3.1 Experience

The analysis of teaching beginnings that we carried out in this study inevitably requires the discussion of the difference between experienced teachers and beginning teachers. The latter are mainly categorized in the education literature from the time factor. Thus, the literature explains that after a certain period of time (usually between one and five years) teachers are no longer considered beginning professionals. Therefore, experienced teachers are commonly identified as those with over three or five years of professional activity, who are supposed to be able to handle practical issues confidently, relating them to the theory learnt and seeking to question their reality with their peers. These professionals tend to incentivize the school collective to study and question, and not conform to the situations experienced by the group, school community, and even to broader social issues (^{MARCELO, 2006}).

In our study, initially supported by this time-based categorization of beginning teachers, we ended up challenging the definition of beginning and experienced teachers using that categorization and sought to build up another way of conceptualizing them.

Our concern originated in the lack of studies considering teaching beginnings in different phases of the education activity² as singular moments in which, from our initial hypothesis, the so-called “experienced teachers” relive situations – ascribed by the literature in this area to the beginning of the teaching activity – which in the time-based classification should be limited to the first few years of the teaching work. In other words, teachers starting to teach in a different phase of the students’ education from the one they used to work with face challenges, which most of the time, are reported by the literature on beginning teachers as characteristic of the first years in the profession (between three and seven years). However, we are quite sure that many of those challenges are relived in new beginnings and, thus, teachers feel like beginners again since they must rebuild their professionality when facing the new work context. According to this hypothesis, in this movement between experienced and beginner, we think that the teachers’ professionality is reconstructed due to the new situation lived, in this case, the beginning of teaching in another phase of education.

The term “experienced teacher” is directly related to the concept of experience. The concept of experience observed in this study is based on ^{Dewey (1976)}, that is, it is not exclusively associated with the time aspect. Thus, teachers are not seen as experienced only due to their time of professional activity. Experience in this sense is related to the events lived by each individual and the consequences of these events on teachers’ learning, which is a process directly influenced by these professionals’ experiences.

In such perspective, we do not take the time aspect as sufficient to determine teachers’ teaching experience, and adopt the idea that teachers are considered experienced when, in their teaching trajectory, they have had meaningful experiences that led them to reflect upon their action and enabled some learning so that future experiences can be (re)viewed in the light of past experiences and contribute to their quality.

We assumed that these professionals lived meaningful learnings in their first teaching experience and those contributed significantly to the quality of the experiences they had in the new phase. Thus, our hypothesis is that there is a set of knowledge originated from their experience that allows them to deal with the new situation, this set of knowledge is kept. At the same time, a new set is developed (or [re]made) within the new context. In this sense, teachers’ initial experience and their professionality built up from it provide them with input regarding some aspects of the teaching activity and are reshaped when facing situations that are particular to each phase of the basic education.

The analysis axes were divided between those linked to difficulties faced and those linked to the easy aspects facilitated by the previous experience. The organization of the axes shows the existence of a higher frequency of aspects related to teachers’ difficulties than easiness. Among the aspects related to the latter, we identified students’ discipline and indiscipline, and relationship with students’ parents and family members.

We observed that when considering the aspects they find easy to deal with, due to the learning developed in their previous experience working in elementary education, the learning events are different for each teacher. Thus, even if they might converge in some points, they are quite divergent in others due to the subjectivity of the experience as pointed out by ^{Dewey (1976)}. Therefore, these teachers’ distinct experiences in elementary education provided them with diverse learning experiences, which enabled approximations between them related to the disciplinary and interpersonal aspects. However, we cannot infer rules that apply to all of them given the subjectivity of each teacher when living the event and the meaning given to each experience.

In other words, each teacher’s subjective process when teaching in elementary education (EE) and reflecting upon their experience, enabled them to build up a set of knowledge and skills related to students’ discipline and their relationship with students’ parents and other relatives that made it easy for them and gave them confidence when dealing with the same aspects in the early childhood education (ECE). Thus, even when considering the distinct experiences and the subjective process of each professional, they revealed some easy aspects they had in common related to these events when shifting from one phase of education to the other.

On the other hand, the data analysis shows us that there is an even larger set of aspects related to difficulties faced by teachers when starting to teach in a new phase of basic education. These aspects are mainly related to their insecurity and need for support in this new beginning in the teaching career. We identified that these difficulties started when they had to change schools, which is characteristic of the beginning teaching period, which allied to other aspects hampers the development of bonds and the understanding of the school culture, thus provoking a feeling of not-belonging, which only ends, according to the teachers, with the “escolha de sede”³, that is, when they choose their permanent school. This is a difficulty relatively discussed in the literature about beginning teachers and, from this study data, we evidenced that also has some effects on new teaching beginnings, that is, even if teachers have overcome this difficulty in their first beginning, it appears again when they start to work in a different phase of basic education.

