An Exploration of Motivational Strategies, Beliefs, and Contextual Factors: A Case of Chinese EFL Teachers

Abstract

Based on the Self-determination theory, teachers can enhance learners’ intrinsic motivation and their use of motivational strategies may be influenced by their beliefs and contextual factors. This case study was thus designed to explore these relationships in the contexts of EFL classrooms in Northwest of China, in which student’s motivation levels in English learning were found in previous studies to be lower than that of the students in other regions. Six EFL teachers from a public upper secondary school in this region were observed in their tenth grade English classrooms over one month. After the observations, they were interviewed to elicit information about their beliefs and contextual factors. In addition, supplementary information about the contextual factors was also obtained from relevant documents. The data were analyzed qualitatively using the coding method.

The findings from the observations revealed a consistent pattern in the participants’ use of motivational strategies. All the six teachers tended to employ controlling strategies to motivate their students in the teacher-centered classroom; nevertheless, they seemed to be aware of a variety of motivational strategies and were observed to use some autonomy supportive strategies. Their beliefs about motivational strategies were found to be varied, either in autonomy supportive style or controlling style. These data suggested that the teachers’ motivational practices might not have been influenced by their beliefs, but rather by contextual factors, including the pressures from “above” and “below”. The discrepancy between teacher beliefs and practices revealed in this study suggests that EFL teachers should be aware of the influence of the contextual factors and seek opportunities to have professional development to be able to properly nurture learners’ intrinsic motivation. Because some strategies did not show a clear trend and the effects of motivational strategies were interpreted based on previous literature only, future investigations on how teachers’ motivational strategies change over a long period of time and how each motivational strategy really affects students’ intrinsic motivation are recommended.