The Process of Becoming a Teacher: Experiences with Teachers in Northeast Brazil

Background: Working conditions in Brazil, both material and contextual, are not suitable for the exercise of the educator's profession nor for the well-being of educators, which is being, therefore, strongly affected. In addition, a little more than three quarters of teaching professionals in Brazilian Basic Education are women. Design: The methodology used was qualitative in nature. Participants: seven Basic Education teachers, who participated as collaborators in the study, narrated their experiences as educators, and the research sought to explain the meanings and senses of the phenomena narrated by them. Data collection and analysis : To collect the information, two Conversation Rounds of two hours and thirty minutes each were held, and a structured questionnaire was applied to obtain personal and professional data from the collaborators. Then, to analyze this information, the strategy suggested by Strauss and Corbin (2012) was used. Results : From the teachers' testimonies, it was found that their training experiences were marked by the motivations for choosing to be a teacher, their insertion in the teaching community and the awareness of their role as educators. Conclusions : It was concluded that the process of becoming a teacher is characterized by unique sociocultural experiences, in which relationships with others have been crucial for the constitution of oneself as teaching professionals.