Teacher identity is an important concept for teacher development (Beauchamp & Thomas, 2009). It concerns the definition of self to oneself (Lasky, 2005). It is knowing who one is at a given moment (Beijaard, Meijer, & Verloop, 2004), and in a given context (Gee, 2001), and how one is understood alongside others (Lasky, 2005). Identity is not simply a response to externally imposed social expectations of what a teacher is or does, it requires that the teacher implant his or her interpretations of experiences (Vargas-Herrera & Moya-Marchant, 2018). It is therefore a fluid and dynamic (Davids, 2018) process involving the construction of a professional self through the integration of past, present and future. It is a process that leads to the development of a professional awareness that drives professional development (Zhao & Fu, 2018) and a process that enables knowing how to understand, be and act in society and in work (Davids, 2018).
Though Education researchers have had some success in differentiating among types of teacher (Lamote & Engels, 2010; Rots, Aelterman, Vlerick, & Vermeulen, 2007) they recognize the need for a method that is sensitive to the processes of identity formation described in the opening paragraph. In a review of identity assessment methods Passmore, Ellis, and Hogard (2014) found that most were based in a single theory of identity and that they were fixed; addressing just one question. In contrast, Passmore et al. reported that the Identity Structure Analysis (ISA) method is based in multiple theories and that it can be adapted to develop multiple instruments that cater to multiple questions. Weinreich (2003, p. 26) provides the following definition of identity:
A person’s identity is defined as the totality of one’s self-construal, in which how one construes oneself in the present expresses the continuity between how one construes oneself as one was in the past and how one construes one-self as one aspires to be in the future.
This definition hints at the capacity ISA holds for accessing identity at various biographical stages. It also hints at the method’s capacity to access the psychological processes that underpin various forms of identification with others and various forms of identification of self. In other words, ISA would appear to be a method that caters to the call for a method that is sensitive to the processes that underpin identity formation (Hogard, 2014; Weinreich, 2003).
The ISA Method
Passmore et al. (2014) argue that ISA is sensitive to an individual’s knowledge of self and to personal and contextual facets of their identity (factors that influence identity formation). Explanation for this sensitivity resides (as we shall soon see) in the bipolar constructs and entities that make up an ISA instrument. This sensitivity means that ISA meets the call for a teacher identity assessment method that recognizes the evaluation and re-evaluation of experience in various social contexts, at various stages of biography, and the status of various concepts of self.
Much of the utility of ISA resides in the dedicated software Ipseus which runs raw data inputted to an ISA instrument through the machinations of the method to provide components of identity in the form of quantitative ISA parameter values. Further, Ipseus provides for two forms of identity analysis: nomothetic and idiographic. In nomothetic analyses ISA parameters values can be interpreted to generate professional development (PD) advice that meets the specific needs of Faculties of Education, school boards, and individual schools. Idiographic analyses permit the creation of mentorship advice that caters to the stresses and conflicts of identification impinging on the working lives of individual teachers. The nomothetic capabilities of ISA are of concern in this chapter (and in Chapter 2).
An ISA teacher identity instrument was developed. It consists (like all ISA instruments) of a series of entities and constructs. Entities comprise people, institutions, cultural icons that according to research and in the opinion of the researchers hold potential for influencing teacher professional identity. They are representatives of various life domains (work and home in this case). Constructs represent themes that influence an identity. In this work the themes are: team player, approach to classroom management and teaching, relationship with students and approach to problem solving. Constructs are bi-polar with each pole being sensitive to a tension within the theme it represents. When a teacher logs into Ipseus a matrix of the various entities and constructs of the instrument is generated on the fly. The combinations of entity and construct are presented t...