Demotivational factors among beginning efl teachers at the university of languages and international studies

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION GRADUATION PAPER DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS AMONG BEGIN

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL

STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION

GRADUATION PAPER

DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS

AMONG BEGINNING EFL TEACHERS

AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

Supervisor: Dr Nguyễn Thu Lệ Hằng Student: Trần Khánh Linh

Course: QH2016.F1.E1

HÀ NỘI – 2020

ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI

TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH

KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP

NHỮNG YẾU TỐ LÀM GIẢM ĐỘNG LỰC CỦA GIÁO VIÊN TIẾNG ANH CÓ THÂM NIÊN ÍT

TẠI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ

Giáo viên hướng dẫn: TS Nguyễn Thu Lệ Hằng Sinh viên: Trần Khánh Linh

Khóa: QH2016.F1.E1

HÀ NỘI – 2020

I hereby state that I, Tran Khanh Linh, from class 16E1, being a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts (programme) accept the requirements of the College relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or reproduction of the paper

Signature

Date: 10/06/2020

Acknowledgements

Foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Dr Nguyen Thu Le Hang, my research supervisor, for her patient guidance, heart-warming encouragement and valuable critiques during the course of this research work and my learning process in general

Special thanks should be given to Le Huong Giang, my best friend, for her unwavering faith and relentless support for me, even in our darkest times

My heartfelt thanks also go to the beginning teachers at FELTE who spend their time and efforts participating in my study, especially amid the Covid19 pandemic social distancing

Finally, I wish to thank my parents for their support and encouragement throughout my study

Abstract

High teacher turnover rate is a severe issue with detrimental consequences in many countries, including Vietnam, and especially among beginning teachers One of the common reasons for young teachers’ turnover is demotivation The present research explores the common and strong demotivational factors among EFL teachers who have less than three years of experience in the University of Languages and International Studies and how they manage to remotivate themselves This study adapts mixed method with online questionnaire and semi-structured interviews with five participants The findings reveal eight common to very common demotivational factors

including workload, stress, salary, students’ lack of interest students’ low English proficiency, lack of knowledge about methodology, physical infrastructure, and research quota The factors that have the strongest impacts

on the teachers’ motivation include problems related to students, workload, curriculum, stress, teaching methodology and research quota There are two main kinds of remotivational solutions, which are action and mental solutions Regarding action solution, teachers deal with methodology-related factors by class observation and joining communities, while student-related factors are tackled by student’s feedback, student’s profiles and teacher’s self-adjustment Regarding stress-related factors, some suggested action plans that teachers would enjoy are participating in benevolent activities and having consultancy from colleagues The mental solutions including focusing on the positives, practicing meditation, ranting with a closed one, having a healthier lifestyle and temporary activities, are mostly effective for teachers dealing with stress from work or heavy workload It is suggested that further study collects data on a larger scope, with different tools and should focus on the effects of the factors and sub-factors found in the current study on the level of demotivation

Table of contents

Acknowledgements i

Abstract ii

Table of contents iii

List of tables, figures, and abbreviations v

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale for the study 1

2 Research aims and research questions 2

3 Scope of the study 3

4 Contributions of the research 3

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 3

1 Definition of key concepts 3

1.1 Motivation 3

1.2 Demotivation 4

2 Review of related studies 5

2.1 Demotivational factors among teachers 5

2.2 Strategies for teacher motivation 11

2.3 Beginning teachers 12

3 Relevant theories and frameworks 12

3.1 Some motivation theories 12

3.2 Directed Motivational Currents (DMC) 13

4 Research gap 14

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 15

1 Research participants and sampling 15

2 Data collection procedure and methods 16

2.1 Data collection instruments 16

2.2 Data collection procedure 17

3 Data analysis procedure and methods 18

3.1 Data from survey analysis 18

3.2 Qualitative data analysis 18

CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 19

1 Research Question 1: 19

2 Research Sub- Question 1: 23

2.1 Quantitative data 23

2.2 Qualitative Data 25

3 Research Question 2: 33

3.1 Action solutions 33

3.2 Mental solutions 42

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 46

1 Major findings 46

2 Implications 46

3 Limitations and suggestions for further research 47

References 49 Appendices I

Appendix 1: Questionnaire I Appendix 2: Interview question IX

List of tables, figures, and abbreviations

Table 1: List of common to very common demotivational factors 39

Table 2: Uncommon demotivational factors 42

Chart 1: Level of popularity of demotivational factors 41

Chart 2: Impacts of factors on teacher’s motivation 44

Language

ULIS: University of Languages and International

Studies

FELTE: Faculty of English Language and Teacher

Education

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale for the study

A good teacher is one of the valuable assets for high-quality education Teachers are the nation builders since the development of any country depends largely on its educational system (Shishigu, 2015) Every teacher in a student's life has made a significant impact on his/her intellectual, personal and social development, thereby shaping the behaviours of generations

High teacher turnover rate might cause multiple serious problems, for instance, it inhibits learning, and it costs a massive amount of money for trainings and reallocation Therefore, it is pivotal to factorize the causes of teachers’ turnover in Vietnam and alleviate the impacts

