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1. Factors That Impact Reform-Oriented Practices of First Year Science Teachers • Association for Science Teacher Education • January 10, 2013 Lori M. Ihrig, Jesse Wilcox, Joanne K. Olson, and Michael P. Clough • Purpose • To understand novice science teachers’ perceptions of factors that influenced their practice during their first year. • Part of a larger longitudinal project exploring the navigation of support relationships by a cohort of Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) graduates and the relationship, if any, that exists between new teachers’ support relationships, experiences, and reform-oriented practices during the first two years of teaching. • Background • The Nature of Novice Teacher Support. • Peer and administrative support is correlated with reduced teacher attrition (Bang et al. 2007; Hancock and Sherff, 2010). • Proximity is a significant factor in determining whom novice teachers relied upon for support (Luft, 2009). • However Herman (2010) found that high implementation teachers actively sought and received support from “like-minded” graduates of the same TEP. • Alignment of TEP and Novice Teacher Support. The longitudinal project explores the generally accepted belief that programs to support new teachers are crucial during the induction years and investigates the hypothesis that how new teachers establish and navigate formal and informal support relationships may vary depending on the alignment of supports to new teachers’ beliefs about practice developed through their TEP. Exploring hypotheses such as this will generate evidence that can be used to make informed decisions about how to improve TEPs and mentoring programs. • Research Questions • To what extent do novice teachers value their pre-service education? • To what extent are graduates’ reflections on their practice and congruent with the research-based thinking and action promoted in their TEP? • How do novice teachers establish and navigate formal and informal support relationships? • Research Design and Methods • Participants (See Table 1.) • 10 of 12 members of the same cohort of students who earned MAT degrees • 3 female; 7 male • Midwestern secondary school settings • Methodology, Data Collection and Analysis. • Qualitative methodology with a phenomenological design (Creswell, 2013). • Data sources included: • Semi-structured interview, audio recorded (1-2 hours) • Analysis involved: • Open-coding and analytic memos (Esterberg, 2002) to form initial themes. • Data reduction involved constant comparative analysis (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) to compare data within and between categories (Anfara, Brown, & Mangione, 2002). Data were further reduced via secondary analysis. • Table 1. Participants’ Teaching Contexts • Findings • Value of TEP. All of the participants, to some extent, found the TEP to be of value. Participants made recommendations for more emphasis on specific topics. One participant attributed his good days to the strong modeling of effective practice, while another defended the TEP to his administration. • (Professor) can model effective teaching very well. My good days... I did all of the positive nonverbals, I asked appropriate questions, everything just went smoothly… A great modeler of effective teaching, and I don’t think you can ever really beat that part of the program. —Mason • Use of Research-based Explanations During Reflection. All of the participants, to some extent, reflected on their strengths and weaknesses through the lens of research-based practice, demonstrating some congruence between their beliefs about teaching and their reflective practice. • While Emma primarily focused on other criteria she still reflected on her practice through a research-based framework. • Questioning, I mean I know I can do better there too as well, but I feel that I’m beginning to understand where my students are coming from more. And then how I can question them to lead them to an answers, or scaffold them I should say, to the understanding that I want. I feel more developed than I was, but not as much as I need to be. —Emma • Participants Navigated Support. All of the participants felt they had to navigate the support offered to them by others. • Hannah avoidedcollegial constraints by remaining quiet during meetings and not drawing attention to herself. • I am in the unique situation that I don't have to collaborate with people in terms of lining up my curriculum with someone else's curriculum in the building. So because it's such a great opportunity and allows me to do and try different things and do what I want to do with the classes that I teach. I'd rather keep it opportunity open. —Hannah • Teachers also selectively conformed to the practice of those around them. • I know that there were certain programs or strategies they wanted to see used in the district…I would work it in and try to incorporate it…I sprinkled them in when I could. —Ethan • I could do things the way I wanted to do most of the time and could fit their 10 minute little reading strategy… —Andrea • They resisted attempts to change their practice by being subversive. • I am a master con artist with my administration. I made it look like I was doing what they wanted me to do to a certain extent… I mean I bamboozled them. I put on a smile, I was charming, I knew what they did to other staff members and I didn’t want that to happen to me…You have to be familiar with whatever [professional development] junk [the administration is] throwing at you. So you have to kind of read it; you have to be up to date on it because if they do walk into your class you have to flip that switch. And you got to… figure out what kind of buzzwords they want to hear and then use them. —Chris • They navigated support and selected the types of support they would seek out from specific individuals. • I had support from colleagues for all sorts of things that were useful, they helped me find equipment… but my colleagues are not necessarily attuned to the sorts of instruction that I am… In that regard I couldn’t get much support from them on that front. —Jack • Conclusions • Novice teachers find value in research-based practice promoted by their teacher education program and implemented research-based practices in their reflections. • When their mentors (formal and informal) did not understand, value, or promote research-based practice, novice teachers’ implementation and development of research-based practices was undermined. Encountering mentors that do not find value in research-based practice is likely a common occurrence (Martin, 1989). In these situations novice teachers are being placed in difficult to navigate relationships where they lack the power of expertise and seniority. • The participants in this study navigated undesirable support. They avoided collegial constraints, conformed to practices they did not believe in, resisted support through subversion, and intentionally and purposefully manipulated support relationships. • Implications • Complex factors beyond proximity are impacting the navigation of support relationships by MAT students of this TEP. • The support relationships extended to novice teachers have the potential to undermine the beliefs and practices teachers developed in their TEPand decrease retention of effective novice teachers. • TEPs should purposefully foster support relationships between cohort members, amongst members of different cohorts, and with other like-minded teachers. • TEPs should develop, implement, and research mentorship programs to support their graduates during their induction years. • References • Anfara, V. A., Brown, K. M., & Mangione, T. L. (2002). Qualitative analysis on stage: Making the research process more • public. Educational Researcher, 31(7), 28-38. • Bang, E. J., Kern, A. K., Luft, J. A., & Roehrig, G. H. (2007). First-year secondary science teachers: A research brief. • School Science and Mathematics, 107(6), 258–261. • Creswell, J. (2013). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five traditions. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. • Esterberg, K. (2002). Qualitative methods in social research. New York: McGraw-Hill. • Hancock C. B., & Scherff, L. (2010). Who will stay and who will leave? Predicting secondary English teacher attrition risk. • Journal of Teacher Education, 61(4), 328–338. • Herman, B. C. (2010). Teaching the nature of science: Practices and associated factors. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). • Iowa State University, Ames, IA. • Luft, J. A. (2009). Beginning secondary science teachers in different induction programmes: The first year of teaching . • Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 40(1), 77–97. • Glaser, B. G., & Strauss, A. (1967). The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitativeresearch. 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