Motivation and morality to manage a class: perceptions of homeroom teachers in China’s Tianjin city

ABSTRACT

This study examines homeroom teachers’ motivation and morality in their classroom-level leadership in China. Data are drawn from questionnaires completed by 137 junior middle school homeroom teachers from Tianjin city, and semi-structured interviews with 10 of them. The participating homeroom teachers saw themselves as having high levels of both motivation and teacher morality. And the variable – teacher with a master’s degree – have significant correlations with teachers’ perceptions of motivation. This study suggests a “morality-motivation-management” framework for understanding the interaction of motivation and morality in homeroom teachers’ classroom-level leadership in China.

KEYWORDS:

• Motivation
• morality
• management
• homeroom teacher
• China
• Tianjin

Introduction

The international literature on leadership has moved from a focus on individual leaders to one on multiple leaders (Leithwood, Harris, and Hopkins 2008). While studies suggest the promotion of decentralised, democratic, and inclusive forms of leadership is often associated with school improvement (e.g. Leithwood, Mascall, and Strauss 2009), most studies on teachers’ roles as leaders have been focused at the organisational or school level; few have examined the classroom level.

In countries with a homeroom teacher system, such as China, Japan, South Korea, and Israel, and such Western countries as Denmark, France and the United Kingdom, there are two major teachers’ roles: subject teacher and homeroom teacher. The subject teacher’s job is to teach specific subjects, while the homeroom teacher’s role includes organisational, educational, social, and administrative duties concerning the students in the teachers’ class (e.g. Popper-Giveon and Shayshon 2017). The subject teacher is engaged primary in instruction and has fewer opportunities to establish meaningful relationships with his/her students. A homeroom teacher, is responsible for a specific class of children and addresses all aspects of education: behavioural, social, moral and educational aspects of teaching. Moreover, homeroom teachers are expected to serve students both in and out of school, for instance, to disseminate information to the student’s parents and other school staff and professionals and get their feedback (Timor 2017). In some countries like China, homeroom teachers are also responsible for subject teaching. The time allotted for such activities enables the homeroom teacher to become familiar with numerous facets of students’ lives and to establish close contact with them. Per West-Brunham’s (1997) definitions of managers and leaders, homeroom teachers’ daily work also involves day-to-day problem-solving, developing and implementing school policies, “getting things done,” controlling and organising students, and making choices about how to lead in the reality of ever-changing demands and constraints. Studies on teacher leadership at the classroom level are important for understanding school improvement (Spillane, Halverson, and Diamond 2001). Research shows that the positive effects of teacher leadership stretch well past the scope of student performance. Teachers benefit from having a greater sense of empowerment, renewal, and increased teacher professional development (Boone 2015) when participating in the decision-making process regarding classroom conditions. Additionally, higher motivation and autonomy have led to decreased turnover among teachers, contributing to a more positive working environment (Jackson 2012).

Two major themes stand out in homeroom teachers’ work – motivation and morality. Like all teachers, homeroom teachers’ work involves interpersonal relationships with different stakeholders, which may cause moral conflicts, increase teachers’ tensions, and decrease teachers’ motivation. Campbell (2008) reported that the interpersonal essence of teaching provides ample fuel to ignite moral conflicts between teachers; among teachers and principals, students, and/or parents; and within individual teachers themselves as they struggle to do the right thing amidst the complexity of determining what is fair, honest, or caring in specific situations. On the other hand, the homeroom teacher position, like other teacher leader positions, may fulfil teachers’ growth needs and maintain their motivation (e.g. Gajda and Cravedi 2006). At the same time, homeroom teachers also shoulder responsibilities related to students’ learning and development, such as being motivated to improve their teaching and students’ learning (Bush 2011), leading students from a position of morality, arousing students’ motivation and morality, and transforming students’ behavioural outcomes (Antonakis and House 2013).

China is an interesting case in which to explore homeroom teachers’ motivation and morality in classroom-level leadership, for three reasons. First, People’s Republic of China (PRC) has a large population of homeroom teachers and they have very close contact with students. By 2017, there were around 12,158,700 teachers work in Grades 1–12, around 30% of whom worked as homeroom teachers. Chinese schools assign new students to a homeroom class that remains relatively stable until graduation. The students use the same classroom all year long. Generally, one of the homeroom class’ full-time subject teachers is assigned as its homeroom teacher. A homeroom teacher assumes multiple roles-instructor, leader, counsellor, and sometimes surrogate parent (Liu and Barnhart 1999). The Chinese state indicates that homeroom teachers should: care about every student’s academic learning and moral, personal development in the class; and provide every student whole-person development opportunities; communicate with other subject teachers and staff in the school; and enhance communication with parents and the community (Ministry of Education (MOE), 2009).

