Slovenian EFL Teachers and the Career Cycle
Jane E. Hardy
Jane Hardy teaches in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Indiana, US. She lived previously in Slovenia, where she worked at the University of Ljubljana and the Slovenian Ministry of Defense School of Foreign Languages. Her interests include teacher beliefs, the teacher career cycle, and students' attitudes towards foreign language learning. E-mail: hardyj@wabash.edu
Menu
1. Introduction
2. Summary of Two Previous Studies
3. Points of Similarity
3.1 Career Entry
3.2 Experimentation and/or Reassessment
3.3 Shift in Emphasis in Work
3.4 Turning Points and Critical Persons
4. Areas of Difference
5. Comparison with Polish EFL Teachers
6. Conclusion
Acknowledgements
References
What made you decide to become an English teacher? How would you describe your first teaching position? What is language learning? These are just a few of the many questions explored in the present study of the professional life stories of EFL teachers in Slovenia. There has been a growing body of research in the area of teacher beliefs, teacher life narratives, and the teacher career cycle. The following study of teachers in Slovenia may provide an additional point of reference in our expanding knowledge base on teacher education and development (as advocated by Freeman and Johnson, 1998).
To investigate the beliefs and life narratives of Slovenian EFL teachers, ten Slovenian teachers of English at the tertiary level were interviewed. Only teachers at the tertiary level were included in order to limit the amount of variability within the population. Five of the teachers were working as language instructors in the Department of English at the University of Ljubljana, and five in 3- or 4-year schools of natural or social sciences. All ten teachers were Slovenian women. They ranged in age from 27 to 52, and had between 7 and 28 years of teaching experience. Each teacher was interviewed one time in a semi-structured format according to the standard methods of qualitative interviewing as outlined in Rubin & Rubin (1995), for example. The interviews followed a core of questions, but the questions were not necessarily followed in any given order, and the interviewees were allowed to introduce and discuss other topics. The interviews were conducted in English, lasted between 35 and 75 minutes, and were recorded.
Although many topics were discussed in the interviews, the focus of the present article is on just one: the teacher career cycle. I will compare my findings with those of three other studies: Huberman's (1989) study of secondary school teachers in Switzerland; Kelchtermans' (1993) study of Flemish primary school teachers in Belgium; and Johnston's (1997) study of EFL teachers in Poland.
Huberman identified several stages in the career cycle of Swiss secondary school teachers, which are summarized below. (These were also summarized in Woodward, 2000):
Huberman identified several stages in the career cycle of Swiss secondary school teachers, which are summarized below. (These were also summarized in Woodward, 2000):
1-3 years: Career entry: painful or easy beginnings; survival, discovery, reality shock.
4-6 years: Stabilization: taking on adult responsibilities; making a commitment to a defined professional goal; giving up other options.
7-18 years: Experimentation/Activism: experimenting with different materials, student groupings, sequencing; attempts to make institutional changes.
7-18 years: Reassessment/Self-doubts: growing sense of monotony (between the 12th and 20th year of teaching); thoughts of leaving teaching; realizing that other careers will have to be ruled out if they do not move quickly.
19-30 years: Serenity/Relational Distance: more "mechanical," "relaxed," "self-accepting."
19-30 years: Conservatism: resistance to innovation, nostalgia for the past; concern with holding on to what one has rather than with getting what one wants.
31-40 years: Disengagement: disengaging from investment in work; serene or bitter.
It should be noted that these phases represent stages that teachers tended to go through as a group, but they do not necessarily reflect the cycle of any one particular teacher. Furthermore, the stages are not necessarily linear, and not all teachers go through all of the phases.
Kelchtermans (1993) did not present a sequence of phases in a cycle by years of experience, but he identified some common trends and recurring themes among the Flemish primary school teachers that he interviewed, including the following:
1.) Teachers reported a shift in emphasis in their work over time
2.) Certain events or persons functioned as 'turning points' (critical incidents or critical persons) in the teachers' lives
3.) Teachers had a primary concern with stability in the job situation
4.) Teachers perceived themselves as vulnerable to the outside world
Based on the way the Slovenian teachers in our study described their professional lives, they appear to fit into Huberman's framework in some ways, but not in others. Likewise, some of the recurring themes in Kelchtermans' study are apparent among the Slovenian teachers, but others are not. To illustrate my analysis, I will present some relevant quotes (reported with fictitious names) taken from the interviews with Slovenian teachers. Although there was some variation among the Slovenian teachers, the quotes which I have selected are representative of the group as a whole.
Huberman describes career entry as a period of survival, discovery, and reality shock. Teachers in his study experienced either 'painful' or 'easy' beginnings to their teaching careers. Similarly, some of the Slovenian teachers described their career entries as painful and others as easy. Monika, for example, described her first teaching experience as especially difficult:
Monika: I had no training at all. I was given some instructions, that was about an hour, and then I went straight into the classroom. And I taught for one and a half hours, and the teacher who was supposed to introduce me to teaching was there observing. And this was the most stressful moment of my life, I think, because I was teaching for the very first time in my life, I had to teach for one and a half hours, and I ran out of materials twenty minutes before the end.
