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Teacher Development
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Student teachers' motivation to become a
secondary school teacher in England and Norway
Chris Kyriacou , Åge Hultgren & Paul Stephens
To cite this article: Chris Kyriacou , Åge Hultgren & Paul Stephens (1999) Student teachers'
motivation to become a secondary school teacher in England and Norway, Teacher
Development, 3:3, 373-381, DOI: 10.1080/13664539900200087
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13664539900200087
Published online: 20 Dec 2006.
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Teacher Development, Volume 3, Number 3, 1999
373
Student Teachers’ Motivation to
Become a Secondary School Teacher
in England and Norway
CHRIS KYRIACOU
University of York, United Kingdom
ÅGE HULTGREN & PAUL STEPHENS
Stavanger College, School of Teachers’ Education, Norway
ABSTRACT This study sought to explore the reasons given by student teachers in
influencing their choice to become a secondary school teacher. Some 105 student
teachers in Stavanger and 112 student teachers in York completed a questionnaire at the
beginning of their postgraduate teacher training course. Twelve student teachers from
each sample were then interviewed. Both groups reported being strongly influenced by
enjoying the subject they would teach, liking to work with children, and the fact that
teaching would enable them to use their subject. This is broadly in line with other
studies. However, there was tendency for more of the student teachers in the York
sample, compared with the Stavanger sample, to place value on ‘wanting to help children
succeed’ and ‘liking the activity of classroom teaching’; conversely, there was a tendency
for more of the student teachers in the Stavanger sample, compared with the York
sample, to place value on ‘long holidays’ and ‘social hours’. These tendencies may in
large part be accounted for by the fact that more of the Stavanger sample were already
teaching, were older and had family commitments.
In recent years a number of studies have been reported which have explored
the reasons why people choose to become schoolteachers. Much of the
impetus for the research on this topic has come from a concern in many
countries that not enough people are making this career choice, resulting in a
shortage of high quality applicants to teacher training courses. Although the
picture varies somewhat from country to country, international reviews of the
state of teacher recruitment indicate that this is a widespread problem (e.g.
Neururer, 1995; Fernández, 1996).
Particular attention in this research has been paid to the reasons given by
student teachers for choosing a career in teaching. Such research (e.g. Brown,
1992; Kyriacou & Kobori, 1998; Chuene et al, 1999) indicates that the reasons
fall into three main categories:
Chris Kyriacou et al
374
(i) Altruistic reasons. These reasons deal with seeing teaching as a socially
worthwhile and important job, a desire to help children succeed, and a desire
to help society improve.
(ii) Intrinsic reasons. These reasons cover aspects of the job activity itself, such
as the activity of teaching children, and an interest in using their subject matter
knowledge and expertise.
(iii) Extrinsic reasons. These reasons cover aspects of the job which are not
inherent in the work itself, such as long holidays, level of pay, and status.
Studies of student teachers in various countries as far afield as Brunei
Darussalam (Yong, 1995), England (Reid & Caudwell, 1997), South Africa
(Leemers, 1998) and the USA (Young, 1995) indicate that the most frequently
given reasons for choosing teaching are:
(i) wanting to work with children;
(ii) wanting to contribute to society; and
(iii) enjoyment of teaching.
However, it is noticeable that there are some marked differences in the
rankings of various reasons from country to country. This may well be a
reflection of the differences between countries in their social, economic and
cultural context, and in the general image held of teaching as a career. For
example, when national economies are buoyant, and jobs other than teaching
are more readily available, the number of high quality applicants to teacher
training tends to decrease. Yong’s (1995) study of student teachers in Brunei
Darussalam found that almost 15% of his sample reported that they had
chosen to enter teaching as a last resort. One would expect that this
proportion is likely to decrease when the economy is buoyant and other jobs
are more easily available, and increase when the economy is flat.
The importance of extrinsic reasons, such as long holidays, has also been
reported in several studies, such as that conducted in Cyprus by Papanastasiou
& Papanastasiou (1998). Interestingly, they reported that the Government of
Cyprus guarantees all newly qualified teachers a job after graduation and their
teaching post is then made secure after 2 years of teaching. ‘Immediate
employment after graduation’ was cited as the strongest reason by their
sample of student teachers for choosing teaching as a career.
In some countries, an important factor is that many students who are
unable to gain a place at university to do a first degree in the subject of interest
to them (such as English, mathematics, science) see a degree-based teacher
training course as offering an alternative access to higher education. For
example, a study of mathematics student teachers in South Africa conducted
by Chuene et al (1999) reported that most of the student teachers in their study
were motivated mainly by a desire to gain a diploma in mathematics rather
than a desire to become a teacher of mathematics.