In Vietnam, according to Vu (2017), at least half of teachers currently

do not want to continue their teaching career, and they regret choosing the teaching profession In recent research by Pham (2019), when investigating pedagogical students after the practicum at high schools, more than 50% want

to change career if they were given the chances The common reasons for the students are demotivation, lack of opportunities for professional development and hardship

In English as a foreign language (EFL) learning environment, the teacher is a significant factor affecting students' achievement, motivation and attitudes toward English learning (Chambers, 1999 and Dornyei & Csizer 1998, cited in Kim, Kim & Zhang, 2014) Dornyei and Ushioda (2011) claimed that ''if a teacher is motivated to teach, there is a good chance that his or her students will be motivated to learn'' (p.156) Moreover, teacher motivation has been found to play a critical role in sustaining their level of enthusiasm, commitment and professional development Last but not least, teacher motivation is also crucial for national education reforms and the development

of education (Day, Elliot & Kington, 2005)

Despite the aforementioned undeniable importance of EFL teacher motivation, recent studies showed that most teachers are not highly motivated,

and there was a general decline of motivation among in-service teachers (Dinham & Scott 2000; Johnson, 2001; Sugino, 2010, cited in Kim et al., 2014) In the previous studies, the majority of EFL teachers reported that they are dissatisfied with their teaching situation In University of Languages and International Studies (ULIS), a large number of English language teachers are working and being trained here every year From the researcher’s observation and personal experiences, a considerable proportion of beginning teachers are facing demotivation in their careers and education, especially in the first few years

Regarding educational consequences, “low motivation leads to absenteeism, misused class time, professional under-functioning, traditional teaching methods, under-preparedness, and distraction from teaching tasks due

to the adoption of another job for a secondary income” (Bennell & Akyeampong, 2007 as cited in Han & Mahzoun, 2018) In terms of teacher’s well-being, Guajardo (2011) indicated that low motivation leads to high rates

of teacher attrition, immutable turnover, changeable levels of professional commitment, lack of confidence, and severe feelings of incompetence (as cited

in Han & Mahzoun, 2018) Therefore, a lack of motivation on the part of EFL teachers causes tremendous negative educational consequences and teacher’s well-being School governors and educators should be aware of the demotivation factors to alleviate their impacts in order to create a healthier and more stimulating environment for their staff

2 Research aims and research questions

For the reasons above and the research gap, I find it necessary to conduct thorough research on the demotivational factors among beginning EFL teachers at ULIS and what they could do to alleviate the problems Therefore, the main research hypothesis is:

Beginning EFL teachers in ULIS are demotivated by various factors

To fully explore the problem and some possible solutions, this study will

be guided by these following questions:

Research question 1: What are the demotivational factors among beginning EFL teachers at ULIS?

Research sub-question 1: Which demotivational factors have the strongest impact on the teacher’s motivation?

Research question 2: How can the demotivational factors among beginning teachers at ULIS be alleviated as perceived by the teachers?

3 Scope of the study

This study is conducted within the beginning EFL teachers who have less than three years of teaching experience in ULIS Therefore, the data and findings are not for the purpose of generalizing the phenomenon in FELTE or ULIS, but rather of gaining an insightful look into EFL teachers’ demotivation

in FELTE

In this research, demotivational factors refer to both external and internal causes that hinder teachers from doing their best in their professions

4 Contributions of the research

The findings of this study would, firstly, contribute to the previous body

of research relating to the motivation and demotivation of teachers in general and young teachers with limited working experience in particular Secondly, the study would raise school governors and educators' concerns and awareness about the impacts of demotivating factors on the quality of education and some solutions for the administration Thirdly, the research could hopefully provide the teacher trainees, novice teachers and teachers with a helpful and systematic reference of demotivating factors and possible solutions for them Lastly, this would serve as a future reference for researchers in the field of education and teacher demotivation

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

1 Definition of key concepts

1.1 Motivation

According to Dornyei (2001), motivation is defied as "why people decide to do something, how long they are willing to sustain the activity and how hard they are going to pursue it" While Dornyei’s defintion is process-

oriented, that of Ryan and Deci (2000) was more motive-oriented, as being motivated means to be moved to do one thing

Regarding the indicators of motivation, Suslu (2006) identifies motivated individuals as ones who energized and activated to the end of the task and differentiates with unmotivated those who have lost impetus and inspiration to act

Metcalfe and Game (2006) state that the spirit of the classroom comes from an energy that is created between not only students but also between teachers and students; it is an energy both teachers and students share This research emphasizes the importance of the teacher's motivation in the classroom Before Metcalfe and Game’s result, most research focuses on investigating the motivation of students and strategies to motivate them

Shaheen, Sajid and Batool (2013) claim that a motivated teacher is recognized by high levels of commitment, hard work, devotion, dedication, and becomes a source of inspiration through his or her exemplary character

1.2 Demotivation

Over the past years, the terms of amotivation, demotivation, and remotivation have been used to refer to lack, loss, and renewal of motivation, respectively (Deci & Ryan, 2000; Dornyei, 2001) According to Deci and Ryan (2000), amotivation, refers to “the relative absence of motivation that was not caused by a lack of initial interest but rather by the individual's experiencing feelings of incompetence and helplessness when faced with the activity” (p 57), while demotivation pointed to states or conditions that hindered a person from doing his or her best in achieving a specific purpose (Deci & Ryan, 2000)