Second, Chinese tradition places high morality requirements on teachers, and homeroom teachers must take on important moral education responsibilities. China has very high expectations of teachers’ character and conduct. As Carr (1993) argued, this paternalistic understanding of teacher morality stems from the belief that one’s values are inherent in one’s character and conduct, and that appropriate values can be transmitted effectively only by those who possess and exemplify them; as such, teachers face high expectations for not only their professional calibre, but also their personal conduct, forms of expression and attitudes, and even appearance. Homeroom teachers are required to organise moral-ideology education in class; shape students’ good habits, values and patriotism, etc. (MOE 2009).

Third, Chinese teachers’ motivation to hold a homeroom teacher position has reportedly decreased in recent years (Kuai 2017), and national and local educational authorities often find it difficult to fill these positions (e.g. Yang 2018). Due to China’s recent industrialisation, Westernisation, marketisation, the implementation of the one-child policy, and the ban on corporal punishment of students, parents have claimed power over their children’s education, and challenged teachers’ authority. This context has led homeroom teachers to complain about the pressures, including a heavy work load, work dilemmas, worries about in-school student accidents, etc. (e.g. Kaui, 2017).

Therefore, this study explores homeroom teachers’ perception of motivation and morality in their classroom leadership work in China. This article first reviews the literature on teacher motivation and morality, and then describes the design and implementation of the study. The major patterns of its findings are presented next, after which some possible explanations for these findings are proposed. Finally, this article concludes by presenting a framework for understanding homeroom teachers’ motivation and morality in leading a homeroom class in China.

The literature

The research questions concern two theoretical concepts – teacher motivation and teacher morality.

Teacher motivation

Motivation is difficult to observe directly, but has been defined as “a process that activates, orients, reinforces and maintains the behaviour of individuals towards the achievement of intended objectives” (Roussel 2000, 5). It includes both initiating motivations and sustaining motivations.

Richardson and Watt (2006) created a factor influencing teaching-choice (FIT-Choice) scale to guide investigations into the factors influencing pre-service teachers’ choice to teach, as well as teachers’ morality and values reflected in for instance, intrinsic values (e.g. a wish to contribute to society). Socialisation influences, antecedent socialisation, and perceptions of previous experiences are presented in the first part of the model, followed by an examination of the context in which the choice of a teaching career was made, combining such constructs as perceived task demands versus returns (e.g. expertise and high expectations versus social status, teacher morality, and salary), teacher’s self-perceptions (perceived teaching abilities), values (intrinsic value, personal utility value, social utility value), and fall-back career (Watt and Richardson 2007). The FIT-Choice has demonstrated good explanatory ability when applied to subsequent studies, and provides an integrated approach in comparative studies across diverse samples and settings (e.g. Watt et al. 2012).

Studies have addressed people’s work motivation after they enter the teaching profession. Achievement goal orientation theory explains the influence of different goals on achievement-related behaviour (Ames 1992), and provides a useful framework for conceptualising the qualitative differences between teachers’ work motivations. Using the self-reported Goal Orientations for Teaching (GOT hereafter) measure, Butler (2012) found five factors that reflected teachers’ striving to: (a) acquire and improve professional competence (mastery orientation); (b) prove superior teaching ability (ability-approach); (c) avoid failure and the demonstration of inferior teaching ability (ability-avoidance); (d) get through the day with little effort (work-avoidance); and, e) create close and caring relationships with students (relational goals).

A number of variables influencing teachers’ motivation, including gender, student body characteristics, and teaching experience, have been reported by teacher motivation studies using FIT and GOT.

