Développement de l'identité professionnelle d'enseignantes débutantes en contexte de relation mentorale
Between 15% and 20% of Québec teachers abandon the profession before reaching five years of practice (Martel & Ouellette, 2003).  The difficulties encountered can disturb their integration and slow down the development of their professional identity (Baillauquès & Breuse, 1993). Some school boards offer supportive measures, in which mentoring is one of the most popular forms.    The goal of our research was to gain a better understanding of the teacher mentoring relationship and identify which of its characteristics are favourable to the development of beginning teachers’ professional identity.  The two concepts are related based on the works of Houde (1995) and of Gohier, Anadón, Bouchard, Charbonneau, & Chevrier (2001).  Our analysis focused on the characteristics of the mentoring relationship, the mentor’s functions, and the development of the beginning teacher’s senses of self-efficiency, recognition, and belonging to the profession.  Five interviews were conducted with novice elementary teachers from the Montréal area having experienced a mentor relationship lasting one year.  The data was analysed qualitatively.  The results show that the participants perceive mentoring to be favourable to the development of the feeling of self-efficiency.  However, feelings of recognition and belonging to the profession are attributed to experience and sociability.  A portrait of the mentor and some conditions for the success of the relation are also exposed.   The fact that only elementary-level mentees have been interviewed presents a limitation. Any generalization is impossible but the results can serve for other studies about professional identity or for the development of teacher induction and mentor training programs.
teacher induction beginning teacher novice teacher mentoring professional development professional identity