Some of the indicators of low motivation among teachers are: carelessness in preparation, poor classroom management, lack of punctuality and failure to obey school policy, low commitment to use their maximum effort for the betterment of students learning (Cook, 1991 as cited in Shishigu, 2015)

In this research, demotivational factors refer to external and internal causes that hinder teachers from doing their best in their professions

2 Review of related studies

2.1 Demotivational factors among teachers

There are different ways that the previous studies classified the demotivational factors among EFL teachers; however, there is no verified framework on these ways of categorizing Therefore, the researcher chooses to synthesize the most common demotivational factors in the literature instead of selecting a particular framework

For ease of investigation, the studies reviewed in the literature are classified into five main categories of social-oriented factors, financial factors, classroom-oriented factors, personal factors, and working conditions factors

Firstly, social-oriented factors refer to impacts coming from outside of the school, including students' parents and society in general According to Han

& Mahzoun (2017), the way parents trigger demotivation lies in their attitudes towards the teachers and on the importance of English as a subject for their children This study, together with Yaghoubinejad, Zarrinabadi, & Nejadansari

(2016) and Aydin (2012), finds out that parents are the leading cause of

demotivation Kim et al (2014, p.45) concludes that teachers felt demotivated, especially by parents’ high level of expectations and interference These findings are often common in the Asia countries such as Korea, China, Iran and Turkey, mostly due to the traditional high family value in these societies Parents in some Asian countries might have large impacts on individuals’ decision, especially at the young ages; therefore, excessive interference from the family might be one of the problem in education

Another salient demotivational factor is lack of social recognition and respect for teachers (Kim & Kim, 2016 and Yaghoubinejad et al., 2016) This

factor indicates that the teachers care about the respect which they can achieve from their job, which is related to recognition for teaching competence In Vietnam and some developing countries in South Asia, declining teacher status

is identified as a feature of the teaching profession (Bennell & Akyeampong, 2007)

Secondly, financial factors, including payment and research funds, are

among the most severe demotivational factors Inadequate payment for what

they do at school is the second highly demotivating factor for Iranian teachers, according to Yaghoubinejad et al (2016) Habibi & Sofwan (2016) claims that almost all teachers agree that the payment that they earn from the institution is not sufficient for their daily needs and some said that they have to do extra work to pay the bills Teachers also believed that there is not any specified and preplanned bonus or reward for what they did at school (Yaghoubinejad et al., 2016) This could affect teachers’ own perception about themselves since many teachers indicate their teaching competence and job satisfaction by the amount

of money they earn, especially in case of the young beginning teachers Baniasad-Azad & Ketabi (2013) and Kızıltepe (2008) indicate that lacking

research fund can largely demotivate the teachers

Thirdly, another demotivational factor is educational factor referring to

the educational and classroom-oriented factors, namely students, curriculum, methodology, teaching materials, teacher’s autonomy, and teacher's self- efficacy

Among these sub-factors, student-related factors are found to be the

most demotivating one The results of a study by Sugino (2010) indicate that 'using cell-phones,' 'sleeping in class' 'being uninterested in studying' and 'taking a rebellious attitude' demotivate the teachers the most Aydin (2012) states that the problem arises from the affective states of learners; for example, the teacher complains that the learners have low levels of motivation no matter what methods and strategies she uses Students low level of performance, response and achievement create a sense of dissatisfaction, apathy, and helplessness among the teachers (Fattash, 2013) In terms of English-teaching context in China, Kim et al (2014) states that teachers attribute students' lack

of interest to students' low English proficiency This might due to the fact that learners find it difficult to success in this subject then they lose interest and motivation to learn Therefore, students' negative attitude also plays a vital role

in creating teachers' demotivation

Curriculum implementation is another demotivational factors that many

teachers in the literature are facing In Hettiarachchi (2013), it is a common consensus among the five participants that the national curriculum of English does not suit the proficiency level of students in their area as they often have to simplify the lessons A teacher also comments on the curriculum that it "does not go with the needs of the students in the country" Habibi & Sofwan (2016) claim that the rapidly changed Indonesian Education curricula are one of the problems in teaching situation of Indonesia Teachers reports that they are confused about what the government wants them to do, and the training on the newest curriculum is not sufficiently available This result is in line with the findings of other researchers (Dornyei, 2011; Hojaji & Salehi, 2017; Sugino, 2010) In Vietnam’s university, the curriculum is often designed and distributed

by the school’s governors; therefore, the curriculum is more customized to the nature of the learners in the schools However, the characteristics of the teachers and other factors such as school’s facilities might not be considered carefully or often be overlooked during the curriculum designing process

Another demotivational factor for the teachers is lack of quality teaching materials The findings of Aydin (2012, p.39) shows that the interviewed

teacher lacks supportive material for classroom use as she reiterates that "it would be helpful to use some additional material in her classes." She also had problems with the unbalanced activities in the course books and the lack of unity and coherence in the books The findings of Hojaji & Salehi (2017) also reveal that teachers need more teaching and supporting materials in order to teach effectively Poor quality textbooks and lack of supporting materials might hinder the teachers from delivering their lectures effectively Teachers would have to spend more time on producing materials by themselves or adapting materials from other sources This amount of time could be used more efficaciously for the teachers to do research, understand more about their students and perfect their teaching