Teacher morality

In recent decades, despite liberal-progressive educators’ misgivings about teachers acting as moral custodians (Carr 1993), there has been increased interest in the moral nature of teaching and the profession’s ethical role (Ye and Law 2019; Fu & Clark, 2019; Maxwell and Schwimmer 2016; Schjetne et al. 2016; Arthur et al. 2015; Campbell 2008). Studies have highlighted such important teacher morality values as principles, rights, and duties; care and caring; and fairness, justice, integrity, honesty, compassion, patience, responsibility, practical wisdom, and variations on the principles of non-maleficence and beneficence associated with societal expectations of professionals (Coombs 1998). However, the teaching process is rife with moral dilemmas (Ehrich et al. 2011). Per Terhart (1994) teachers must serve both students and society, whose interests sometimes conflict. This double mandate was evident in the present study, in which teachers themselves describe the ethical problems in their day-to-day professional lives. The current school reform “hype” (David and Cuban 2010), characterised by managerialism, marketisation, and privatisation (Cribb 2009), increases the double-mandate pressure on teachers. Oser, in studying teachers’ professional ethos (1991, 202), argued that moral conflicts in educational settings arise when three types of moral claims (justice, care, and truthfulness) cannot be met simultaneously. These claims are critical to teachers’ professional decision-making, and professional morality emerges through strategies for co-ordinating moral dimensions in search of solutions to problems.

Teacher motivation and teacher morality in Chinese context

Teacher motivation is closely related with teacher morality in China. China has a long tradition of having high expectations of teachers’ morality, with the motivation to learn to teach well being viewed as a part of teacher morality. Famous scholars/educators such as Confucius (B.C. 551–479) and Mencius (B.C. 372–289) developed China’s shi dao chuan tong – a traditional way of doing education and of being a teacher. This tradition places very high requirements on teachers, asking them to model good moral character, master knowledge well, be devoted to teaching, do research and studies with passion, be lifelong learners, and love the teaching profession. A teacher lacking commitment in these areas is not considered a moral teacher.

The PRC has likewise set very high standards for teacher motivation in the nation’s teacher morality codes. Rather than merely stating teachers’ legal, contractual, and ethical obligations, the Primary and Middle School Teacher Morality Codes (MOE 2008) identifies six basic requirements that reflect China’s traditional expectations of teacher morality, of which teacher motivation – i.e. a commitment to love the teaching profession, love and care for students, teach students with patience, become role models to students, be lifelong learners, and be willing to dedicate and sacrifice themselves as “ladders for students” – was one. The Codes further warns teachers that their dedication to “the lesson plan, teaching, homework correcting, [and] tutoring students seriously should not be half-hearted” (MOE 2008). The Codes also included civic competence requirements (e.g. loyalty to communist ideals) as part of teacher morality in PRC.

However, recent social transition and teacher education reform have raised challenges to teacher morality and teacher motivation in China. First, the profound economic changes of recent decades have challenged teachers’ ability to live out their morality. The social transitions in contemporary China have brought changes to traditional teacher authority. Per the Chinese tradition of respecting teachers, teacher authority was an important part of teacher morality, with teachers having full authority over the teacher-student-parent relationship. Once children were placed under their care, teachers had full authority over them – including the power to administer corporal punishment – by both cultural practice and law, without parental intervention (Wang 2014). However, scholars have reported that, against the background of China’s emerging market economy, parents increasingly view teachers as service providers, rather than unchallengeable authorities (Chang et al. 2003). On the other hand, Chinese schools became the point of first observation of the impact of social changes/problems among children and adolescents (Levin & Zhu, 2010). The rapid growth in gross domestic product was accompanied by unprecedented levels of mental problems among Chinese adolescents (Xin, Niu, and Chi 2012), who faced increased pressure due to rising levels of divorce, crime, and unemployment in society, along with fiercer competition among peers. The suicide rate among Chinese adolescents also increased, with conflicts with teachers being deemed a major cause. In Zhao and Liu’s survey of 12, 000 homeroom teachers from 10 provinces in China, homeroom teachers named ensuring their students’ lives and safety as their most important tasks (2018). Moreover, policy shifts resulted in a massive wave of urbanisation through internal migration, which overturned traditional family dynamics and increased stress levels among youths in schools, thus complicating teachers’ ability to behave morally when dealing with students and parents (e.g. Author, 2016). Teachers were challenged to solve problems caused by migrant students, such as larger class sizes and migrant students’ frequent need to move, lack of related learning experience (due to China’s rural-urban divide), less supportive parents, etc. (Tian et al. 2008). Liu and Laura (2018) suggested that, in this context, teachers may become less motivated, more frustrated, reduce their efforts, and suffer attrition.

Therefore, in the Chinese case, variables influencing teachers’ perceptions of teacher morality, civic competence, and motivation include their school locations (which determine their students’ characteristics under China’s “enrol nearby” policy), their political affiliation, and the subjects they teach (which may influence their perceptions of examination pressures) (Ye and Law 2019).

