Hong Kong secondary schoolteachers' understanding of their careers

Changes that occur in teachers’ careers are typically conceptualized in research as occurring in several demarcated and sequential stages/phases. This study examines secondary schoolteachers’ understandings of their careers and whether they could identify stages/phases in their career development. It is based on experienced teachers’ recall of their career development and their in‐depth interviews. The findings demonstrate the need to acknowledge the individual ways in which teachers develop as well as the need for the use of multiple frameworks for describing teachers’ career development. Using a single a priori model to describe their career development, as has been common in certain previous research, does not do justice to teachers’ understanding of their own careers. Furthermore, the findings of this study shed light on the contextualized nature of experience and expertise. Accordingly, implications for teacher education and policy‐making in the area are drawn.