Exploring the Construction of Novice EFL Teachers’ Identity in University Context

Abstract

The issue about teacher identity has been interesting to be observed by researchers in the past decades, not only in science but also language. Understanding teacher identity becomes important for teacher, both novice and experienced teacher in which they need to shape and to develop professional identity. Become a teacher needs continuous process then it will be essential to understand the professional teacher identity. This research aims at exploring the construction of novice EFL teachers’ identity in university context. This research is qualitative research which takes written or spoken words of some individual’s personal stories as data for analysis. This research used narrative study to reveal the challenges and the experiences of novice EFL teachers. This research adopted TESOL teacher identity frameworks by Pennington (2014) to capture the participants’ narrative and utterances which indicate the teacher identity construction. The findings show that teachers’ identity was constructed by the participants as novice EFL teachers through the implementations of teaching practices within professional development in university context that includes teaching strategies application, the knowledge field mastering, professional comprehension, teaching commitment, and life need fulfillment. It was also influenced by intrinsic and extrinsic factors. Intrinsic factors include the participants’ motivation, satisfaction, and competence. Extrinsic factors include the participants’ work environment, job career, students’ need and interaction with colleagues. It is suggested for further researchers to conduct the research by investigating teacher identity construction in other educational contexts. Besides, it is suggested for further researcher to adopt other identity frameworks that will enrich the data analysis of teacher identity and uncover various identity issues reflected in educational practices.