Another important factor, which again varies from country to country, is
the perceived status of teaching as a career, and the extent to which wanting to
do a high status job is an important motivating factor in people’s choice of
STUDENT TEACHERS’ MOTIVATION
375
career. Certainly in a number of countries where there is a problem in
recruiting teachers, measures to raise the status of the profession have been
taken to encourage more well-qualified applicants. For example, a survey by
Shen & Hsieh (1999) in the USA highlighted the pressing need to raise the
status of teaching there, and indicated that factors such as improving teachers’
salary, working conditions, opportunity to exercise leadership (viz. teachers
taking important decisions themselves rather than being told by policy-makers
what to do), and increasing entry and exit standards were perceived by future
teachers to be measures that would achieve this. In addition, changes in the
prevailing values within a country can also influence recruitment patterns. For
example, Awanbor (1996) noted in his study of student teachers in Nigeria that
an increasingly materialistic value system prevalent in Nigeria had, to some
extent, devalued teaching as a career choice.
Despite such differences between countries, few comparative studies
have been reported which have collected data in two countries using the same
research instrument. This study was thus designed with the intention of
comparing the responses regarding motivation to become a secondary school
teacher for a sample of student teachers in York, England, with that for a
sample of student teachers in Stavanger, Norway.
Data Collection
The questionnaire used in this study consisted of a single sheet with the
following heading: ‘Here is a list of possible reasons why someone might
decide to become a secondary school teacher. How much did each of these
reasons influence your decision to become a teacher?’ A list of 20 reasons was
then presented in the order shown in Table I, and the student teachers were
asked to tick one of three boxes for each reason, which were labelled ‘very
important’, ‘fairly important’ and ‘not important’ respectively. The items in
this list were selected to cover the range of reasons highlighted in previous
research (e.g. Brown, 1992; Kyriacou & Kobori, 1998; Chuene et al, 1999) and
pilot work by the authors.
The York sample comprised 112 student teachers attending a 1-year fulltime
postgraduate teacher training course at the University of York, England.
All the student teachers were training to teach in secondary schools, in one of
five curriculum areas (English, History, Mathematics, Modern Foreign
Languages and Science). In England, the 1-year full-time postgraduate teacher
training course is the main route of training for secondary school teachers. The
York sample comprised 21 student teachers of English, 23 in history, 12 in
mathematics, 24 in modern languages, 28 in science, and four unspecified.
The Norwegian sample comprised 105 postgraduate student teachers
attending either a 1-year full-time teacher training course or a 2-year part-time
teacher training course, based in Stavanger (or nearby Haugesund). Most of
the student teachers in the Stavanger sample were training to teach in senior
high schools, with a smaller number training to teach in junior high schools. In
Chris Kyriacou et al
376
Norway, senior high school student teachers may train to teach either
‘academic subjects’ (e.g. Norwegian, social science) or ‘vocational subjects’
(e.g. health care, engineering). The Stavanger sample comprised 50 student
teachers training for academic subjects, 38 in vocational subjects, and 17
unspecified.
In Norway, student teachers in senior high schools typically work as
salaried pre-certified teachers, prior to and during their course, and it is also
quite common for student teachers to register for the 2-year part-time course
rather than for the 1-year full-time course. Approximately 70% of the
Stavanger sample were registered for the part-time course. It is also important
to note that in Norway, in so far as entry requirements to postgraduate teacher
training are concerned, academic and vocational qualifications are considered
to be of equal merit. As such, whilst student teachers of academic subjects
usually have a degree, student teachers of vocational subjects will usually have
an equivalent high status occupational qualification (a fagbrev).
For both the York and Stavanger sample, the questionnaires were
completed by the students at the start of their teacher training course (in
English at York, and in Norwegian at Stavanger). In order to minimise any
problems stemming from using a version of the questionnaire in two different
languages, the Norwegian version also included the statements in English.
However, the point has been made concerning comparative studies, that
despite efforts to find an exact translation, the meaning of each statement will
still always be context dependent (see Hjerm, 1998).
A follow-up interview was then conducted with a random sample of 12
student teachers in York and 12 student teachers in Stavanger. This follow-up
interview focused on four reasons where there appeared to be a difference in
the questionnaire responses of the York and Stavanger samples.
Findings and Discussion
The percentages of the student teachers in each sample who rated each of the
20 reasons as ‘very important’ in influencing their decision to become a
teacher are shown in Table I.
The five reasons which received the highest ratings for the Stavanger
sample were as follows.
[ I enjoy the subject I will teach (84.5%).
[ It enables me to use my subject (74.3%).
