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 evolved in many ways: from a face-to-face annual conference to a collection of curated videos online, and to a synchronous online conference. Yet, one feature has remained constant: it is one of the best venues for teachers across Japan and beyond to share reflections on their classroom situations. 

This year, Teacher Journeys aims to facilitate a continuous dialogue between presenters and viewers culminating in a synchronous online conference on December 16th 2023. 

We are inviting everyone to submit proposals for video presentations that fall broadly under the theme of teacher development. A successful applicant will be asked to record a presentation to be published on the blog of the Teacher Journeys website.

We are most interested in personal narratives that clearly explain the professional change and the path to it. A typical proposal and subsequent video presentation will consist of the following elements:

• Describing your situation (views, experiences, behaviors, opinions, etc.) before the change.
• Describing what prompted the change. This often comes in the form of a critical incident leading to a certain insight.
• Describing what informed the change. This may be personal observations, experience or reading of specific academic literature (or anything else we may not have thought about).
• Describing the results of the change. This may include your views, behavior, opinions and/or other things.

Please see some of the previous submissions here, here and here to get a better idea of what we are looking for and, perhaps, for some inspiration.

If you believe have a story worth sharing, please consider contributing to this year’s conference! The deadline for proposal submissions is August 31st.

Click here to go to the conference website.