Teachers in rural schools are often caught in a binary between a curriculum and "official" pedagogies that value cosmopolitan ways of being and their own situated concerns for the interests of the students they teach and the communities in which they live. In this paper I draw on the example of two categories of (history) teachers, those…

In this paper, we describe how and why we adopted a socially critical orientation to early career teacher resilience. In re-conceptualising early career teacher resilience, we expose the normative components of resilience by revealing the implicit values, beliefs and assumptions that underpin most traditional conceptions of resilience. We argue…

Induction programs largely focus on informing the beginning teacher about the school culture and infrastructure yet the core business of education is teaching and learning. This qualitative study uses a survey, questionnaire, and interviews to investigate 10 beginning teachers' needs towards becoming effective teachers in their first year of…

This paper considers the implications of mentoring for the discursive formation of professional identities of newly graduated teachers. The site for this analysis is the Teacher Mentoring and Induction Program, in Victoria, Australia. The paper draws attention to the effects of mentoring as conceived in this context on the construction of new…

According to Bandura (1986; 1997), perceptions of efficacy are based on four sources: enactive attainment; vicarious experience; physiological and emotional states; and verbal persuasion. The factors affecting Early Career Teachers' self-efficacy for reading instruction are closely related to these four sources. It is not difficult to imagine an…

In this paper the written feedback provided by mentor teachers using a new assessment model for preservice teacher professional experience deployed in the Australian Capital Territory and based on the Australian National Standards for Teachers is analysed. The analysis reveals mentor teachers hold a pervasive theory-in-use in regards to the needs…

In considering the blurring of boundaries between vocational education and school education since the introduction of Vocational Education and Training in Schools (VETiS) in the senior secondary school system in Australia, it could be argued that the key figures in practice are the VET teachers in schools. The focus in this paper is 12…

Policy documents informing the profession of teaching in Australia and elsewhere explicitly recommend nurturing those new to the profession working collaboratively with colleagues. Key to the development and growth of beginning teachers is the informal exchange of ideas and knowledge between colleagues--essentially through the functioning of a…

In this paper, we undertake a brief review of the "conventional" research into the problems of early career teachers to create a juxtaposed position from which to launch an alternative approach based on resilience theory. We outline four reasons why a new contextualised, social theory of resilience has the potential to open up the field…

For students in Years 1-10 in Queensland, Australia, The Arts (hereafter referred to as "arts") is one of eight Key Learning Areas in the core curriculum. Yet, while arts--comprising five strands including music--is a mandatory component of the curriculum, implementation varies widely. This occurs for a range of reasons, one of which is…

This paper presents experiences and responses of a first-year teacher, Emily, who participated in research exploring the identity formation of early career teachers. 14 teachers were recruited from South Australian schools and Emily was one of four participants working in a rural school in her first year of teaching. What emerged from her…

As educators encounter a policy landscape where increasingly the education lexicon includes keywords such as data, evidence, quality, and standards, it is interesting to revisit Garth Boomer's contribution regarding teachers as researchers. In "Fair Dinkum Teaching and Learning," Boomer (1985) clearly named at least two key problems that…

This paper presents preliminary data from a mentoring program, initiated in response to widespread Government reform policy that targeted early childhood teachers who were new or professionally isolated. It was implemented over a period of two years (2011-2012) in the state of Victoria, Australia. The paper focuses on the voices of these future…

This article focuses on the induction and mentoring of early career teachers. The context is a suburban primary school in Victoria, Australia, as the school develops mentoring networks for graduate and beginning teachers. Instigated from a school-university partnership, the research draws from the traditions of practitioner research. In the…

This article reports on a study of academics who observed their colleagues' teaching at a large research-intensive university in Australia. These academics had completed peer observation as part of a foundations programme designed for those new to teaching or new to the university. Survey responses and interview transcripts form the basis of an…