have a few students and could, therefore, be easily identified, we did not ask students to further specify their study area. Participation in the study was voluntary and no incentives were provided for partaking.

Assignment

Data was collected in the form of a written assignment, aiming to activate student teachers’ inner dialogue between their different I-positions and thereby unlock the potential for negotiation and identity development. More specifically, student teachers were asked whether they had experienced tension or conflict between their personal characteristics or beliefs and the role expectations set for teachers during the school practicum, followed by a request to choose the tension that is most important for them for further analysis for an individual assignment. The actual work assignment was formulated as follows:

Please take an A4 blank sheet and divide it into three sections (25/25/50% of the page). Firstly, please elaborate on the two opposing positions and give clarifying explanations in the two smaller page sections (i.e., one position in each section). Secondly, please discuss the positions and try to formulate a coalition between positions or a new situation that would meet the following criteria: (i) the initial tension or conflict is resolved, and (ii) one position does not dominate over the other. You can think of this assignment as developing a coalition between two parties. Thirdly, please elaborate on the coalition on the remaining section of the page (50%).

Data Collection and Analysis

Data was collected in autumn 2014 during a pedagogical core course seminar in the form of a written assignment, asking student teachers to communicate and resolve the tensions they perceived to have had experienced between their personal features and professional role expectations. Consequently, there were respondents that only reported one pair of positions causing tension (N=17; i.e., 34% out of all respondents), as well as those that conveyed several mismatches (30% of respondents communicated two pairs; 16% reported four, 12% three, and 8% five pairs of positions causing tension).

Moreover, the data analysis consisted of several steps. To begin with, based on the consensus of two authors of this paper, a total of 116 tensions were identified and coded following the four categories proposed by Leijen and Kullasepp (2013b) first and then inductively specifying their context and nature by utilizing the thematic analysis. Next, descriptive statistics (i.e., frequencies and three-way crosstab) were provided, and thematic analysis carried out in order to distinguish between different types of tensions that the respondents had communicated as well as the source setting the professional role expectations and strategies utilized to solve the reported tensions.

Results

In this study, student teachers were asked to communicate and resolve tensions they had perceived to occur in a professional context between their personal features and teacher professional role expectations. Although the work assignment encouraged participants to formulate a coalition between their personal and professional positions, the respondents tended to incline towards solving the tensions by choosing one of the positions. In fact, the most popular strategy for solving tensions was through the utilization of professional position (N = 63; i.e., 54.3% out of all solutions), followed by an approach aiming to maintain the personal position (N = 22; i.e., 19.0% of all solutions), and thirdly, finding consensus by formulating a coalition between the aforementioned perspectives (N=14; i.e., 12.1% of all solutions).

Additionally, there were also cases where student teachers found help from a third party (i.e., an external regulation, for instance, colleagues or the curriculum) when solving tensions (N = 10; i.e., 8.6% of all answers). In N = 7 cases (i.e., 6.0% of all answers), the respondent’s strategy for solving tension between personal and professional positions could not be identified and was therefore marked as “Unknown.” These results indicate that student teachers find it difficult to form a coalition between their personal and professional positions when experiencing tensions; instead, they tend to manage tensions by choosing the perspective of a professional role rather than maintaining their personal position or looking for a consensus between their personal and professional positions.

The Types of Tensions Reported by Student Teachers

In addition to differentiating between the strategies for solving the tensions communicated by student teachers, this study also aimed to give insight into the nature of those tensions. Namely, in the process of data analysis, a distinction was made between student teachers’ reporting of (1) personal characteristics, (2) values or convictions, and (3) professional competence. Additionally, the source setting professional role expectation(s) was identified. A differentiation was made between (1) students and teaching process, (2) school management, (3) parents, (4) colleagues, (5) regulations (e.g., the curriculum), and (6) teachers themselves as the establishers of teacher professional role expectations. Next, a three-way crosstab was created on the basis of these three dimensions, that is, (1) the type of tension reported, (2) the context setting the role expectation(s), and (3) what strategies do student teachers use to solve the tensions communicated. The type of reported tensions along with the context of professional role expectations and student teachers’ choice of strategy when managing tensions is presented in Table 1.

