Matter: adaptation of novice teachers to professional work in Japan; Aim: to analyze theoretical ideas and practical experience of novice teachers’ professional adaptation in Japan and identify the peculiarities of the teacher induction program to suggest the perspectives of creative use of Japanese positive experience in Ukrainian education field; Methods: terminological analysis, analysis, synthesis and comparison of scientific sources materials, systematization and generalization; historical methods (comparative, retrospective, structural, logical); system-structural method, comparative and prognostic method; observation, interviews and conversation; study of official documentation, reports, statistics, methodological recommendations and guidelines; Novelty: the holistic historical and pedagogical analysis of the establishment and development of in-service teacher education and training in Japan was made; the stages of the development of novice teachers’ professional adaptation system in Japan were identified and characterized; modern development tendencies of professional teacher training system were highlighted; the peculiarities of teacher training in Japan as the prerequisites for the introduction of teacher induction program were revealed; aims, the content, methods, and forms of teacher induction program were revealed; archetypal nature of mentoring and the influence of traditional culture of teaching on the relations between a mentor and a novice teacher were investigated; the influence of sociocultural concept of “uchi-soto” on the nature of pedagogical mentoring was revealed; the prospective directions for application of innovative Japanese experience were suggested; earlier unknown facts and theoretical ideas of Japanese researches, legislative acts and documents on the problem of professional teacher education were introduced to the scientific circulation; the conceptual-categorical apparatus is specified, in particular the notion of “professional adaptation”, “professional disadaptation”, “reality shock”, ”teacher induction”, theoretical foundations as for the essence, duration and factors of initial adaptation, theoretical foundations as for the types, causes and degrees of maladjustment; the general conclusions as for the prevention and managing of disadaptation were made; further development of scientific ideas concerning creative use of innovative ideas of foreign experience in the system of postgraduate education in Ukraine are actualized.
