Choosing the FL/L2 teaching career: initial motivation of students of Italian Universities.

Abstract

After the mushrooming of studies and research about language students’ motivation, in the last decades language teachers’ motivation has started being investigated more thoroughly; however, some of its aspects remain for the most part unexplored, such as prospective teachers’ motivations to pursue the FL/L2 teaching career. Drawing from research studies on motivational matters carried out in various contexts, the present study sought to understand what motivates student enrolled in two Italian universities (Venice and Bologna) to prospect for and embark on a career as FL/L2 teachers. Moreover, the study aimed at understanding whether respondents’ personality traits correspond to those that, according to Holland’s theory about the personality-occupation compatibility, are held most compatible to the teaching career. 103 students were asked to complete an online questionnaire created by taking as example Watt & Richardson’s (2007) FIT-choice scale survey and adding elements drawn from Kyriacou & Kobori (1998), Kyriacou & Benmansour (1999) and Barnes (2005). Results showed that among the various personality codes of the prospective teachers in exam the most prominent are SOCIAL, INVESTIGATIVE and ARTISTIC, partly in line with those hypothesized by the leading theory. For what concerns their choice to teach the FL/L2, international posture is the leading motivational factor, followed by intrinsic value (passion for the FL/L2 and interest for the career) and social utility value (also known as altruistic motivation); such findings are in line with those revealed by most of teacher’s entry motivation literature carried out in western countries up to the moment.