Taking a stance through visual texts: novice teachers as educational agents

Abstract

Drawing on qualitative methodologies that integrate verbal and non-verbal texts, this study investigated novice teachers’ attributions of their experiences of internship, as conveyed through a visual text. Novices were invited to design a visual text that represented their experience during internship, as part of a national call entitled ‘Novices in Poster.’ The posters submitted yielded the publication of 127 published posters, which constituted the data for our study. The visual data were analyzed using a multilayered approach to the analysis of visual texts, drawing on Lemke’s analysis of visual and verbal data as complementary channels for obtaining an integrative interpretation of the expressed experience. Findings indicate that novices expose critical stances in relation to activism, collegiality, and leverage, making public their unique potential to improve the educational system. The visual texts underscored novices’ strong social–professional stances towards teaching, positioning them as delegates and agents striving for professional justice.

Keywords:

• visual texts
• educational stances
• induction