Initial teacher education for autonomy - Using Possible Selves Theory to help student teachers construct their professional identity

Abstract

Teacher education for learner and teacher autonomy is one of the greatest challenges faced by the profession. This challenge involves facilitating student teachers’construction of their professional identity, giving them the possibility of having an active role in the process. The construction of a professional identity is not the result of an academic degree but a dynamic process influenced by both personal and professional factors. Furthermore, it is a process that begins when the individual starts school, continues during initial teacher education and throughout one’s professional career. In this paper I set to explore the way in which the notion of “possible selves”(Markus and Nurius, 1986) understood as conceptions of our selves in future states can help student teachers develop and elaborate their own possible self in writing as the conclusion to the course portfolio and then seeking spaces for manoeuvre in the practicum so as to be guided by it in the teaching they do in this period.