Browsing by Subject "opettajan motiivit"

Objectives. Around the profession of teaching, certain stereotypes have formed about the types of people who become teachers and what interests and motivates them in that field, creating a certain mold for teachers. However, there are many variables behind this orientation. Previous studies have shown that individual's internal, external, and altruistic motivations particularly influence the choice to become a teacher. The goal of this study was to increase knowledge and understanding of the attractiveness of teacher education, focusing on the perspective of those interested in psychology. I wanted to find out what motivated students to be interested in elementary teaching and delve into how they justified their choice to themselves. I wanted to know which motives influenced the selection of the secondary choice the most and whether the secondary choice was still considered secondary later on. The theoretical framework was based on Reiss's (2004) motivation theory and Watt & Richardson's (2007) FIT-Choice scale. Additionally, I explore factors influencing career choices, such as education and the teaching profession. Methods. The study took the form of a case study, where I delved into four cases of elementary teacher students by conducting interviews to gather information about their experiences. I interviewed them individually using a semi-structured thematic interview, and then analyzed their responses through theory-driven content analysis. Results and Conclusions. As with case studies in general, the results of the study are not generalizable. The study revealed that for the interviewees, the choice of profession was guided by some form of alternative to psychology. The responses of the interviewees also indicated that there was not complete satisfaction with the teaching profession. Each interviewee had some future plan outside the classroom, albeit only much later. Surprisingly, the results showed that, contrary to the theory, working with children was a very significant motivation to choose teaching as a career for each interviewee.