Advice for the First Year
Physics Teacher:
Literature Review
The review of the literature has revealed a gap in the research in the domain of advice for first year
physics teachers. However, much has been written about the first year teaching experiences, working with
veteran teachers, and advice for beginning teachers. This review of the literature will first focus on studies
related to the basic question of this project. Then, several related articles will be reviewed.
RESEARCH STUDIES
First, the article by Amy DePaul of the U.S. Department of Education Office of Educational Research and
Improvement "What to Expect Your First Year of Teaching" is a study based upon the responses of winners of the Sallie Mae First Class Teacher Award, for outstanding elementary and secondary educators
during their first year of teaching. Data collection methods included discussion, focus groups, and essays
of the respondents. Advice included: "Prepare, but then again . . . be prepared to wing it if that's what it
takes .... Make friends with the custodial staff–you'll need them .... Reach out to parents and form
relationships with them before problems begin .... Get to know your students by coaching or taking part in
an extracurricular activity .... Take care of yourself physically and spiritually .... Don't forget, you're only
human" (DePaul, 1998).
ARTICLES AND BOOKS
In "Support for New Teachers", Barbara Davis outlines ways for schools to support new teachers such as
the following: be understanding, be fair in class and prep assignments, guide new teachers with
curriculum and lessons, and have organized orientation (Davis, 1998).
The results were a very helpful collection of general tips for the beginning teacher. However, the study
did not delve deeper into most of the tips to explain specific examples of how to achieve the goals. For
example, how does one be "prepared to wing it if that’s what it takes." Specific suggestions would have
been helpful. This study provided a good picture of the issues facing the first year teacher, however, there
is no information given about data analysis. The study seems to have dropped the ball, by gathering a
collection of valuable information, presenting only select excerpts of the data, and not presenting any
analysis or conclusion from the data.
Another of the publications available through the U.S. Department of Education Office of Educational
Research and Improvement is "Survival Guide for New Teachers", also written by Amy DePaul. This
article is based upon another study that interviewed the 53 winners of the Sallie Mae First Class Teacher
Award. The study also used the award winner’s entry essays as a data source. The interviews were
conducted with a set of five questions. Each question focused on what type of support is needed from
different sources, including administration, teacher educators, veteran teachers, parents, and the
community and what support was available to them in their first year of teaching. The article outlines the
issues facing the beginning teacher. In the final summary, DePaul remarked, "time and again, the teachers
we interviewed talked about the difficulties they faced working in isolation, when deprived of the
opportunity to collaborate with colleagues, learn from principals, and form partnerships with parents."
These teachers offered much advice to new teachers including to share materials with veteran teachers,
asking for their ideas, and to not try to reinvent the wheel. DePaul concluded that new teachers need more
support (DePaul, 1999).
This study asked questions in the form of "what type of support is needed from [different sources such as
community, parents, administrations." Since the purpose of the article was to create a survival guide for
new teachers, it seems that it might have been more useful to ask how these award-winning teachers have
found the support that they needed in their teaching or other techniques and tips to aid in the first year of
teaching. Once again, the results of the interviews and essay analysis provide a broad perspective on the
needs of beginning teachers and much advice for the first year, however, there is no information given
about data analysis or how results were found from the study. The report seems to have gathered some
very valuable information, but not analyzed it or drawn any conclusions from trends in the data.
"Telementoring: Helping New Teachers Through the First Year," by Gordon Eisenman and Holly
Thornton inquires into the successes of a program designed to help teachers survive their first year by
keeping them in contact with mentors through email and listservs. Data collection methods included
interviews and focus groups with graduates of the ASU teacher education program. Interviews and focus
groups discussed their current concerns about teaching and how they felt telementoring could or was
assisting them. The article concluded that teachers feel a great need for support during the first year and
that the electronic mentoring program was more helpful than traditional mentoring programs, although
the reasons for this were not stated. First year teacher issues that were identified as a theme in the data
included the following: a need to find resources, feedback on their performance, discussing everyday
issues, isolation from others, difficulty operating as student-centered teachers in a real classroom, and
difficulty managing paperwork (Eisenman, Thornton, 1999).
This study used participants who were all recent graduates of the education program at Augusta State
University. Communication was achieved electronically. Specific questions were not given in detail in the
article. Specific details about data analysis were not discussed, but only included discussion wordings
such as "themes emerged from…" and what specific statements were made or concerns discussed. There
was no mention of quantitative analysis or any concrete qualitative analysis.
In "First-Year Teachers: Strangers in Strange Lands, Edward L. Corley questioned what were the elements
that led to success or prevented it for three first-year teachers. Data collection included a series of
interviews, a questionnaire, journals, observations, interviews with the students and mentor teachers of
these first-year teachers, and informal observations of the teachers in activities outside of class. Five
factors were associated with success or failure: communication, mentoring, classroom savvy, discipline,
and expectations of others, such as administration. Data analysis details were not available, except for the
extraction of the most important factors that were associated with success or failure for these teachers and
the listing of other factors.
In "Facilitating Success for New Teachers," Jerie Weasmer and Amelia Mays Woods wrote about the
importance of the first year because of the high rate of teacher attrition. Recommendations for principals
to support the first year of teaching include a fair workload, limiting extracurricular coaching and other
commitments, establishing clear expectations, and providing observation and written feedback regularly
(Weasmer, Mays, 1998).
In " Easing the Way for New Teachers," Joan Montgomery Halford explains some of the problems that
cause new teachers to leave the profession, and what schools can do to keep them, such as mentoring,
observation and feedback, and other support. Halford concludes that even the cost of mentoring in
California, $5,000 is well worth the cost to keep quality teachers in the classroom (Halford, 1998).
In " Policies to Support New Teachers," Joan Montgomery Halford focuses on the conflict between teacher
shortages and public attention on quality education. Increasing new teacher retention is proposed as one
solution, discussing mentoring support programs as answers to the teacher shortages (Halford, 1999).
In "What New Teachers Don't know," James Bushman reviewed two studies which delved into the needs
of the new teacher that may be incorporated into new teacher inservices. Some of the more subtle, but very
important instructional methodology concepts such as "hands on" learning and the way we think of our
students' intellect are discussed(Bushman, 1998).
In The First Days of School : How to Be an Effective Teacher, Harry K. Wong and Rosemary Tripi Wong
wrote a very practical and inspiring guide for new teachers. It was recommended by several of the
participants in this study. Topics range from signs to hang in your classroom to discipline to motivation.
Excellent.
Please email comments to Julie-Peterson@nwu.edu
Julie Peterson's home page.