Lack of knowledge about methodology or failure in methodology

implementation might also lead to teacher demotivation Teachers might

perceive their teaching as a failure when students seem to unenthusiastically react to the teachers' efforts despite the wide range of methodology their implement (Kim & Kim, 2016) Besides, Aydin (2012) reveals that teacher's lack of knowledge in using appropriate teaching methods and techniques (e.g for teaching vocabulary, grammar and necessary language skills) together with lack of pedagogical experience (e.g on how to deal with and teach special children) largely demotivate them from their teaching Methodology plays an important role in successfully delivering language lessons Lack of effective teaching methods could possibly hinder teachers a lot and render them doubts about their teaching competences In long terms, these unsolved doubts might cause demotivation in teachers

Lack of teacher autonomy is identified as one of the demotivational

factors among EFL teachers The concept of teacher autonomy briefly refers to the authority and freedom of teachers in the planning and implementation of the instructional activities and the decisions made during the instructional process (Ozturk, 2012) Few opportunities to teach English in an autonomous and diverse way was the sixth demotivating factor in the research by Yaghoubinejad et al (2017)

Insufficient self-efficacy is also one of the reasons for teacher

demotivation Deci & Ryan (1985) list competence (i.e feeling efficacious and having a sense of accomplishment) as one of the primary conditions of intrinsic motivation However, teacher education has traditionally taken a very one-sided approach by placing most emphasis on subject-matter training In Vietnam, pedagogical students usually have up to seven semesters for attending lectures at universities but only one semester for teaching practicum As a consequence, most newly qualified teachers are overwhelmed by the harsh reality of everyday classroom life, often referred to as the ‘reality shock’ (Veenman, 1984, p.143 as cited in Dornyei, 2011)

Fourthly, another main demotivational factor is working environment,

including administrative systems, workload, research quota, the relationship with colleagues, facilities and opportunity for professional development

Administrative system is the most influencing sub-factor in school

teacher's demotivation, according to the reviewed literature For most of the cases, administration and working conditions pertain equally since teachers' attribute working conditions to the status of teachers in the eye of the administration, which means how the administration treats the staff represent working conditions According to Han & Mahzoun (2017), too many extra unpaid but obligatory tasks, frequent meetings, most of which teachers are not informed in advance, and frequent changes in the schedule are examples of working conditions that teachers blame the administration for Little appreciation and lack of support from the administration would also cause teacher demotivation (Hettiarachchi, 2013 and Sugino, 2010) A teacher in the study by Aydin (2012) also states that she suffered from communication problems with school administrators and ideological discrimination by the school administrators

Among the factors, workload has significant impact on teachers’

demotivation Findings of Sugino (2010) reveal that long meeting hours and much paperwork would demotivate teachers In a qualitative study by Hettiarachchi (2013), a teacher stated that English teachers get assigned more extra-curriculum activities like sports, training children for different functions compared to other teachers of other academic subjects Marwan (2009) conducted research into the workload of six English teachers working full time

at an Indonesian vocational university With the qualitative method, he found that the participants experienced difficulty in applying good EFL teaching practices because of their heavy workload, suggesting its negative influence on EFL teaching quality In Vietnamese university context, lecturer’s workload

also includes research quota (the minimum number of hours devoted to

research per school year).1

Another problem that cause teachers’ demotivation is poor relationship with colleagues In Han & Mahsoun (2017), the field notes of the researchers

1 In ULIS, the quota for a beginning teacher is 600 hours/year for Bachelor and Master holders, and 650 hours/year for PhD holders (from http://felte.ulis.vnu.edu.vn/)

show that there is no collaboration among EFL teachers in Turkey A teacher even recalls her helplessness as a new teacher and had received no supports and guidance from other teachers (Hettiarachchi, 2013) Unsupportive or critical colleagues ranks third among twelve demotivational factors in s study conducted at six primary schools in the UK (Addison & Brundrett, 2013) This problem is even more serious among beginning teachers since they are being the most ‘fragile’ during their first years; therefore, colleague support or mentorship is critical in this period

Facilities factors, including class-size and physical infrastructure, are

proven to be one of the factors affecting teachers’ demotivation According to

Yaghoubinejad et al (2016), large class size is revealed as the fourth major

demotivational factor for Iranian teachers since at least half of the interviewed teachers thought that there are too many students in their English classes (approximately 35 students/ class) Teachers in Indonesia also face the same problem when they have 40 to 50 students in one room; the teachers complain that they could not maximally manage to transfer information and knowledge (Habibi & Sofwan, 2016) In ULIS, the class-size is at least 35 students/ class for a normal language classroom and might be much higher for other subjects’ classrooms

According to Yaghoubinejad et al (2016), in Iran, the teachers mostly

complain about the insufficiency or lack of facilities such as language labs,

teaching aids, English storybooks, projectors Seven out of ten interviewees complain about the fact that there is only one smart classroom and this would cause dissatisfaction and inconvenience among teachers as they have to share

it With more than thirty students in one classroom and with no coolers, teachers find it challenging to transfer their knowledge to their students in Indonesia (Habibi & Sofwan, 2016) This result is also in line with findings of other studies in the UK and Iran (Addison & Brundrett, 2008; Nazari & Taki, 2015)