Advancing in the discussion of difficulties, we identified three aspects that polarize it, constituting the phenomenon that we identified as the great challenge related to teachers’ professionality, namely, what to teach, how to teach, and the children’s learning. Teaching work in EE regarding these aspects was not seen as a generator of learning easily transferred to the ECE and facilitate the teachers’ work in this phase. Therefore, teachers feel as beginners in these aspects. This does not imply the absence of lived and reflected experience by these teachers in EE related to the teaching action but rather demonstrates the specificity of the teaching action in each phase of education. Consequently, the need for an attentive institutional look into the entrance of these teachers, even if experienced, in a different phase from that they used to work with is required. In other words, institutions must consider teaching beginnings as multiple moments, quite specific and that make these professionals face feelings and experiences characteristic of the beginning teaching period.

Thus, in the context of this study we identified learnings originated in the experience of these elementary school teachers, which when they started to work in early children education, made it easy for them and allowed the (re)construction of their knowledge for the beginning teaching in early childhood education. This movement broadened their first experience, with a propositional and constructive character evidencing the beginning of the experience continuity. On the other hand, we identified with greater representativeness, difficulties in the new teaching beginning, which those teachers associated with lack of knowledge and lack of confidence and, at this point, we emphasize the discussion about the specificities of teaching and of the teaching professionality in different phases of education. This confirms the perspective we defend regarding teaching beginnings, that is, the novelty of each phase triggers experiences commonly found in the first years of the teaching practice, and we evidenced that this time framework is not enough to resolve them since even experienced teachers become beginners in relation to the specific challenges posed by the new phase of education.

3.2 Professionality

When beginning teaching, the movement between the set of knowledge that is kept and the part that requires reconstruction leads to the constitution of a new professionality that occurs from the elements of the previous experience in dialogue, reflection, and conflict with the beginning of the new phase. In this sense, considering teaching beginnings implies knowing and recognizing that new learnings are aggregated to the lived experiences and constitute teachers’ professionality. This process is marked by singularities about which there is not enough evidence in the specific literature on beginning teaching and which are the focus of this study.

Teaching beginnings keep particularities that influence directly the construction and reconstruction of teachers’ professionality, covering aspects that interfere and reconfigure the process of becoming teachers. The teachers’ profession has a complex nature and specific and singular features regarding its activity in each phase of education, so that being a teacher in each phase entails specificities thus requiring specific knowledge. Therefore, when teachers start to work in a different phase of education, they go through a process of knowledge mobilization and constitution of new meanings that demand their pedagogical, disciplinary, and interpersonal expertise, and other types of knowledge, reconfiguring the development of their professionality and involving new knowledge and skills needed in their professional activity. However, these teachers already have the experience developed in their teaching work in other phases and, in this sense, certain knowledge and skills are rebuilt according to the specific characteristics of the new phase. At the same time, other knowledge and skills already consolidated remain and from the hypothesis of this study might appear in the teachers’ action in different phases.

A fundamental difficulty in the constitution of the participant teachers’ professionality is the constant change of schools at the beginning of their teaching career, that is, successive mandatory changes in the teaching beginning that are characteristic of this career. This fact is not favorable to the creation of bonds among peers, to the constitution and strengthening of groups, or to the development of a feeling of belonging to a collective organization. The strengthening of teachers’ professionality usually results from the feeling of belonging to a cohesive group and identification with their peers, students’, and the school community.

The rotation system experienced in the first years of their teaching career hampers the development of their professionality exactly at the point that teachers most need support as verified in the data. Teachers reported that in the first years of teaching in the new education phase, many frailties are revealed. They indicated the need for support to the development of their work and very frequently mentioned that they found difficulties to seek this help inside schools, since they did not feel to belong to that group. We verified that, in such context, working permanently in one school helps beginning teachers to feel like belonging to a group and favors relationships and their identification with their peers, enabling the development of collaborative partnerships and professionality among teachers.

In addition to the problem of constantly changing schools, these professionals face lack of welcoming programs for beginning teachers, that is, no support is offered by the education system or within the schools. The literature about beginning teaching systematically points out this lack of guidance, welcoming, and support to beginning teachers and indicates that the so-called survival period is marked by suffering resulting from pedagogical loneliness (^{GUARNIERI, 1996}; CORSI, 2006; ^{FONTANA, 2000}). We observed that this process also occurred in these teachers’ new beginnings since they pointed out the need for support in distinct issues such as routines, classroom organization, planning, and students’ learning, among others. The lack of systematization of welcoming actions to the new teachers make them experience the onboarding process on their own, which usually makes this period painful and a generator of demotivation in the work.

Regarding the specificity of the teaching activity (^{ROLDÃO, 2007}), it constitutes the fundamental characteristic of the teachers’ professionality and refers to the teachers’ activity character. The teaching action is a function that is socially ascribed to teachers (^{GIMENO SACRISTÁN, 1995}; ^{ROLDÃO, 2007}) and requires the mobilization of a set of specific knowledge needed to its development. Several aspects are ascribed to teachers’ professionality, among those related to the teaching activity, we find pedagogical knowledge (teaching, guiding students’ learning process, preparing materials, evaluating, and organizing spaces and materials) and abilities, that is, know-how and the ability to develop the teaching action.