[ I like working with children (56.3%).
[ There are long holidays (51.9%).
[ It is a socially worthwhile job (49.0%).
The five reasons which received the highest ratings for the York sample were
as follows.
[ I want to help children succeed (92.0%).
[ I enjoy the subject I will teach (87.5%).
STUDENT TEACHERS’ MOTIVATION
377
[ I like working with children (87.1%).
[ It enables me to use my subject (67.9%).
[ I like the activity of classroom teaching (66.4%).
From this comparison we can see that both groups reported being strongly
influenced by enjoying the subject they would teach, liking to work with
children, and the fact that teaching would enable them to use their subject.
Reasons Stavanger
data
(n = 105)
York
data
(n = 112)
1. The job offers good job security 21.4 25.2
2. The job has social hours 38.8 9.2
3. The level of pay is quite good 8.9 5.5
4. There are long holidays 51.9 21.4
5. I enjoy the subject I will teach 84.5 87.5
6. I like working with children 56.3 87.1
7. I want to help children succeed 45.6 92.0
8. The job has a varied work pattern 45.6 54.5
9. It enables me to use my subject 74.3 67.9
10. I like the activity of classroom teaching 35.6 66.4
11. It is a socially worthwhile job 49.0 54.5
12. I am good at my subject 32.4 38.2
13. I can get a job as a teacher in any part of the country 23.3 34.2
14. My subject is important to me 35.9 63.4
15. My subject is an important subject for pupils 42.6 58.0
16. Being a teacher can help improve society 26.7 50.5
17. Being a teacher can lead on to other jobs in the future 35.9 17.0
18. Other people encouraged me to become a teacher 13.7 8.0
19. It can help me to get a job teaching in another country 4.9 22.5
20. My experience as a pupil gave me a positive image of the job 16.5 18.8
Table I. Percentage of postgraduate student teachers in each sample who rated each of these
reasons as a ‘very important’ reason influencing their decision to become a secondary school
teacher.
It is interesting to note that for both samples the two reasons ‘the level of pay
is quite good’ and ‘other people encouraged me to become a teacher’ received
a relatively low rating as an important influence.
These findings are broadly in line with other studies, including previous
research in England (Reid & Caudwell, 1997) and Norway (Bergem et al,
1997). However, Table I also indicates some areas where there appear to be
differences between the two groups. The most striking differences were, on
the one hand, the much higher ratings of ‘wanting to help children succeed’
and ‘liking the activity of classroom teaching’ for the York sample, and, on the
other hand, the much higher ratings of ‘long holidays’ and ‘social hours’ for
the Stavanger sample.
In order to help interpret these differences, follow-up interviews were
conducted with a subsample of the student teachers in York and Stavanger, to
explore their views about these four reasons. These indicated that the
Chris Kyriacou et al
378
differences between the two groups might appear in part to be a reflection of
the fact that more of the Stavanger sample contained older students (over 30
years of age) who had family responsibilities and already had experience of
teaching prior to completing the questionnaire. Indeed, many of the Stavanger
student teachers referred to why they ‘became’ a teacher (using the past tense)
in contrast to the York student teachers, who tended to refer to ‘becoming’ a
teacher (in the future). This would appear to make the Stavanger group
slightly less idealistic and slightly more concerned with practical matters. This
is illustrated by the following quotation from a Stavanger respondent:
as a woman, I have a family and children; I can be free when they’re free during
holidays and leisure time, and I can work when they are in bed. A flexible school
timetable is very important.
Indeed, more of the Stavanger sample explicitly referred to their family
commitments. Teachers in secondary schools in both countries are contracted
to work 195 days. A typical school day in Norway would be from 8 am to 2.30
pm, compared with a typical school day in England lasting from 8.45 am to
3.30 pm. This allows teachers who are also parents to get home at about the
same time as their children who are at school and well before the end of the
typical working day for most other careers, and also to be on holiday at the
same time (more or less) as their children who are at school.
However, it was also noteworthy that in the interviews with the York
student teachers, several of them argued strongly that teaching did not have
social hours. The following remarks by one of the York student teachers
illustrates this well:
Social hours, what social hours? If you have to spend a lot of time in the evenings
and at weekends marking pupils’ work and preparing lessons, I can’t see how you
can say teaching has social hours. There are many jobs where at the end of the
working day you can go home and completely forget about the job. You can’t do
that in teaching.
However, some student teachers, both in Stavanger and in York, compared
teaching very favourably to other jobs, as is illustrated by the following
statement by a student teacher in Stavanger:
I have had different kinds of occupational experiences. I have had to work
weekends, on public holidays, at Christmas, New Year, Easter, evenings and night
shifts. All of a sudden I now feel that I can live.