Table 1 The type of tensions reported, the context setting professional role expectations and student teachers’ choice of strategies for solving tensions
Full size table

The tensions reported by student teachers tended to arise more often when it regarded teachers’ work in the classroom (i.e., communicating with the students and planning/leading the learning process) and less frequently when it involved teacher professional role expectations set by other stakeholders (e.g., parents, colleagues and school management). Regarding the nature of tensions reported, student teachers’ professional competence and values or convictions were referred to more often than their personal characteristics. Moreover, the most popular strategy for solving tensions was the utilization of a professional perspective; in fact, this approach was prevalent in managing all three types of tensions. However, when it regarded maintaining personal position(s), this strategy was strongly represented in the management of tensions involving student teachers’ values or convictions.

Recurring Themes That Create Tension Among Student Teachers

To begin with, student teachers named several tensions when recognizing the presence of a mismatch between their personal attributes/qualities and the expectations set for them in the professional role of a teacher. Some themes initiating tension(s) appeared more frequently. Those themes regarded, for instance, teacher’s physical appearance, self-expression (e.g., the use of spoken language in professional context), their activity in- and outside working hours as well as strictness and patience. As follows, an insight into the aforementioned themes is provided, utilizing text excerpts from student teachers’ written assignments.

Teacher’s Physical Appearance

Regarding teacher’s physical appearance, respondents perceived a tension to arise from the mismatch between the correctness and politeness expected from the attire of a professional versus wearing clothing that fits their comfort zone. For instance, it was indicated that “A teacher must have a correct and polite appearance, cannot look like a student. A teacher is inherent to a certain dress code,” however, “Since I am young, I dress accordingly. I like to wear jeans and shirts not skirts and pumps. I don’t feel comfortable wearing heels all the time.” As a resolution, in this case, it was denoted that “As a young teacher, I can dress politely. Thus, not wearing a costume, but a polite skirt and for example flat shoes. The main point is that the apparel would be polite, not for example an old sweatshirt and sneakers.” Another student teacher echoed that despite the “correct appearance” expected from a teacher, she can “sometimes be dressed in a manner that is not inherent to my role [as a teacher]. For example, like a student.” Similarly to the previous respondent, she too concluded that “I find the main point to be that the attire is proper and representative. How a person presents oneself is voluntary. The main thing is that the teacher does not dress very extreme. For instance, in fishnet stockings and a mini skirt.” Overall, when it regarded the physical appearance of a teacher, the respondents acknowledged a gap between their personal comfort and the correctness expected from a professional, and saw the solution in adapting to the requirements of politeness in attire while maintaining personality, since “if one does not feel comfortable in front of a class, nothing [good] comes of teaching.”

Teacher’s Self-Expression

Another theme that student teachers often referred to was teacher’s self-expression. Here, attention was paid to for example, the use of spoken language and the volume of voice. For instance, it was indicated that despite the concreteness and correctness of self-expression required from a teacher, several respondents were inclined to use spoken language in the professional context. As a solution, student teachers emphasized the need to acknowledge one’s inclination and prepare for the classes accordingly; that is, “one has to take more control over and think about what is being said. Instructions should be thought through and written down beforehand,” as well as “controlling my use of language, especially when it regards avoiding the words ‘quite’ and ‘like’. In case of a slip-up, I have corrected myself.” In addition, a tension was sensed from “Raising voice (not yelling) to keep order in class” whereas “in my nature, I don’t particularly like raising my voice on anyone, but there are situations where one has to be a little more strict.” As a solution, it was stated that “alternative methods need to be found to solve the discipline [situation] in class. Raising voice moderately is normal in order to gain attention. There is never any point in yelling as it may not make the situation better.” Overall, when it involves solving tensions regarding self-expression, student teachers tended to take the perspective of a professional.

Strictness and Patience

Moreover, the third theme emerging from student teachers written assignments involved teacher’s strictness and patience. For example, a tension was recognized between remaining “strict” and “order-ensuring” versus “being too casual and friendly” and “trying to please the majority.” As a solution, it was suggested “together with the students to put in place rules to follow so that the students know why they are punished when being wrong,” and claimed that “a balance has to be found between the roles of a friend and a teacher.”

