RESEARCH ARTICLE


Irish Physical Education Cooperating Teachers’ Experiences of Learning to Become a ‘Teacher of Teachers’



Ann-Marie Young1, *, Ann MacPhail2
1 Department of Education and Professional Studies, University of Limerick, Ireland
2 Department of Physical Education and Sport Sciences, University of Limerick, Ireland


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Creative Commons License
© 2014 Young et al.

open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

* Address correspondence to this author at the Department of Education and Professional Studies, University of Limerick, Ireland; Tel: 00353 61234810; Fax: 00353 61331673; E-mail: AnnMarie.Young@ul.ie


Abstract

This article presents case studies detailing the learning trajectories of two physical education (cooperating) teachers as they strive to establish and maintain their identity as competent and confident supervisors to pre-service teachers on school placement. The cooperating teachers who participated in the study share their experiences in attempting to construct a professional identity within the school placement triad. Lave and Wenger’s (1991) theory of situated learning and the concept of legitimate peripheral participation were employed to investigate each of the cooperating teacher’s journeys in their attempt to shape their professional identity through participation in a variety of professional learning communities. The data revealed that the cooperating teachers experienced various forms of legitimate peripheral participation and, as a result, their learning trajectories and attempts to construct professional identities were diverse. The cooperating teachers’ learning did not always follow a positive trajectory, often meeting obstacles, resulting in the teachers experiencing both highs and lows during the supervision process.

Keywords: Professional identity, legitimate peripheral participation, professional learning communities.