Professional concerns of beginning special education teachers of deaf and hard of hearing students

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the professional concerns of beginning special education teachers of deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) students. Five beginning teachers were selected for this study. Three of the participants were beginning self-contained and two were beginning itinerant teachers. To examine their professional concerns, participants were asked questions in the domains concerning life, contemporary, and meaning-making experiences. The study used the in-depth phenomenological interviewing method. Shadowing and critical incident reports were used to triangulate interview data. Analysis-in-the field strategies were used to analyze field notes, critical incident reports, and interview data. Inductive analysis strategies were used to conduct in-depth within- and cross-case analyses. The results of the study revealed that the majority of participants were motivated to become teachers of DHH students by family support, experience with DHH students, personal preference for teaching DHH students, friends' encouragement and support, interest in sign language, and teacher support in high school. The study also showed that participants found audiology, reading, and speech classes to be particularly helpful. The majority of participants perceived their over all teacher preparation experiences as very positive and felt that their teacher preparation programs were very good. The professional responsibilities of participants vary according to the service delivery models in which they worked. All participants were responsible for teaching academics, supervision of students, assessments, and writing students' IEPs. Itinerant participants had expanded responsibilities. Participants' professional interactions were with students, parents of their students, school administrators, teachers, and other school personnel. The nature and purposes of these interactions vary among participants. Professional concerns of participants include lack of administrative support, non-accepting attitudes of regular education teachers towards DHH students, human relation, students' behavior problems, policy concerns, and parents' expectations. To address beginning teachers concerns, participants recommended administrative support, parents empowerment, training on inservicing regular education teachers who work with DHH students, inservices for special education directors on the needs of DHH students, and staff development activities. Participants recommended various classes, early exposure to real life teaching situations through internships, and more emphasis on teaching practical techniques for teaching and classroom management to preservice teachers.