A Study On The Correlation Between Private College Foreign Language Teachers' Informal Learning And Professional Development Motivation

Informal learning,an emerging field of research,did not attract the attention of educators until in the 1950s,when American adult education scholar Malcolm Knowles put forward the notion of informal learning.After decades of development,a large amount of theoretical,empirical and applied research in the world has been launched in different fields like technology,education and training etc.Informal learning has been proven to be an indispensable method of learning for teachers to put into practice the concept of lifelong learning.Therefore,previous research has contributed to the importance of informal learning in teacher development.Up till now,much research examines tihe relationship between informal learning and teacher development around the globe.However,most of such previous research has just focused on primary and secondary school teachers,with little on college teachers.In addition,only a small minority has involved foreign language subjects,which have been widely taught across China.Researchers in China have scarcely put their lens over the PD(professional development)motivation of teachers in private colleges,who have played an increasingly important role in the country's higher education and whose PD is of great significance and in urgent need of support.Therefore,this research intends to study the correlation between informal learning and PD motivation of full-time foreign language teachers from a private college in Wuhan,Hubei Province.The research questions are:1)Do private college foreign language teachers differ from each other in their informal learning condition?If they do,which factors contribute to the differences?2)Are they different in terms of their PD motivation?If they are,which factors contribute to the differences?3)Is their informal learning condition significantly correlated with their PD motivation?If yes,how are the two correlated with each other?Questionnaires and interviews were employed to collect data,then descriptive statistics and correlation analysis methods with SPSS software for questionnaire analysis,and text analysis methods for interview transcription analysis.The main findings are as follows:1)private college foreign language teachers have a relatively high overall PD motivation;2)there is a significant negative correlation between their teaching experience and overall PD motivation;3)there is a significant positive correlation between their overall PD motivation and their two informal learning dimensions:learning frequency and attitude,and the overall PD motivation is more significantly related to their learning attitude;4)there is a significant positive correlation between their economic pressure and the two:learning frequency and attitude,and the economic pressure is more significantly related to their learning attitude.The current research generates some insights to various parties concerned about and involved in private college teachers' PD,including private college teachers,private college administrators,and education authorities at different levels.And to some extent,it also provides implications for the training and reform concerning foreign language teachers' PD and informal learning in colleges,particularly in private colleges.