'I'm a Teacher Material!': Reasons of Preservice English Teachers for Choosing to Become a Teacher

Abstract

This qualitative single-case study aimed to explain the reasons why individuals choose teaching from the viewpoint of preservice English teachers, on which the number of qualitative studies with this study population are scarce. The case, in this direction, was a Turkish state university’s Department of English Language Teaching, and the sampled group comprised of 10 preservice teachers of English as a foreign language. Qualitative data was obtained through an online form, which included ten sentence completion prompts starting with the statement, “I want to be a teacher because…”. Then, through a rigorous coding and notetaking process, categorical analyses were done to identify the reasons why preservice teachers chose this career path. Out of 100 statements provided by the participants, 131 coding references emerged, fitting under a total number of 11 themes and 13 subthemes, categorized as intrinsic, altruistic, and extrinsic motivational reasons. Overall finding in the study was that preservice teachers were mostly intrinsically and altruistically motivated for being a teacher since the majority of them expressed their interest in teaching with personal values and commented on the place of the profession as a contributory element for the growth of the community and its members. On the other hand, one subcase exhibited immoderately elevated levels of altruistic motives, which may lead to job burnout or dropout in the future. As for extrinsic motivations, such as prestige, financial gains, or external influences like family members or peers, they held the least importance among the study’s participants, and only one subcase reported to have chosen teaching as a fallback career. The study’s results, in this regard, are anticipated to provide valuable insights into EFL preservice teachers’ own justifications for choosing a career path in teaching.