Many previous studies in teacher education have examined the professional learning of teachers, particularly the formation of their identities. However, not much attention has been paid to the trajectories of professional growth of teacher educators who teach current and future teachers (Brody & Hadar, 2011) and their role has been marginalized in educational research. There also seems to be an assumption that educating teachers does not require any preparation if one is a good teacher of elementary or secondary education (Zeichner, 2005). However, Trent (2013) states the transition from teacher to teacher educator could be problematic as they are likely to encounter many dilemmas and tensions. In Williams and Ritter's (2010) self-study research, they also identified two major challenges of beginning teacher educators: making professional connections with other teacher educators and negotiating new professional relationships with students.
In the Japanese context, one can become a foreign-language teacher educator without any specific qualifications, and usually no training is provided (Takeda, 2012) regardless of the target languages. Furthermore, Asaoka's study (2022) on two foreign-language teacher educators' narratives shows that there is no one universal trajectory that teachers take to become teacher educators, although they utilize their identity as a learner and as a teacher in ways that help them "deconstruct" and "reconstruct'' who they are as teacher educators. It also indicates that these teacher educators are on a solitary journey without a space to share their experiences and feelings and to negotiate their identities as teacher educators to become full participants in their social and professional networks.
Thus, with the use of online journals and focus-group interviews, the current study explores how teacher educators of foreign languages in Japan co-construct and reconstruct their professional identities in a collaborative community of practice, focusing on the process of becoming active participants of the community. It also discusses how the participation influenced their reflection on their conceptualization and practices of teacher education in relation to those of other teacher educators, and how and why they became able (or remained unable) to deal with tensions and dilemmas that they have encountered in educating pre-service and in-service teachers.
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