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The importance of language teacher identity has been widely recognized recently as teachers’ professional development is highly influenced by the ways teachers view themselves. Critical orientation towards identity has also received considerable attention recently. The present study, thus, investigated the effect of a Critical Teacher Education Course (CTEC) on EFL teachers’ identity (re)construction. The participants included thirteen teachers who were first interviewed using a 20-question interview checklist whose items enabled the researchers to elicit teachers’ professional identity with a focus on critical pedagogical orientation. The teachers then attended an in-service CTEC held for ten sessions. The course was primarily dialogue-based where different premises of transformative education and critical pedagogy were introduced and discussed. This was followed by the second interview session in which the teachers were asked the same questions as the first interview. In the meantime, the teachers were also required to critically reflect on their classroom practices through reflective journals. The data were subjected to content analysis (inductive category development). The findings revealed that prior to their participation, the teachers viewed teaching English as a neutral act unaffected by contextual factors, whereas after the CTEC, they became more aware of the social, cultural, economic and political factors that might affect the whole process. Secondly, compliance with the rules and regulations, policies, and the status quo marked teachers' identities. However, they changed to more integrative teachers with critical orientations after CTEC. The findings might imply that EFL teacher training/education programmes become more localized, dialogic, interaction-based, negotiation-oriented and integration-driven.

Introduction: Musculoskeletal Disorders (MDs) largely contribute to occupational diseases in the workplace. Prevention from these disorders requires their evaluation in different occupations. This study aimed to compare the MDs of the neck between the teachers of Physical Education (PE) and those of the other majors in the high schools of Tehran City, Iran. Methods: The study sample included 180 teachers of mathematics, PE, and the religion and lifestyle in the high schools of Tehran (with the Mean±SD age of 42.11±6.65 years, and the Mean±SD weight of 72.28±12.98 kg). The participants were selected from 19 districts of the Tehran Departments of Education using multistage cluster sampling. The standard Nordic questionnaire was administered to investigate MDs among the teachers. The obtained data were analyzed with the Chi-square test to compare the MDs of the neck between the three groups of teachers. Results: A significant relationship was observed between the neck problems of the female (P=0.016) and male (P=0.017) PE teachers and the other teachers. Moreover, the neck problems were associated with the teaching experience (P=0.024) and teaching major (P=0.004). Conclusion: Based on the results, it seems that regular exercise can reduce the developing risk of MDs in the neck. Thus, this study recommends the performance of regular exercise and the correction of job-related postures to all teachers.

In recent years, ecological metaphors have gained popularity in the field of innovation. Such excessive preoccupation of researchers with common ecological metaphors, such as ecosystems, and a lack of due attention to the development of other ecological principles, challenges the systematic conceptual framework of the field. This raises the metaphorical concept of a "boundary object," which could hinder the connection between theoretical discussions on innovation ecosystems and their practical applications and policy development. Therefore, there is a need for an evidence-based approach to define and map the innovation ecosystem metaphorically. The concepts deployed would form a part of the conceptual network of the innovation ecosystem. As part of an effort to implement evidence-based practice in the field of innovation ecosystems, this study employs Scaringella's and Radziwon's (2019) systematic review framework and the comparative-qualitative content analysis method. The analysis is based on a structured matrix that is rooted in metaphor mapping. Upon analyzing the content of the selected articles, the ecological metaphors grounded in innovation ecosystems can be classified into two general categories: metaphors related to actors (species, population, and community) and metaphors related to the environment (landscape, biome, and ecotone). The developed framework serves as a tool for innovation policymakers, enabling them to make informed decisions by gaining a comprehensive understanding of the seven hierarchical metaphorical layers within innovation ecosystems. Consequently, policymakers should not restrict their governance to the suggestions offered by the prevailing literature on ecosystems. Instead, they should also give equal attention to the various dimensions of innovation ecosystems, including actors, the environment, and the relationships between them, from an ecological perspective.