In contrast, Ana described her first teaching position positively:
Ana: … and I applied for the English teacher position and I was accepted. So, you know, it came sort of naturally. Then I never thought about finding a different sort of job anymore … And I think most of it, that I liked being in the classroom and the children didn't bother me. I mean, I liked them very much. Every day I got something in return. You know, I came here and felt fulfilled, and especially when I started teaching English.
The Slovenian teachers also showed through their interview responses that they had engaged in some kind of experimentation and reassessment of their teaching, which corresponds to the phase Huberman identified at about 7-18 years of teaching. Huberman characterizes this phase as one of experimentation with different materials, student groupings, and sequencing; and attempts to make institutional changes. It is clear that Barbara had engaged in some reassessment of her teaching when she described changes in her beliefs about language learning. When asked to complete the sentence "Language learning is …," Barbara answered:
Barbara: Doing something else, trying to be communicative and using the foreign language as the working language.
Interviewer: 15 years ago?
Barbara: Well, 15 years ago, I would say, "Language learning. That's grammar exercises, a little of vocabulary and filling in the dialogue." Yeah, we did a lot of that.
Some of the Slovenian teachers also indicated a shift in emphasis in their work, as did the teachers in Kelchtermans' study. More specifically, Kelchtermans found that his teachers tended to emphasize 'pedagogical work' over transmission of knowledge over time, and began to pay more attention to the social and emotional well-being of students and understanding their personal problems. In the present study, Ivana indicated that her feelings about her students changed over time:
Interviewer: Did you feel the same way about your students when you first started teaching?
Ivana: I don't think so … You learn that through other things in life as well, not just longer experience as a teacher. Also through being a parent, through other social contexts, different jobs that you had, different colleagues. So all these things I think contribute to that final realization that people are far more different than you think when you are a young person.
Katja also indicated a concern for the personal well-being of her students:
Katja: Teaching has a lot to do with being involved with students as well. Because these students, when they come to university, most of them are on their own for the first time, they are away from their parents and families and they do go through a lot of changes, and I've been through this, I went through the same thing years ago. So at least I have some similar experience …. I've got quite a motherly energy in the classroom, I'd say … I can show them that I like them, you know.
Finally, like the teachers in Kelchtermans' study, several of the Slovenian teachers mentioned turning points in their careers. Katja described her first year of teaching as a critical time in her career, and actually uses the expression "turning point." Jasna described an influential teacher who could be considered a critical person in her development as a teacher.
Katja: … the first year I was teaching there [at the University of Ljubljana], they asked me to teach fourth year students who were basically a couple years, three years younger, some of them more, and some of them even older than I was … and that was turning point because I would all the time, you know, they know so much, and I over-prepared all the time .… that was really, really difficult for me. I never knew whether they liked it, I never knew whether they regarded me as somebody who knew anything about the subject …. But I, I know that I came a long way from there …. At the beginning I wouldn't dare to move from what I had prepared at home, you know, but now I have my ideas, and I would feel comfortable with it … if there was, somebody started a discussion that wasn't planned, and I think it's useful, would just go with it.
Jasna: One thing I can say for sure is that it [a teacher's influence] influenced my teaching in more ways than I am aware. After maybe a year or so of actually teaching myself, and teaching properly, I realized that I had the same kind of, same kind of style, same kind of classroom presence, and I was saying the same kind of things as my secondary school teacher. Same kind of attitude towards my students, I guess.
Although the Slovenian teachers appeared to parallel the teachers in Huberman's and Kelchtermans' studies, they differed in a few notable ways. One point of difference is Huberman's stage of stabilization, which he describes as making a commitment to a professional goal and giving up other career options. The Slovenian teachers did seem to stabilize in the sense that they became more confident and comfortable in their work. However, all of them seemed to have made a commitment to teaching early on-in some cases in childhood, or at the very latest at the time of finishing university. There was no evidence that the teachers continued to cling to other options which they gave up at a later stage in their careers. This is exemplified in the following quotes by Ivana and Monika:
Ivana: I was considering becoming a teacher in primary school. I have always said I would be a teacher .… Why did I think in primary school that I would be a teacher? I remember that I had dolls at the time and I disguised them all and gave them roles of pupils and I was the one who was teaching them, I think tests and so on. This is how it started …. And I remember an aunt of mine asking me why was I going to become a teacher? Why would I want to study for a teacher? You're good at school, so it's not necessary for you … everybody felt that being a teacher was not a job that one should strive for ….
Interviewer: What did you say to that?
Ivana: … I don't know, usually I said that I wanted to do that. Why wouldn't I? I know that I always, from a young age on, I wanted to be a teacher …
Monika: I wanted to teach English. That's why I became a teacher. I went to study English because I wanted to teach English.