Another demotivational factor is limited opportunities for professional development This could also be known as inadequate career structure or

professional contingent path For English teachers, areas of advancement or further goals to attain are minimal, therefore, teachers often feel that they 'got stuck' or 'reach the plateau' Therefore, bright future professional perspectives are essential for the teachers However, given the lack of a career path contingency for most teachers to provide this more long-term satisfaction, there

is nothing to offset the daily frustrations of their work (Dornyei, 2011)

The last type of demotivational factors is personal factors, including

stress and Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS) Stress in school teaching is often

caused by the fact that teachers have to spend most of their working hours with groups of children or young adults Teachers often deal with learners who are going through the most turbulent phases of their personal lives, which is usually reflected in increased rebelliousness and fundamental behavioral problems (Dornyei, 2011) Kieaschke and Schaarschmidt (2008, as cited in Dornyei, 2011) call for significant reforms in pre-service teacher education so that adequate attention is paid to the personality and health conditions that may impact on teachers' ability to manage stress effectively

According to the US Department of Education (2012), STS can affect the following bio-psychosocial characteristics: physical, emotional, behavioral, cognitive, interpersonal, spiritual, and professional The impact of STS on a teacher’s personal or professional life can be devastating or debilitating, and acknowledging and recognizing the signs of STS can be one of the first steps in ameliorating its effect

2.2 Strategies for teacher motivation

Motivation waxes and wanes as it is dynamic, situational, and psychologically experienced (Dornyei, 2001) However, chronic drops over the long-term might indicates teacher burn-out, of which three factors are – emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and low personal accomplishment (Grayson & Alvarez, 2007; Skaalvik & Skaalvik, 2009 as cited in Falout, 2010) Falout (2010) suggested that teachers with at-risk conditions can remotivate with three principles – managing emotions counters emotional

exhaustion; joining communities counters depersonalization; and boosting efficacy counters low personal accomplishment

2.3 Beginning teachers

According to Veenman (1984, as cited in Dornyei, 2011), knowledge of the problems faced by beginning teachers in their first years of teaching may provide critical information for the improvement and (re)designing of pre-service and in-service programs For this reason, many studies have been conducted to determine these problems and the relationship between these problems and teacher education programs In this study, beginning teachers are teachers that have less than three years of teaching experience in FELTE In Vietnam, the most common reasons for the beginning teachers or pre-teach teachers are stress, lack of opportunities for professional development and hardship In 2011, Nguyen Thanh Ha conducted a research to investigate job satisfaction level among 43 young lecturers who have been teaching English in ULIS, VNU for less than three years The findings revealed that most young lecturers were satisfied with the teaching profession, their working abilities, community's good opinion of teachers, and promotion prospects Some factors that displeased young lecturers include poor salaries, and facilities in teaching and learning The eight problems perceived most often are classroom discipline, motivating students, dealing with individual differences, assessing students' work, relationships with parents, organization of classwork, insufficient and inadequate teaching materials and supplies, and dealing with problems of individual students

3 Relevant theories and frameworks

3.1 Some motivation theories

A thorough understanding of some motivation theories might provide us with the theoretical justifications for the motivational and demotivational factors later in the discussion

There are numerous theories of motivation that investigating the origins and underpinnings of motivation Nevertheless, we can categorize them into two main types: content and process motivation theories In the literature,

content theories relate to the individual goals and needs that intrinsically motivate one's actions - for example, physical needs, psychological needs or safety needs Content theories focus on answering the "what" questions, whereas process ones seek to answer "how" questions about the formation of motivation In other words, process theories try to explain how an individual behaviour is ignited, conducted and maintained The main principles of process theories are in line with early cognitive theories, which claim that behaviour originates from conscious decision-making processes (Han & Mahzoun, 2018)

3.2 Directed Motivational Currents (DMC)

Dornyei, Henry & Muir (2016, as cited in Sugino, Abe & Ueda, 2017) offer as follows as DMC's vital points:

 A DMC is an intense, motivational drive-or-surge, which is capable of stimulating and supporting long-term behavior (such

as the learning of an L2)

 A DMC is similar to the flow experience in some aspects (most notably the learners' absorption in action) but different in others (most specifically their timescales, the different sources of positive emotionality, and the structures underpinning them)

 The tasks which make up a DMC pathway will inevitably consist

of activities which both would and would not be perceived as enjoyable in their own right; however, regardless of their inherent

"enjoyability" in normal circumstances, all tasks along a DMC pathway are perceived as enjoyable because they transport an individual toward a highly valued end-goal

Though a DMC is often a highly individual experience, we can relate this to L2 learning, as a DMC is an essential phenomenon because teachers can play a vital role in helping to transfer the energy of a DMC into a more conventional form

The researcher concluded further investigation was necessary as to how teachers regain motivation and hopefully toward directed motivational currents (DMC), which not only provide direction for action but also energize action (Dörnyei et al., 2016)

4 Research gap

Despite the importance of teacher demotivation, there is a significant research gap in the field of demotivation of teachers, especially for inexperienced teachers

