Meaningful Moments in Teacher Educators’ Careers

Research topic and background
Being a teacher educator includes several elements of professional awareness concerning teacher education as a specific profession, such as self-studies as a method for development, second-order teaching, and teacher educators’ involvement in research (Nielsen, 2023). This highlights the diversity in teacher educators’ professional development and personal practice.
We aim to research how teacher educators experience satisfaction in their work.
Theoretical framework
We have used a value system proposed by Schlick and Wipperfürht (2019) to analyse the participants’ stories for aspects they value in their work as teacher educators. The value system is derived from Frankl’s (1984) theory of logotherapy, which describes a person’s drive to find meaning in life, combined with self-determination theory. Based on this value system, nine categories were developed to describe how meaning can be experienced in human life, these served as the starting point for the coding of the transcribed interviews.

Methods
To bring forward the voices of the individual teacher educators it is necessary to listen to their professional stories. We have done this by conducting and recording focus group dialogues with volunteers at two international conferences. There were seven dialogues, with a total of 15 participants from seven countries.
Participants were prompted to self-reflect about their meaningful moments. Each participant then shared their moment followed by clarifying questions from the group.

Findings and conclusions
This study explores teacher educators' approaches to their work and their sources of satisfaction, including teaching, student interactions, and presenting their ideas. Teacher educators attain satisfaction through authentic meetings with students, specifically by nurturing meaningful relationships, sharing experiences, and caring for students. Satisfaction is also linked to experiencing a certain amount of autonomy, opportunities for continual learning, and growth in the teaching profession. These aspects contribute to making their educational careers meaningful and valuable.


References
Frankl, V. E. (1984) Man’s Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Nielsen, B. (2023) Læreruddanner inden for det naturfaglige område – international forskning og ny viden fra NAFA. MONA 1 p. 73-91.
Wipperfürht and Schlick (2019) Das modell einer sinnorientierten Wertedynamik an Schulen (er)lebbar machen. Erziehung und Unterricht, iss: ⅚, s 443-458.