The Scary Part Is That It Happens Without Us Knowing

This fascinating paper provides journal entries made by two student teachers along with their mentors' reflections on the narrative. These teachers describe their struggle to hold onto their teaching ideals once they have taken on the challenges in a classroom. This paper should be helpful to PIs and teacher leaders that are thinking about ways to support and foster the growth of their eager and idealistic new teachers. Part of a journal entry: "Teaching is much more complex than teacher education. Discussing an isolated topic isn't difficult compared to dealing with the thirty people and hundred things going on. Issues don't come one at a time any more...Knowing what we believe in theory doesn't mean we are equipped to carry it out. More likely, we'll fall back on what we "know." Two years of intense learning has to contend with a life of living and doing school. New teachers are pressured to give up ideals either to fit in to a school or because they don't know how to reconcile idealism, theory, and learning with the real world. The scary part is that it happens without us knowing."

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