Firstly, research on motivation and demotivation in the EFL learning and teaching processes had thus far mainly focused on language learners However, the main factor affecting students' level of motivation is the teachers Therefore, it is essential to factorize the demotivation of teachers to enhance the quality of education Secondly, the studies in terms of EFL teachers mainly focused on motivation, strategies to motivate teachers and student-teacher motivation relationship rather than teacher demotivation Lastly, there is a serious lack of research on teacher demotivation in the Vietnamese context, as only one study was found on the issue, regarding the situation at a college in Vinh Phuc province The researcher can find none regarding the demotivational factors for beginning EFL teachers in Vietnam

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

The present study employs Mixed-method research design According to Dornyei (2001), the mixed-methods research is useful in examining multidimensional and complex issues, especially in the field of language learning Further, it possesses value in that the corresponding evidence achieved from multiple methods can increase the validity of the findings (Dornyei & Ushioda, 2011) In this research, the explanatory design allows quantitative data to be collected and analyzed first, and then the qualitative findings to be used "to explain, refine, clarify, or extend quantitative results" (Ivankova & Creswell, 2009)

1 Research participants and sampling

Criteria for selection is EFL teacher who has less than three years of working experience in FELTE Five EFL teachers in FELTE, who has three or less than three years of experience in the faculty agreed to join in the current study Three teachers are from English One divisions, one from English Two, one from English for Specific Purposes and one from Interpreting and Translation division Their ages range from 23 to 31 years old All of the participants are female

Four out of five agreed to take part in the interview for further investigation

This section reports the four interviewees’ demographic details, university education, teaching experiences, and the current working environment All of the participants’ names below are pseudonyms in order to preserve their privacy

Van is a 25- year- old female English teacher currently working at

FELTE She works in English 1, which means she mostly teaches and interacts with first-year students She spent her four years of university education at the fast-track program in ULIS, majoring in English language teaching At the time

of this research, she is studying for her Master degree She had teaching experiences as a private tutor and teacher since the years in university and

continued teaching as a lecturer at English 1 after graduation She has been working in FELTE for almost two years

Phuong is a female EFL teacher at the age of 32 Currently, she also

works in English 1, in which the target students are freshmen only She studied

at Hanoi National University of Education and earned her Master degree at ULIS in 2016 She has eight years of teaching experience at four different universities in the Northern part of Vietnam Her strength is teaching writing skills, which rooted from her rich experience She has been working in FELTE for two years

Hue is a female between 35 and 40 years old Currently, she has been

working at the division of English for Special Purposes at FELTE, ULIS for three years She has 11 years of experience in total in teaching English for Special Purposes (ESP) for two different universities She finished her PhD degree in ESP in 2017 at ULIS and started working here then

Lan is a 25 – year – old English teacher She started working at English

1 at the same time as Van; therefore, she also has approximately two years of working experience at FELTE She studied English Language at Hanoi University, majoring in Translation and Interpretation After graduation, she took part in a two- month TESOL course organized by her university She is

also studying for her Master degree at the time of this research

2 Data collection procedure and methods

2.1 Data collection instruments

Data collection of this mixed-methods study included two stages

Firstly, a questionnaire was designed by the researcher, originally based

on the reviewed literature of main demotivational factors and the research questions The questionnaire was conducted in English The questionnaire was distributed online to the participants on 25th December and collected on 31stDecember

The questionnaire (Appendix 1) includes four main parts: Years of experience, Common factors (Likert scale), Strong factors (Likert scale), Your action/ Your solution (Open-ended) Qualtrics Survey Software powered the

survey and thanks to its advanced feature of Carrying Forward Statement, the researcher needs not to repeat the demotivational factors to assess their impacts

Secondly, in order to obtain an in-depth understanding of the strong demotivational factors and solutions suggested by EFL teachers at ULIS to alleviate the demotivational factors, the researcher organize interviews with the participants The interviews are conducted in Vietnamese, with four EFL teachers in January 2020 The transcript’s used translation has been cross-checked by a senior student in the ULIS majoring Translation and Interpretation Further investigation was necessary as to how teachers regain motivation and hopefully toward directed motivational current (DMC), which not only provides a direction for action but also energizes action (Dornyei et al., 2016)

2.2 Data collection procedure

Generally speaking, the process of data collection went through seven main steps as following Step one is deciding what information is needed The next step is designing the questions for the pilot interview/ pilot questionnaire

In this step, I designed the first draft of the questions for pilot The following step is organizing in advance the access to our respondents The fourth step is conducting the pilot questionnaire/ interview This step was carried out after I had done with the first draft of the questions Delivering the main questionnaire/ interview is the following step After having the response and feedback from the aforementioned teacher, I made some changes accordingly Then I had to deliver the questionnaire to the teachers The final step is collecting data and monitoring the process

The surveys were delivered and conducted online in an estimated time

of 15 minutes The interviews were carried out with each individual of the participants Clarification of concepts or confusing words is provided before and during the process In this step, the researcher used audio recordings to better document the answers

The interviews were carried out with four participants with a view to not only answering the second research question but also gathering more information and descriptions of the salient demotivational factors identified in the survey

3 Data analysis procedure and methods

3.1 Data from survey analysis

After all the data was collected in the Qualtrics software, data were tabulated and entered into Excel for Windows Descriptive statistics, including data for research question 1 and research sub-question 1, were generated and reported

