Teaching, upbringing, and something else. Vocational teachers' professional identity from the perspective of everyday practices
Keywords:
professional identity, qualitative research, teacherhood, vocational education and training, vocational teachersAbstract
In the article, I analyzed the professional identity of Finnish vocational teachers. As my analytical framework, I utilized the theory of communities of practice. According to this theory, identity is based on actors’ participation in meaningful communities and their practices, and, in my analysis, I focused especially on vocational teachers’ practices of teaching and upbringing. First, I asked what proportion of their daily work did teachers view as teaching and how much of their work was upbringing; secondly, I asked what teachers considered as teaching and upbringing in their work; and thirdly, I asked what was the relationship between teaching and upbringing in teachers’ work. As my data, I utilized 14 vocational teachers’ focus group interviews, and as my method I applied qualitative classification analysis. According to the analysis, vocational teachers identified themselves both with teaching and upbringing. From their perspective, teaching referred to teacher-centered working based on schedule, curriculum, and traditional habits. Upbringing referred to consideration of students’ welfare and other learning conditions, personal encounters with students, and preparing the students also for something more than mere working life. Neither field of practice alone was enough for the interviewed teachers, and they aimed to combine both in their professional identity. However, there is no clear and established term for this combination, and it is often called as “new” or “changing” teacherhood in Finnish discussions on vocational education. I propose that the clarification and systematization of this working style and professional identity as a part of teachers’ everyday work and its practices is a crucial part for the development of Finnish vocational education.