Furthermore, in one case, the patience requested from a teacher was contradicted by “the desire that students would learn faster, understand quicker what I expect from them. A habit to explain only once.” Here, a solution was seen in the “better establishment of order in class so that children would listen to me and understand what they have to do,” and in the realization that “I just need to take into account that all kids don’t learn as fast.” In line with the previous, another respondent added that “by nature, I myself actually am patient, however, I presume that students answer my patience with efforts.” As a solution that same respondent conveyed the importance of self-regulation; that is, “I believe that as a teacher I should not be patient and indulgent for too long, but politely signal my actual discontentment before I blow up.” Hence, it can be concluded that the theme of teacher’s strictness and patience yielded in rather different solution patterns where no one specific strategy (i.e., the utilization of professional, personal, or coalition’s perspective) seemed to prevail.

Being Active (In- and Outside of School/Working Hours)

Lastly, the theme of teacher’s expected activity emerged from student teachers written assignments. Here, a tension was perceived to stem from finding an appropriate balance between one’s professional and personal life. For instance, it was stated that “a teacher has to be active (organizing and taking part in events outside school hours)” whereas “I myself am more calm. I enjoy spending time at home. I don’t like to perform in front of crowd.” As a solution, it was considered that “one should not fully book their schedule from the very beginning. [Instead] one should begin with 1–2 activities and later on consider whether to be more active. [Meanwhile] one cannot be totally inactive either. It may then happen that students, colleagues or school management will reproach this.” Consistent with the previous, another student teacher reported experiencing a tension between “being active in- and outside school hours” and “spending time with family, [since] I am very family-centred and don’t gladly give up time I spend with them.” The solution here was formed as follows: “As a consensus, I see a situation where I partake in certain suitable school events in order to merge with the community and show its significance for me. Meanwhile, I won’t let myself be over-ridden and will learn to politely turn down what doesn’t suit me and violates my right to personal leisure time.” Thus, it can be concluded that the tensions regarding finding balance between personal and professional life got solved mostly through the perspective of a coalition.

Unrealistic Professional Role Expectations

Data analysis revealed an interesting phenomenon regarding the character of professional role expectations expressed. Namely, there were cases where professional role expectations conveyed by student teachers were unrealistic and even absurd. Those expectations tended to be accompanied by hyperboles (e.g., always, never, with everyone). For instance, regarding teacher’s character, it was claimed that “a teacher is always positive and motivated,” as well as that “a teacher should be open and never get tired of speaking.” Moreover, concerning professional competence, it was indicated that “a teacher knows everything” and that “a teacher cannot make mistakes.” Such examples of professional role expectations bring into focus the perceived solvability of tensions experienced, that is, whether or not student teachers’ perceive to have the resources needed for solving the tension. For instance, the lack of skills can be overcome by practise whereas changing one’s personal traits to conform to the professional role is more challenging. In line with the socio-cultural approach to professionalization, the students’ personal representations of “the teacher,” that is, their images of who is and what is expected from a teacher (in- and outside of working hours), are crucial in the regulation of their’ inner psychological experiences (e.g., feeling tension) and overt behaviour (e.g., behavioural responses to the colleagues requests). Thus, mapping out students’ images of “the teacher” can result in a useful tool, directing the development of more realistic expectations that in turn (are assumed to) form the basis for students’ own professional conduct.

Discussion

The current article contributes to recent trends in teacher identity research (Leijen & Kullasepp, 2013a; Ligorio, 2011; Toompalu et al., 2016) and moves to the practical concerns of teacher education by proposing some support for facilitating negotiation of personal and professional positions in teacher education programs, and thereby possibly contributing to/enhancing student teachers’ adjustment into their (future) professional role. Drawing on concepts of “meta-position,” “coalition of positions,” and “borderland discourse,” an assignment was implemented to facilitate student teachers’ recognition and negotiation of different and (often) conflicting personal and professional positions in the course of teacher education. Below, we discuss the main findings of the empirical study.