3.2 Qualitative data analysis

Qualitative analysis procedures were adapted to address the research question of the study This study aims to provide an in-depth and interpreted understanding of the social world of the participants by learning about their social circumstances, their experiences, perspectives, and histories

After reading thoroughly through the interview transcripts, the researcher broke down the data into first level concepts and used content analysis method to look for common and recurring themes I also made marginal remarks and note down and any “emergent codes” which are ideas, concept or themes that come up in the data and are dissimilar to the preset codes At a later point, I thus collapsed the aforementioned codes into a larger theme which allowed myself to reconstruct prominent codes and categories

CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

In this chapter, the findings of the two research questions and one question are presented and discussed Quantitative data were analyzed to answer research question 1 and sub-question, whereas the analysis of qualitative data provided a more insightful view for the sub-question and answered question 2

sub-The total number of survey responses collected was six; however, one of them was disqualified by the participant’s long working time in the faculty

“Never experience”, “Uncommon”, “Common” and “Very common”

The results of the study revealed eight main factors for demotivation

among the beginning teachers in FELTE: problems related to the workload, stress, salary, students’ lack of interest, students’ low English proficiency, lack

of knowledge about methodology, physical infrastructure, and research quota,

ranked in the order of popularity

Table 1: Items for demotivational factors among beginning teachers in

FELTE ranked in the order of their mean scores

7 Physical infrastructure 3.00

Min = 1.00, Max = 4.00 The maximum score is 4.00, representing the Very common scale, while the minimum is 1.00, representing the Never experience scale As can be seen

in Table 1, the highest mean score was found in Item 14 (Workload) at 3.60

Most of the participants (60%) valued item 14 as Very common, and 40% rated

it as a Common demotivational factor The data indicate that English teachers

in FELTE have difficulties dealing with the large amount of workload from school and balancing between work and life; thus, it was perceived as the most common demotivational factor

Chart 1 illustrates the level of popularity of 22 questioned

demotivational factors Accordingly, Item 20 (Stress) and 2 (Salary) were both

identified as the second most reported factors with 40% of the participants rated them as Very common, 40% as Common and only 20% voted for Uncommon The other common demotivational factors were found related to

item 4 (Students’ lack of interest), item 5 (Students’ low English proficiency), item 9 (Lack of knowledge about methodology), item 17 (Physical infrastructure) and item 21 (research quota), all of which have the mean of

3.00 in the results

All of the participants (100%) agreed that Students’ lack of interest and Physical infrastructure are Common demotivational factors among FELTE

teachers Another factor related to students, Students’ low English proficiency,

was rated as Common by 60% and as Very common by 20% of the participants; however, another 20% ranked this as Uncommon Regarding teaching methodology, 80% of the asked teachers admitted that they felt a lack

of knowledge in order to successfully deliver the lessons to students; whereas

20% did not see this as a common factor In terms of research quota, most of

the

participants (60%) acknowledged that the large number of hours dedicated to research might be a common demotivational factor for teachers, 20% thought this was Very common, and another 20% ranked this as Uncommon

Table 2: Uncommon demotivational factors

18 Opportunities for professional development 2.00

15 The relationship between colleagues and

19, Item 3, Item 18, Item 15, Item 1 and Item 11 All of these items have mean

scores less than the middle point (M= 2.50) Two of these factors are not common due to the nature of the university learning environment, and another

two are due to the nature of ULIS Firstly, Secondary traumatic stress and Students’ parents’ intervention might only be a prevailing factor in the primary

and high-school teaching environment, where the learner autonomy is not emphasized, and teachers are supposed to take care of students’ study and health, both physically and mentally Moreover, university students are expected to handle their problems better, which includes not letting the problems affect their study The relationship between teachers and university students are mostly for academic purposes; therefore, the teachers are unlikely

to be exposed to their students’ traumatic events and stress and to stay connected with their parents Secondly, two other factors characterized to ULIS

are Opportunities for professional development and The relationship between

colleagues and employers According to one participant’s response in the

interview, the working environment in ULIS is “ideal for teachers” regarding

these two factors In terms of The attitude from society toward their profession,

the asked teachers were well aware; however, they managed to balance their lives and never stop striving for the best in their careers

In conclusion, there were eight main common to very common factors

that demotivate English teachers in FELTE, namely workload, stress, salary, students’ lack of interest, students’ low English proficiency, lack of knowledge about methodology, physical infrastructure, and research quota

2 Research Sub- Question 1:

Which demotivational factors have the strongest impact on the teacher’s motivation?

2.1 Quantitative data

After identifying the Common and Very common demotivational factors, the participants were asked to rate the effect that those factors have on their motivation on a three-level Likert scale ranging from “None” to “Strong”

The results of the survey showed that 14 over 22 questioned factors have significant impacts on the participants and the four strongest factors were item

4 (Students’ lack of interest), item 14 (Workload), item 6 (Students’ negative attitude) and item 20 (Stress)

