Katrijn Ballet

The micropolitics of teacher induction: a narrative-biographical study on teacher socialisation

Abstract The ‘praxis shock’ of beginning teachers not only has to do with issues at the classroom level, but also with teacher socialisation in the school as an organisation. This thesis was studied with beginning primary school teachers in Belgium. Combining a narrative-biographical and a micropolitical approach, the idea that teachers’ actions as members of an organisation are guided by professional interests had a central place in the study. Interpretive analysis of questionnaire and interview data revealed five categories of professional interests: material, organisational, social-professional, cultural-ideological and self-interests. Finally, it is argued that understanding beginning teachers’ micropolitical experiences is important not only for the theory development on teachers’ career-long learning, but also for improving the quality of teacher education and induction programmes.

Micropolitical Literacy: Reconstructing a Neglected Dimension in Teacher Development.

Abstract Teachers’ professional learning takes place in an organisational context, in which issues of power, influence, and control can play an important part. In this article, we argue that learning how to deal with these inevitable micropolitical aspects of their work lives, constitutes an important dimension in teachers’ professional development and needs to be included in any appropriate theory on teacher development. We describe this ‘political’ learning process as the development of micropolitical literacy. Although the development of micropolitical literacy may be stimulated and intensified by particular policy measures or reforms, as a learning process it starts at the very beginning of the teacher career. Using the micropolitical perspective as a theoretical framework, we will illustrate this by presenting the results of an interpretative analysis of one primary teachers story about his first years in teaching.

Workload and willingness to change: disentangling the experience of intensification

Teachers are facing an increasing number of changes in their job context, many of which significantly affect their work lives. This study offers a theoretical understanding of the changes in teachers’ working conditions, starting from the intensification thesis. The case study of a Flemish (Belgian) elementary school shows the existence of various and mutually reinforcing sources of intensification. Those sources emerge not only from outside school (e.g. policy‐makers and society), but also as teachers impose their own standards on their work. The case study exemplifies the compelling (and thus intensifying) character of a collective norm of willingness to innovate. However, this norm seems to act paradoxically: both as a support in dealing with external pressure and as an intensifying factor, increasing the workload. The possibly intensifying impact of changes on teachers’ working conditions is mediated by the school organization as well as the personal interpretative framework (sense‐making) of individual teachers.

The lucid loneliness of the gatekeeper: exploring the emotional dimension in principals’ work lives

Based on a secondary analysis of studies on Flemish primary schools, the article argues that the metaphor of the gatekeeper, on the threshold between the outside‐school and the inside‐school world, is a powerful frame to capture some of the particular complexities of principals’ emotional experience of themselves and their working conditions. More in particular, the image allows for a more refined and in‐depth understanding of the emotional and relational aspects in the position and role of the principal. Apart from depicting the working conditions of leadership in terms of the gatekeeper‐image, the authors contend that the inevitable normative character of education contributes to a sense of vulnerability and emotionality in leadership. Two themes appeared to be prominent in principals’ experience of their gatekeeper’s position: first, being caught in a web of conflicting loyalties and second, the struggle between loneliness and belonging. Underneath these themes—it is argued—lies the issue of the principal’s professional self in the particular school. The article concludes with suggestions for the training of (future) principals.

Surviving Diversity in Times of Performativity: Understanding Teachers’ Emotional Experience of Change

In this chapter we focus on the way teachers experience their job and their professional identity. Our narrative and biographical approach allows for an in-depth reconstruction of the political and moral tensions teachers experience; the pressure to reconceptualise their “selves”; and as a consequence the emotional quality of their work lives. We argue that the changes in the working conditions deeply affect teachers both in their professional actions and the emotional experience of the job. Teachers experience intense emotional conflicts as they struggle to cope with conflicting identity scenarios, the web of (conflicting) loyalties they find themselves in, etc. Our findings confirm, exemplify and deepen earlier work on vulnerability as a structural characteristic of the teaching job.

Beginning teachers’ job experiences in multi‐ethnic schools

Multi‐ethnic schools in Flanders are frequently portrayed – both in popular media and research – as highly problematic working environments for (beginning) teachers. This article reports on an exploratory study of beginning teachers’ experiences in one secondary multi‐ethnic school in Flanders. Based on data from questionnaires, document analysis and semi‐structured interviews with both six beginning teachers and two mentors, the study concluded that the structural and cultural working conditions as well as the personal belief systems of the teachers were essential to understand the actual impact of the multi‐ethnic character of the school on new teachers’ job experiences. Due to the mediating role of these factors, beginning teachers do not consider the multi‐cultural character of their working environment as problematic as such.