Teaching in Uncertain Times: Exploring the Challenges of Millennial Teachers

• In Event: 30.080 - Roundtable Session 10
  In Roundtable Session: 30.080-15 - Teacher Ideals, Inquiry, and Identities

Abstract

This paper explores how the current era in which we live, Uncertain Times, has been characterized by changing social, economic, and technological conditions, and how these changes have both afforded and constrained the work of teachers. This paper depicts cases of teachers just starting their teaching careers, thereby illuminating these teachers’ understandings of teaching and the role of the teacher in these times. Findings highlight salient themes that teachers articulate as features of teaching in Uncertain Times: 1) teachers as shape-shifters, or workers who adapt to the market, 2) teachers’ work as increasingly shaped by diversity and technology, and 3) teachers’ work as embracing disciplinary change.

Author

• Heidi L. Hallman, The University of Kansas