| The novice teacher stage is a necessary stage for the teacher profession.Teachers at this stage will face various difficulties.It is a great challenge for novice teachers to quickly adapt to school life,deal with personal relations and complete teaching tasks.Mentoring has been an effective way to help novice teachers adapt to school life quickly and complete role change in primary and secondary schools in China for many years,which has enabled thousands of novice teachers to gain professional growth,successfully complete identity and adapt to school life.In recent years,the identity of English teachers has gradually attracted the attention of researchers at home and abroad.This study is based on the background of mentoring in our country,aiming to study the influence of mentoring on the identity of novice English teachers.In consequence,the author puts forward two research questions.(1)How does mentoring affect the identity of novice English teachers?(2)What factors contribute to novice English teachers’ identity in the process of mentoring? This paper attempts to provide operational reference for the implementation of mentoring and enable novice teachers to quickly complete identity.The research method used in this study is qualitative method,which is mainly carried out through interviews,teaching journals,as well as field observation of Miss Shi and Miss Han and their mentors in two high schools in Jinan.Through sorting out the interview and observation materials,teaching journals,as well as other materials based on Xun Yang’s(2012)framework of identity,this paper analyzes the influence of mentoring on the identity of two novice teachers,and attempts to summarize what factors affect the identity of English teachers in the implementation of mentoring.This study found that the teacher’s guidance had a positive and profound impact on novice teachers’ career identity,major identity,personal identity and situated identity.In the aspect of career identity,the mentor’s guidance enables novice teachers to make clear their duties and responsibilities,and enables novice teachers to have sense of belongings to their career.In terms of major identity,the guidance ofmentors can enable novice teachers to increase their professional knowledge and skills,having a correct view towards students.In terms of personal identity,the mentor’s guidance can make the novice teacher from a “privileged student” to become a real teacher and can better adapt their new roles of being teachers.In the aspect of situated identity,novice teachers quickly integrate into teachers’ faculty under the guidance of teachers and adapt to unfamiliar environment.Under the guidance of mentors,novice teachers quickly adapt to the role of teachers,grow up quickly and become qualified teachers.The two novice teachers enjoy being teachers and complete identity construction under mentors’ guidance.In the research process,the author finds that there are many factors that affect the identity of novice teachers.The personalities of mentor and mentee,age gap,professional knowledge and school management of mentoring will affect the implementation of mentoring.On this basis,the author puts forward some feasible strategies to promote novice teachers’ identity construction in the process of mentoring,such as to carry out theoretical training for mentors,to provide material support and spiritual encouragement for the mentors and mentees,and to improve the mentoring plan of the mentoring in schools.These will help novice teachers to quickly complete their identity construction.Of course,novice teachers themselves must have subjective initiatives and actively participate in mentoring activities to accelerate identity construction. |
