Guidelines for the promotion of teacher wellbeing in a township primary school

Abstract

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to gain insights into the state of teacher wellbeing in a township primary school and develop guidelines to promote it. Literature was reviewed to situate township schools socially, historically and politically and to explore the role of teachers as significant input resources in education systems. Process and content pathways to wellbeing were explored through perusal of literature related to theories, models and strategies that promote wellbeing from an asset-based perspective. Such asset and values-based approaches, including Positive Psychology and the PERMA+ model of wellbeing, formed the conceptual framework of the study and served as a baseline for the exploration of pathways to wellbeing. The empirical research was conducted in three phases at the same school with a set of fifteen participants in Phase 1 and seven participants, who were a subset of Phase 1 participants, in Phases 2 and 3. The purpose of the three phases was to penetrate the study from broader context analysis, to participants’ awareness, exploration and personalisation of factors that promote their own wellbeing. The results of the study highlighted the systemic influences on teacher wellbeing and has implications for considering teacher wellbeing from personal, professional and institutional perspectives. Furthermore, the asset-based process and content pathways explored were found to be beneficial in the promotion of teacher wellbeing. Guidelines from the findings of the study were developed for the Department of Education, the school and its management and other structures as well as for teachers, for whom this research was conducted.