Becoming a teacher: struggles of a second‐career beginning teacher

Second‐career individuals are entering the teaching profession in greater numbers. These older, mature individuals bring diffent experiences to teaching than do younger, traditional preservice and beginning teachers. Lyle, a second‐career teacher, began his first year of teaching in a junior high school, a setting that did not allow him to teach in ways that he believed he should. This paper presents a record of Lyle's struggles as he negotiates the role of teaching and his relationships with students. The conclusions examine some factors that mitigated against Lyles’ smooth transition into the teaching profession and suggest that second‐career teachers such as Lyle may be disadvantaged by traditional teacher education programs, the pressures under which they accept teaching positions, and their sometimes distant perspective of teachers, teacher's work, and students.