Coping Mechanisms of Novice Teachers

Most novice teachers are coming into the teaching profession and receive little or no assistance and yet are expected to perform the full teaching responsibilities despite their inexperience. Novice teachers are expected to formulate their own coping strategies and to grapple with the challenges they encounter during their first year of teaching on their own. In this study I investigated the coping mechanisms used by novice teachers to achieve their teaching goals during their first years of teaching. Through various interviews with novice teachers and HODs I found that novice teachers encountered many problems and had to formulate own coping mechanisms to achieve their goals. Although not all mechanisms were effective there were pockets of successful coping mechanisms from some novice teachers. The study recommends that the teacher training institutions, the Ministry of Education and schools have an important role to play in facilitating the use of effective coping mechanisms and in assisting novice teachers in alleviating these challenges. Schools should provide orientation and support to all novice teachers to be fully integrated into the school and teaching culture.