Teacher quality is not often defined but can be understood through the way that policies and expectations for teaching quality are talked about and talked into being. How do early career teachers (ECTs) navigate high expectations of becoming quality teachers, especially when there are several discourses of quality, some prominent and others less…

This study seeks to investigate the scope and quality of reflective practice in ELT in contemporary Ukraine. 56 English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers were surveyed to gain a better understanding of reflective practice in the country. Data were collected using both a quantitative (questionnaire) and qualitative (interview) method. The…

Many early-career teachers (ECTs) begin their teaching careers in rural and remote schools in Australia, and do not stay long, with consequences for their own lives, and for their students, schools and communities. By understanding how first-year ECTs navigate personal (subjective) and contextual (objective) conditions, opportunities to disrupt…

Research literature often addresses the problems entailed in the integration of beginning teachers within the education system. Most studies emphasize the conflicts these teachers experience, especially between the personal and professional aspects of their profession. We conducted qualitative research among participants and graduates of the…

The goal of our project was to develop an understanding of the connections among emotional episodes and emerging professional teacher identities of first year teachers. We interviewed eight first year mathematics and science teachers. We asked them to reflect on emotional episodes and talk about how those emotions informed their teaching…

If teaching is a complex act, it is additionally complex for first-year teachers', who enter with the same responsibilities as veteran teachers yet encounter specific difficulties as beginning teachers. This paper uses existing research on beginning English teachers major concerns to frame the exploration of concerns faced by four beginning…

Just as linguistic errors have provided insights into the nature of linguistic competence(s), detailed analyses of blind spots or "marked trajectories" in the reflection cycles of novice teachers may provide a window on their underlying beliefs, and thus on relevant zones of proximal development. In this paper we analyse a case study in an…

The development of beginning teachers' practice during a school placement is a multiplicity of mediated interaction between university and school based systems. Both systems have the common aim of training effective teachers. However day-to-day internal institution matters can cause tension between the learning goals set out for the beginning…