Both the Stavanger and the York students interviewed were generally positive
about the importance of ‘wanting children to succeed’ and ‘liking the activity
of classroom teaching’ as reasons for becoming teachers. One student teacher
in the York sample stated:
I feel I have done well out of the Education system, and I feel I now have a chance
to help others be successful, and it appeals to me to do a job that I feel is really
worthwhile and important. I knew teaching was not a well paid job, when I
STUDENT TEACHERS’ MOTIVATION
379
applied. I suppose I have always wanted to be a teacher and I think it’s because I
like the idea of helping others.
Another York student teacher said:
This is my main motivation. I tend to feel better when I am working to help others
rather than myself.
Many of the student teachers also stressed the important role of teachers in
helping pupils to succeed, by developing their social skills and their selfconfidence
(as well as by developing their academic abilities). For example,
one of the student teachers in Stavanger said:
teaching children social skills, teaching them what’s right and wrong, and to take
responsibility for themselves and their own learning – I think these things are
important.
Another student teacher in Stavanger said:
They come from different home backgrounds, and I think that the teacher is an
important resource, not just in subject terms, but also in relation to social skills,
ordinary up-bringing. They are going to meet people of different ages when they go
out to work and they need to know how to conduct themselves, and I think it’s
important from a teacher’s position that we want to help them get on, that we
want to make a contribution, that we are going to help them.
Overall, however, there was a tendency for the comments made by the York
sample to be generally more enthusiastic about the importance of helping
children to succeed. A possible reason for this difference may well be the fact
that the Stavanger sample included those training to teach vocational courses
mainly aimed for the post-16 sector, and as such the reference to ‘children’ (as
against students or young adults) might well have been seen by them to be less
relevant to their role.
Finally, in response to a request to comment further about liking the
activity of classroom teaching, it was very interesting to note that whilst the
York students had been very positive about this when they filled in the
questionnaire at the start of the course, the statements made during the
interviews conducted with a subsample 5 weeks later were not quite as
positive. During these 5 weeks, the student teachers in York were spending 2
days a week in schools, and were beginning to get a more realistic view of
classroom teaching and this may have toned down their expectation of
enjoying classroom teaching. The following comment by a York student
teacher illustrates this:
Although it seems rather daunting now, the process of classroom teaching remains
an interesting and rewarding challenge.
Another said:
Chris Kyriacou et al
380
I do like the activity of classroom teaching but I realise that it can be an extremely
stressful experience at times. I have only had positive experiences in the classroom
so far, so I have yet to see the other side.
In contrast, because the Stavanger student teachers already have teaching
experience, their views about liking the activity of classroom teaching may be
more stable. Their answers to this question tended to recognise that being in
the classroom was an essential part of teaching and if you did not like this, you
would find teaching difficult or boring. One student teacher said:
If you don’t like the classroom then you’d better not be a teacher, because the
classroom is where you do your work.
Conclusion
The findings of this study indicate that most of the student teachers reported
being strongly influenced in their choice of teaching in a secondary school as a
career by enjoying the subject they would teach, liking to work with children,
and the fact that teaching would enable them to use their subject. This is
broadly in line with other studies. However, there was a tendency for more of
the student teachers in the Stavanger sample, compared with their York
counterparts, to place value on long holidays and social hours, although this
tendency may in large part be accounted for by the fact that more of the
Stavanger sample were already teaching, were older and had family
commitments. As such, we need to be cautious in interpreting the extent to
which any differences between the two groups relate to differences in the
characteristics of student teachers in the two countries (e.g. sex, age, teaching
experience) or differences in the working conditions of teachers in the two
countries.
Such findings may provide a useful basis for further exploration of why
people choose teaching as a career, which in turn may lead to more effective
action to improve teacher recruitment and retention. Whilst many
recruitment campaigns tend to highlight altruistic reasons for choosing
teaching as a career (e.g. to help children succeed), the data here suggest that
more could be made of the fact that teaching enables people to continue
working in a subject area they enjoy, and certain aspects of the working
conditions of teachers (such as long holidays and social hours) may also be
seen by many potential applicants to be attractive features of the job, although
some other aspects of the working conditions of teachers (such as the level of
pay) may need to be improved before they will act to encourage applicants.
Acknowledgement
We are grateful to the British Council (Oslo Office) for financial support.
STUDENT TEACHERS’ MOTIVATION
381
Correspondence
Dr C. Kyriacou, Department of Educational Studies, University of York, York
YO10 5DD, United Kingdom (ck1@york.ac.uk).
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