It is interesting that although the students were prompted to create coalitions between conflicting positions, we witnessed the use of other strategies in solutions more often. On the one hand, the tendency to utilize professional position when solving tension(s) is understandable, as student teachers are embarking on a journey of professional identity development and taking the perspective of a professional in tense situations may help them in becoming one. It is expected that the internalization/externalization of role-related expectations that accompanies students’ movement to a new social position will be expressed in their responses to different kind of events as a sign of emerging personal culture shaped by the institutional representations, and/or the collective culture. On the other hand, there is a strong tradition in the field of teacher identity studies that for several decades has emphasised the importance of the “personal” side of professional identity development, and recently focused on the significance of dialogues between the professional and personal aspects of the self. These scholars claim that although teachers share some similar aspects in their professional identity, there is no uniform professional culture and every teacher develops to some extent their own unique teaching style (Feiman-Nemser & Floden, 1986). Despite the vast body of literature on professional identity development, the results from the current study seem to confirm the situation criticised by Alsup (2006), who pointed out that in many teacher education programs, issues related to professional demeanour, dress, and communication are touched upon. What is neglected, however, are “aspects of identity development that involve the integration of the personal self with the professional self, and the ‘taking on’ of a culturally scripted, often narrowly defined, professional role while maintaining individuality” (p. 4). Our findings did not only confirm the dominance of the professional discourse, but highlighted student teachers’ concerns related to the demeanour, dress, and communication.

Moreover, these findings are very important for the development of teacher education programs. As was noted earlier, student teachers in this sample followed a revised teacher education program, which, compared to the past arrangement, included much more attention to fieldwork and connecting theory with practice. It was expected that these changes will make teacher education more realistic and meaningful. Considering the results from the current study, it seems that the initial ideas have not been fully realized. Mentor teachers represent the profession and can probably help student teachers’ socialisation process into the field, but it seems that the latter are still not sufficiently supported to work on the deeper integration of their personal and professional selves. The need for further facilitation by mentor teachers for supporting the integration of students’ different positions was also pointed out by Winters (2013). More specifically, it is important to educate mentors to provide the so-called “third position” (see Hermans & Hermans-Konopka, 2010, chap. 3), that is, to identify specific dialogues that would enhance student teachers’ integration of their personal and professional positions and thereby promote successful adjustment in their (future) professional role.

The findings also revealed student teachers’ tendency to maintain personal position(s) when managing tensions involving their values. This can be explained, for instance, in terms of constructing meaning systems (Valsiner, 2007), where student teachers’ personal values seem to remain rather stable and shape their decisions when solving professional dilemmas. Although changing personal meanings is challenging, teacher education should create opportunities for reflecting on them to contribute to the development of constructive strategies for solving professional dilemmas.

What is more, another interesting finding was the presentation of unrealistic professional role expectations among student teachers. The respondents were teacher education students on their final year of studies, just half a year prior to being awarded the Master’s diploma and the consequent certificate to teach. As described in the theoretical framework, the construction of professional role is influenced by many experiences (including non-formal encounters and expectations). However, it is important to reflect on these implicitly and explicitly held beliefs and develop a meaningful understanding of oneself (see e.g., Poom-Valickis & Löfström, 2014). As illustrated by the results, these reflections do not take place alone. On the contrary, students need to be guided in this process. For example, the utilization of guided reflection procedures (e.g., Allas, Leijen, & Toom, 2017; Husu, Toom, & Patrikainen, 2008; Korthagen & Vasalos, 2005; Leijen & Sööt, 2016; Leijen, Valtna, Leijen, & Pedaste, 2012) is rather beneficial when exploring one’s personal positions and questioning their relationship (and possible fit) with the socially prescribed professional role expectations. Other useful pedagogies to explore personal beliefs, values and unique experiences that constitute teacher identity, as outlined by Leijen, Kullasepp, and Anspal (2014), are analysing novice teachers’ feelings connected with their profession (see e.g., Timoštšuk & Ugaste, 2012) and unlocking beliefs through metaphors (see e.g., Anspal, Eisenschmidt, & Löfström, 2012; Löfström & Poom-Valickis, 2013) in order to observe when the personal positions tend to cause tensions that hinder student teachers’ settling into their (future) professional role.