Fostering elementary school English teachers’ professional identity through artifacts of practice

ABSTRACT

Documents, interviews, and observation notes were used to analyze 19 Taiwanese elementary school English teachers’ professional identity construction through artifacts and tools. The conceptual framework was adopted from Wetzler’s (2010) Teacher Learning and Performance and Wertsch’s (1998) three conceptual terms of artifacts. The study concluded two findings. First, the power and authority of the artifacts and tools referenced by participants also helped them to construct their professional identities. Second, the affordance of artifacts and tools led English teachers to exercise their reflective practice.

KEYWORDS:

• Artifacts
• professional dialogue
• professional identity
• reflective practice
• tools

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan [MOST 105-2410-H-134-006].

Notes on contributors

Chin-Wen Chien

Chin-Wen Chien received her Doctor of Education degree from the University of Washington (Seattle, USA). She is an associate professor in Department of English Instruction of National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan. Her research interests include language education, language teacher education, and curriculum and instruction.