A Moral Voice of Vocation in Teachers' Narratives

This article examines the teacher's vocation as a moral voice and its manifestation in the form of caring in teachers' descriptions of their own practices. Vocation is ultimately adopted in practice and it also shapes practice. In our attempt to be sensitive to what teachers have to say on the subject of vocation, we present here the life stories of three teachers and describe the content of their vocation and the way in which their sense of vocation developed. We also analyze caring as 'an answer' to the vocational call within the teachers' descriptions of their practices. We argue that by revitalizing the concept of vocation and by being sensitive to the teachers' own language, we are able to better understand the essence of teacherhood from teachers' own perspectives.