Describing Elusive Educational Practice: What is Teacher Presence and what characteristics do teacher practitioners in English primary schools describe?

Teacher presence is often spoken about in education, but its definition is elusive and understanding of its meaning is tacit and assumed. In reality, it is a complex and multi-faceted phenomenon that is difficult to define. For new teachers, this aspect of professional practice can become a barrier when they are asked to improve their teacher presence. This motivation to understand how teacher presence manifests itself underpins this study. It has sharpened the focus to consider whether a technique-based approach (behaviourist) or a development of the teacher’s self and relationships with others (humanist) encapsulates what teacher presence is. Research views teacher presence as stemming from these two distinct paradigms; the outcome of this study is that a combination of both behaviourist and humanist principles, synthesised reflexively, results in effective teacher presence. This outcome is a unique contribution to the field.

A case study approach has been adopted working with four experienced teachers. To gain a detailed understanding of teacher presence a range of data collection tools have been used including observations and a reciprocal discussion. This study found that there are three dimensions to teacher presence: the personal, the relational and the professional persona. The importance of reflection and developing an authentic and individual approach in the classroom (personal dimension) has been a significant finding. This state is termed ‘comfortableness’, which describes a relaxed, open and confident style with a connection between the teacher and the pupils (relational dimension) where the teacher feels they can be themselves, albeit at times an exaggerated version (the professional persona dimension). The use of techniques by established teachers has also been a finding from this study. Both techniques and developing your own comfortableness and individual approach are synthesised for the most effective display of teacher presence. Synthesising these techniques with the previously defined state of 'comfortableness' in a tailored and individual characterisation results in the most effective model of teacher presence.