Chart 2 illustrates the level of impact that the 14 factors have on

teachers’ motivation Accordingly, item 4 (Students’ lack of interest) and item

14 (Workload) were identified by all of the participants as very common or

common factors and affect the teachers’ motivation to some extent 80% of the participants agreed that these two items have strong impacts on their teaching motivation and only 20% claimed that the impacts were slight Secondly,

another strong demotivational factor was item 20 (Stress), which 80% of the

asked teachers claimed to have strong influences on their motivation; however,

the other participant found Stress uncommon Thirdly, 60% of the participants perceived item 6 (Students’ negative attitude) as common and imposing strong

effects on the teachers’ motivation

Other salient factors were item 5 (Students’ low English proficiency), item 21 (research quota), item 2 (Salary), item 9 (Lack of knowledge about methodology) and item 10 (Failure in methodology implementation) These

five factors were all perceived by 80% of the participants as imposing somewhat adverse effects on their teaching in the descending order

All eight factors identified as the most common ones do have negative effects on teachers’ motivation, ranging from slight to strong impact It should

be noted that some factors which were previously rated as common or very common do not have significant effects on teachers’ motivation, namely Item

12 (Insufficient self – efficacy) (M= 2.00), Item 16 (Class- size) (M= 2.00) and Item 22 (Research fund) (M= 2.00) The maximum score is 3.00, representing

the Strong point, while the minimum is 1.00, representing the None point on the applied scale

In conclusion, the results showed that the four strongest factors were

item 4 (Students’ lack of interest), item 14 (Workload), item 6 (Students’ negative attitude) and item 20 (Stress)

2.2 Qualitative Data

After collecting the survey’s data, interviews were carried out in order to find more information (specific situations, consequences, causes, possible patterns) about the four strongest demotivational factors among beginning

teachers, namely item 4 (Students’ lack of interest), item 14 (Workload), item 6 (Students’ negative attitude) and item 20 (Stress) However, three other factors, which are item 7 (Curriculum implementation), item 9 (Lack of knowledge about methodology) and item 21 (Research quota) were added, since the

researcher found out their significant impacts on teachers’ motivation based on their interviews

2.2.1 Students’ lack of interest and Students’ negative attitude

Factors related to Students, namely Students’ lack of interest and Students’ low English proficiency, are the most significant demotivational

factors among asked beginning teachers at FELTE These factors are so

common that one of the participants mentioned students - related factors as

“inevitable” in teaching Another claimed that not only she encountered these problems but also most of the other teachers, approximately 100%, would experience these

According to the participants, teachers often remark demotivating students’ behaviors as “passive learning, unresponsive to the tasks and instructions, and unfinished, plagiarized or poorly - done assignments” Phuong recalled times when her students copied works online, whole or partially:

I could easily tell from which sources they plagiarized as I am already familiar with the sources and the given tasks Moreover, I, as a teacher, could remember the work produced by my students and based on that to build profiles of the students’ writing styles and their language proficiencies accordingly Therefore, I could almost immediately tell which part seemed

“odd” to their own styles or to their whole essay (if they copy partially)

To explain this, Van said students’ negative behaviors, to some extent, could be attributed to their strangeness to the new learning environment in university According to her observation, it took some good classes a couple of weeks to adjust to the new learning style; however, classes with batches of reserved students could need up to one semester to adapt From Lan’s viewpoint, the fact that high schools in Vietnam usually do not emphasize learner autonomy could account for this practice According to some participants, first-year students at ULIS show a lack of experience in group work, teamwork, and active learning and this has become a pattern among first-year students here Another explanation for students’ lack of interest is that some of them already know the target knowledge and might find the lessons less exciting and useful, according to Lan The students might or might not concentrate on the lectures and put their best effort into the assignments It is detrimental to the classroom environment that these students might spread that

“laid-back” spirit to others, who are new to the knowledge

Concerning the consequences, in Phuong’s opinion, beginning teachers with high expectations might encounter some “reality shocks'' as their students are not up to “their standard” These teachers pour their whole hearts in the first

few semesters and end up being “worn out” of enthusiasm for teaching afterwards Another participant, Van, admitted that she felt bored and unmotivated when her students were unresponsive and claimed that this phenomenon is common among teachers

However, from Lan’s point of view, students’ lack of language proficiency is not as “scary” as students with negative attitudes Phuong also agreed that:

Teachers should find a way to accept that some students’ former education cannot live up to “their standard” and the students are encountering countless difficulties in their studying However, it is noticeable that even though we agree upon “no one being left behind”, the rotten apple that spoils the barrel - students with zero autonomy and motivation - chooses to be left behind For Hue, the problems might stem from both sides The teachers should re-evaluate their methodologies, and ways of delivery as those might not stimulate the students’ interest as much as they expected

The finding of this study that participants are being greatly demotivated

by their students has strong echoes in teacher demotivation research in many other contexts too Kiziltepe (2008) in Turkish public university, Sugino (2010)

in Japanese colleges and Hojaji (2017) in Iranian English institutes context all agreed that students’ negative attitude and behavior are the biggest source of demotivation for teachers However, the attitude and behaviors of the ULIS students were described to be less expressive than in Sugino (2010)’s (“sleep in class”, “use cell phones’, “take a rebellious attitude”) and other studies

2.2.2 Stress

For beginning teachers, stress comes from plenty of sources, ranging from home to school Van, who has two years of working experience in FELTE, shared that unexpected classroom observations from the manager board are extremely tense She also thought that the Mentoring program would cause stress to some teachers since almost every action they take will be monitored To make a comparison, Van said this stress is even more severe than the one from students However, for the outsiders of the program -