Basic psychological needs of in-service EFL teachers in blended professional training: voices of teachers and learners

Basic Psychological Needs (BPN) in blended learning has become a crucial precursor in promoting the harmony of competence, relatedness and autonomy for both traditional and online learning approaches. This mixed study aims to investigate in-service teachers' and learners' perspectives of BPN fulfillment and its issues under the context of blended professional training. A total of 60 in-service teachers and 120 secondary school students from 24 provinces in Indonesia participated in the study. Construct validity of the questionnaire was established using exploratory factor analysis. Findings using the non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test showed no significant differences between in-service teachers' and learners' perspectives of the in-service teachers' BPN. Learners believed that the in-service teachers' fulfillment of relatedness and competence was low in connecting to other people using IT, online care, online teachers' adornment, and learning new skills. The interview with both groups of participants depicted that in some points, the learners perceived that their in-service teachers BPN of relatedness made them unsatisfied with low online care, empathy, and massive online tasks. Suggestion to harmonize these issues and their pedagogical implications for the second language (L2) curriculum and teacher training program in Indonesia and similar contexts were discussed.

Automated summary

This study investigates the fulfillment and issues of basic psychological needs in the context of blended professional training from the perspectives of in-service teachers and learners. Findings reveal that learners perceive a low fulfillment of relatedness and competence from in-service teachers, and suggest the need to address these issues in second language curriculum and teacher training programs.