In language education in Japan and around the world, almost every teacher’s career path takes the form of a unique and eventful journey. We often take this for granted, but it is exactly these journeys, these narratives of teacher identity formation, that enrich our profession and serve our students. Since 2011, the Teacher Journeys conference has been the venue for educators of all backgrounds and teaching contexts across Japan to share and reflect on such stories.

This year, we are looking for presentations that fall broadly under the theme of teacher development. Personal narratives that highlight professional change and the path to it are welcome. Descriptions of the professional change, what prompted it, what informed it, what the results of it were: all of these in any combination should make for a presentation suitable for the conference. Please see the previous submissions here and here to get a better idea of what we are looking for and, perhaps, for some inspiration.

We envision this conference not only as an opportunity for viewers to learn from the presenters’ stories but also, and more importantly, to share their own. We hope to achieve this goal by a) employing a flipped format for some of our presentations and b) by utilizing a novel online environment for socializing.

Learn more about the conference by visiting the pages for presenters and attendees. If you have a story worth sharing, please consider contributing to this year’s conference! The deadline for proposal submissions is June 30th July 31st.

Click on the image below to go to the conference website.