The data analysis revealed that the teaching activity is the sore point in the constitution of beginning teachers’ professionality, starting with the issue ‘what to teach’, we identified that, unanimously, the teachers participating in the study reported that their greatest insecurity and anxiety experienced at the beginning of the ECE referred to “what” and “how” they had to teach, and they linked them directly with the identification of their lack of knowledge. According to ^{Roldão (2007)}, the teaching activity is essentially understood as the specialty of leading somebody to know something (curriculum). Therefore, before teaching, one must master the content to be taught, thus, knowing the curriculum content or the subject knowledge is an essential requirement (^{RAMALHO; NUNES; GAUTHIER, 2004}).

One possible solution to minimize this lack of knowledge and guide teachers’ practices, provided that the school is aware of these aspects, would be the existence of welcoming programs or dynamics targeting beginning teachers to give them the chance to share their difficulties and their lack of knowledge, helping to guide and support these professionals. Otherwise, the abandonment of these teachers in their lonely search for the solution of their difficulties end up impacting students’ learning. According to ^{Lima (2006)}, students are the ones most affected by the evident and inescapable struggles that characterize the beginning teaching period.

Going further in the specificity of the discussion about teaching and the aspects related to it regarding teachers’ professionality, we noticed the issue of “how to teach”. It appeared at the beginning of the ECE teaching and was directly linked to the pedagogical know-how and the abilities to develop the teaching activity and pedagogical skills. These aspects, in early childhood education, present specific characteristics that define them in a particular way, different from those observed in elementary education since they require some knowledge of the children’s development specificities – teaching very young children requires ways of communicating, organizing, and relating to the body and movement, among others, that are specific of children between 0 and 6 years old – and of the form-content relation, that is “content pedagogical knowledge”. According to ^{Shulman (1986)}, this knowledge corresponds to the knowledge specialization, it goes through reflection upon one’s know-how, taking practice to a certain level of awareness, reflection, analysis, systematization, and intention. Grasping this movement characterizes the teachers’ professionality construction regarding specific knowledge – teaching – and, thus, it is built up in teaching beginnings when facing the specificities of the education phase, being part of what we call teachers’ professionality aspects that are (re)built throughout teaching beginnings.

Another aspect of this professionality, still regarding the skills needed to develop this work, refers to interpersonal skills, which include abilities and skills employed in interactions with students’ parents and other family members, mediating interactions in the classroom and developing a relationship with their peers and the school management team.

Interacting with students’ parents and relatives and keeping discipline in the classroom by establishing conduct norms are two of the main problems faced by beginning teachers, constituting aspects characterized as the great difficulties of the beginning of their professional career (VEENMAN, 1998). We observed that in the new beginnings, this difficulty disappears and the relationship with parents is not a matter of concern for the teachers, who reported that although parents’ concerns and needs are different in different education phases, the way of dealing with them learnt while teaching in EE is similar to that developed in ECE and they feel confident about it.

When analyzing their ability to mediate conflicts (^{CONTRERAS, 2002}) and regulate classroom interactions (^{GIMENO SACRISTÁN, 1995}), the literature about the beginning of teaching reports that disciplinary issues are a source of anxiety and difficulty in this period. This study identified that such issues are not among the greatest difficulties faced by ECE teachers. Therefore, apart from the discussion about what discipline is and what a disciplined student is, in this new beginning, the previous experience allows teachers to master some pedagogical resources including classroom management. In such context, students’ discipline, which in the past was one of the main difficulties starts to have a secondary role in this new beginning. For this reason, we consider that seeking mechanisms and alternatives to deal with students’ parents and other family members and solve students’ disciplinary issues are aspects of teachers’ professionality that appear in the new beginnings as consolidated despite the specific characteristics of dealing with children in a different age group.

Finally, the discussion of interpersonal skills also regards teachers’ relationship with their peers and the school management team. As observed, their relationship with students’ parents and relatives as well as the mediation of students’ relationships are no longer great difficulties in these teachers’ new beginnings. Conversely, their relationship with peers and the management team – similar to what is reported by the literature about the beginning teaching period – remains a conflict aspect in new beginnings since the participant teachers reported that they feel lonely, unsupported, and insecure in relation to their peers. This data refers to the previous discussion about changing schools and lack of a feeling of belonging experienced by beginning teachers, which hampers the establishment of bonds that would make them confident to share their difficulties with the group. On the other hand, we noticed that difficulties related to interpersonal skills that involve pedagogical knowledge tend to worsen because when the several “beginnings” of the teaching career are not recognized, these teachers who have already acquired the status of “experienced” should not present these doubts. For this reason, they experience a feeling of loneliness accompanied by shame for not knowing, since for being “experienced”, when they reveal lack of knowledge and seek help, it might be interpreted as a recognition of inability before their peers in the new education phase. The solution found most of the time is to talk to colleagues from other schools that they trust and feel they can share their difficulties with – the so-called “critical friends”. These findings point out, again, the common path that indicates lack of welcoming and support to beginning teachers, which is worse in their career new beginnings since they are no longer considered beginning professionals.