Another way in which the Slovenian teachers differed from the teachers in Huberman's study was at the stage of self-doubt. Huberman characterized this as a period of monotony which included thoughts of leaving teaching. Although some of the Slovenian teachers expressed doubts about their abilities at the beginning of their careers, these doubts did not parallel this part of Huberman's model. In fact, all of the teachers seemed very much committed to teaching and enthusiastic about their work. There was also nothing in the Slovenian teachers' discourse which corresponded to Huberman's stage of conservatism, which he described as resistance to innovation and nostalgia for the past. As for his stage of serenity/relational distance, the Slovenian teachers did describe themselves as becoming more relaxed and self-accepting, but this seemed to happen much earlier in their careers than where Huberman puts it (19-30 years of experience). Finally, none of the teachers seemed to have reached the point of disengagement-at least not yet.
As for the recurring themes in the career stories of Kelchtermans' teachers, the Slovenian teachers did not indicate a primary concern with job stability, nor was vulnerability to the outside world a strong theme in any of the interviews. This difference can easily be accounted for by the very different educational systems in which the two groups of teachers were working. The Belgian primary school teachers in Kelchtermans' study were particularly concerned with getting a 'lifelong assignment,' which makes it nearly impossible for a teacher to get fired, and also represents a formal recognition on the part of the school board of a teacher's professional competence (Kelchtermans, 1993). There is nothing parallel to this lifelong assignment in the Slovenian teachers' environment.
A final point of comparison with the present study is Johnston's 1997 study of EFL teachers in Poland, 'Do EFL Teachers have Careers?' The answer to the question he poses in the title seems to be 'no' based on the way the teachers he interviewed talked about themselves and their work.
On the surface, the context in which the Polish EFL teachers were working would seem to parallel that of the Slovenian teachers. His teachers were working at a time of rapid economic and social change in their country, when there was a sudden growth in EFL and private language schools. However, the discourse used by the Polish teachers to describe their professional lives sounded very different from that used by the Slovenian teachers.
First, nearly all of the Polish teachers held down two jobs or more along with other work such as private lessons. Many worked in both the private and public sector. This was done for economic reasons, and often resulted in a lack of time for the teachers to prepare properly. Slovenian teachers also supplement their income by taking on external contract work. However, English teachers at the tertiary level in Slovenia earn more than the average salary, so they have the financial freedom to turn down extra work if they feel that it would interfere with their primary job.
Second, the Polish teachers described their entry into teaching as accidental or as a second choice. In fact, none of them described teaching as their first choice of occupation. This was obviously very different for the Slovenian teachers, as indicated in the above quotes by Ivana and Monika with reference to the stage of stabilization. In fact, all of the Slovenian teachers described teaching as their professional goal.
Third, EFL was described by the Polish teachers as a 'permeable' occupation-that is, a profession which is easy to enter and easy to leave. The possibility of leaving teaching was constantly present in the teachers' discourse. Job changes represented "skillful adaptation to changing circumstances rather than progression along a career path" (p. 692). In contrast, all of the Slovenian teachers seemed content with their decisions to become English teachers, and none mentioned the possibility of leaving teaching.
Finally, the Polish teachers drew on alternative identities. Non-native speaking teachers preferred the identity of 'expert speaker of English,' which may have lent them greater flexibility. In contrast, the Slovenian teachers very clearly identified themselves as English teachers.
Although I have emphasized the differences between the Slovenian teachers and the teachers from the three other studies, the differences are neither surprising nor difficult to account for in light of the fact that the four studies were conducted in different countries and in quite different contexts. As mentioned in the introduction, Huberman's subjects were secondary school teachers and Kelchtermans' subjects taught at the primary level. Johnston's subjects taught in a variety of contexts: in primary schools, high schools, private language schools, a teacher training college, and at the British Council Centre.
In spite of these differences, it is interesting to compare the four groups of teachers as a means of contributing to the broader knowledge of teacher career cycles and as a first step in determining which factors (such as level of instruction or the national educational system) may affect the career cycle. Furthermore, for those involved in teacher training, it is helpful to look at the stages teachers in different contexts may go through during their careers and how they develop professionally over time. Finally, for anyone who teaches, self-reflection and discussion of the career cycle with colleagues can be a beneficial way of examining where we are in our careers and where we would like to be.
I am grateful to the ten Slovenian teachers who willingly gave of their time to be interviewed for the present study. I am also grateful to Lisa Harshbarger, my original co-investigator, who worked with me on the initial conceptualization of the study, data collection, and analysis.
Freeman, D. and Johnson, K. (1998). Reconceptualizing the knowledge-base of language teacher education. TESOL Quarterly, 32, 397-417.
Huberman, M. (1989). The professional life cycle of teachers. Teachers College Record, 91, 31-57.
Johnston, B. (1997). Do EFL teachers have careers? TESOL Quarterly, 31, 681-712.
Kelchtermans, G. (1993). Getting the story, understanding the lives: From career stories to teachers' professional development. Teaching & Teacher Education, 9, 443-456.
Rubin, H.J., & Rubin, I.S. (1995). Qualitative Interviewing: The art of hearing data. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Woodward, T. (2000). The professional life cycles of teachers. IATEFL Slovenia Newsletter, 13, 10-11.
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