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Teacher Professional Identity and Career Motivation: A Lifespan Perspective

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Research on Teacher Identity

Abstract

A developmental perspective on teacher identity and motivation leads us to expect processes of adaption and dynamism that are responsive to context. Critical to our understanding is the consideration that identity is a multidimensional construct in which the personal and social are interwoven. We explore how extant motivational theories offer insights into the nature and correlates of teacher motivation and identity formation including self-efficacy, expectancy-value, achievement goal, and self-determination theories. We propose that these provide lenses that fruitfully highlight aspects of identity development at different points across the lifespan of a teaching career. Drawing from the canvass of lifespan developmental psychology, we propose the SOC (Selection, Optimisation, and Compensation) model of successful ageing as an overarching theoretical lens to provide new insights and a potentially integrative framework, within which diverse theoretical perspectives on teacher motivation and identity development could be coherently further explored.

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Acknowledgements

The FIT-Choice project (www.fitchoice.org) is supported by sequential Australian Research Council grants DP140100402 (Richardson & Watt), DP0987614 (Watt & Richardson) and DP0666253 (Richardson, Watt, & Eccles).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Education, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia

    Paul W. Richardson

  2. School of Education and Social Work, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, Australia

    Helen M. G. Watt

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  1. Paul W. Richardson
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Correspondence to Paul W. Richardson .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Texas, San Antonio, Texas, USA

    Paul A. Schutz

  2. University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma, USA

    Ji Hong

  3. Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA

    Dionne Cross Francis

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Richardson, P.W., Watt, H.M.G. (2018). Teacher Professional Identity and Career Motivation: A Lifespan Perspective. In: Schutz, P., Hong, J., Cross Francis, D. (eds) Research on Teacher Identity. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93836-3_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93836-3_4

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-93836-3

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