Session Information
10 SES 06 B, Research on Professional Knowledge and Identity in Teacher Education: Teachers' Resilience
Paper Session
Contribution
Research questions and objectives
To date, there has been little research which has investigated the nature, contexts and influences of these factors on teachers’ sense of resilience, and thus their capacity to teach effectively. Drawing upon empirical evidence from a four year national study on teachers’ work, lives and effectiveness in England, this paper seeks to redress the balance by examining circumstances and scenarios in which resilience is sustained or becomes eroded over time in different contexts. Key research questions include: i) what is the nature of teacher resilience, and ii) what are the key factors which affect, positively and/or negatively, teacher resilience in individual, relational and organisational settings in which they work.
Theoretical framework
The major advances in understandings of the concept of resilience in other disciplines provide an important conceptual basis for our analysis of teachers’ self-reported perceptions of resilience and how it may be nurtured, developed and sustained over time and in different contexts. In particular, research in developmental psychology argues that resilience should always be used when referring to a dynamic ‘process or phenomenon of competence’ which encompasses ‘positive adaptation within the context of significant adversity’ (Luthar et al., 2000: 554). This process involves ‘a developmental progression, such that new vulnerabilities and/or strengths often emerge with changing life circumstances’ (Luthar et al., 2000: 544).
Teacher resilience
Teachers work takes place in individual (micro level), relational and organisational settings (meso level). The nature of these, together with that of the wider social and cultural structure in which the settings locate, influences the meaning and effectiveness of education, teachers and teaching. Its nature and sustainability throughout a career will be determined by the interaction between the strength of the vocation of individual teachers, those whom they meet as part of their daily work and the collective resilience of the organisation in its internal and external environments; and teachers’ capacities to manage unanticipated as well as anticipated events effectively will be mediated by these.
We argue, then from a psycho/socio-cultural perspective, that teacher resilience is at least in part influenced positively and negatively by individual biology and biographies, organisational cultures and the quality of conditions and relationships in classrooms and staffrooms. It i) can contribute to teachers’ capacities to be effectiveness; ii) is constructed, deconstructed and reconstructed psychologically and socially, denoting a dynamic state and a ‘developable capacity’ (Luthans, 2002: 702) which can be fostered or eroded in the interaction between teachers’ inventories of physiological, cognitive, affective and social assets, their underlying values and beliefs (Luthans et al., 2007; see also Masten and Reed, 2002) and the personal and professional support mechanisms in their workplace; and iii) is managed and mediated within the changing landscapes, sites of struggle of teachers’ work and lives. It is, therefore, not necessarily stable or sustained. Because of this, it is an important indicator of teachers’ capacity to teach to their best and, thus, a key factor in teachers’ capacities to maintain or improve standards.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Luthans, F. (2002). The need for and meaning of positive organizational behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 23, 695–706. Luthans, F., Avolio, B.J., Avey, J.B., & Norman, S.M. (2007) Positive psychological capital: Measurement and relationship with performance and satisfaction. Personnel Psychology, 60: 541-572. Luthar, S. S., Cicchetti, D., & Becker, B. (2000) The construct of resilience: A critical evaluation and guidelines for future work. Child Development, 71, 543–562. Masten, A. S. & Reed, M. G. J. (2002) Resilience in development. In C. R. Snyder, & S. Lopez (Eds.) Handbook of positive psychology (pp. 74–88). Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press.
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