This study

This study investigates homeroom teachers’ motivations and morality in managing homeroom classes, through the following two research questions:

(1) What are homeroom teachers’ perceptions of their entry motivations, goals for homeroom teacher work, and teacher morality?

(2) What variables are correlated with homeroom teachers’ perceptions of their entry motivations, goals for homeroom teacher work, and teacher morality?

To answer these questions, this study adopted a mixed methodology approach, consisting of a questionnaire survey and semi-structured interviews.

Data collection

The first data collection method was a questionnaire, consisting of three major sections, each designed based on related existing literature.

In the first section, 14 items based on the FIT-Choice scale (Richardson & Watt, 2007) were used to assess homeroom teachers’ entry motivations to do homeroom teacher work in these dimensions: socialisation influences (e.g. “My family support me to work as a homeroom teacher”), perceived task demands versus returns (e.g. “Homeroom teachers’ work hours are not very long”); intrinsic values (two items; e.g. “I like working as homeroom teacher”), personal utility values (e.g. “I can earn extra income by working as homeroom teacher”), social utility values (e.g. “Homeroom teachers have the opportunity to cultivate next generations’ value”), and fall-back career (e.g. “I choose to be a teacher because the school required”).

The second section included 32 items. 13 items, based on Goal Orientations for Teaching (GOT) (Butler 2012), were used to assess homeroom teachers’ goals for homeroom teacher work in these dimensions: mastery orientation (e.g. “I learned a new thing”), ability approach (e.g. “Students in my class performed better than other classes in the exam”), ability avoidance approach (e.g. “My class didn’t perform worse than other classes in the exam”), work-avoidance (i.e. “The class is easy for me, thus I put little effort into management”), and relationship with students and parents (e.g. “I developed close relationship with students”). Seven items addressed difficulties in homeroom teachers’ daily work (e.g. “I worried about my students having an accident in school”) were adopted from extant studies on homeroom teacher in China (e.g. Zhao and Liu 2018), 12 items homeroom teachers’ perceptions of help seeking, and their perceptions of degrees of help school and colleagues provided (e.g. “To ask other people to help me is also a good way to learn”) were adopted from GOT (Butler 2012). In Sections 1 and 2, respondents used a seven-point Likert scale (from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree) to indicate their perceptions.

The third section included three parts to survey teachers’ perceptions of teacher morality requirements in China. The first part was adopted from extant studies (e.g. Ye and Law 2019) and included two factors: teacher morality and citizen political-civic competence (which is an important aspect of teacher morality in China). Through 19 items, the first part in section three asked teachers’ perceptions of teacher morality (e.g. “Teachers should be role models for their students”), while 25 items addressed teachers’ perceptions of civic competences (e.g. “support state policies”). Respondents used a five-point Likert scale (from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree) to relate their perceptions.

In the second part in section three, respondents were asked to reflect on a common metaphor long used to describe societal expectations of teachers’ selfless dedication in China: “Many people use this poem as a metaphor for teachers’ sacrifice: ‘A silkworm exhausts its silk till death. A candle burns itself out to give light.’ What do you think are the implications of this metaphor for being a teacher, and why?” Metaphors on teacher studies are believed to work as a medium of reflection, and research using them can help to make the intuitive knowledge teachers hold about themselves, their classrooms, and their practices more explicit (Erickson and Pinnegar 2017).

In the third part in section three, the surveyed teachers were required to respond (and explain their responses) to five hypothetical work conflicts, to examine the values teachers are guided by in teaching dilemmas: 1) a student misbehaves in the classroom, seriously bothering other students’ listening to the lecture (hereafter, classroom misbehaviour); 2) a colleague teacher’s behaviour hurts one of your students’ feelings (hereafter, hurtful colleague); 3) if a perennially failing student scores 59 on an exam (60 is the pass point) will you pass him/her (hereafter, 59 scores); 4) a student behaves poorly, but if you tell his/her parents, he/she will be beaten (hereafter, violent parents); and, 4) a parent criticises your teaching (hereafter, parental criticism). This section was designed based on Oser’s model for studying teachers’ professional ethos (1991, 202). The four hypothetical conflicts examined teachers’ perceptions of their working relationships with students, colleagues, and parents.

The second data collection method was semi-structured interviews. Two follow-up, focus-group interviews were held by the researcher to collect deeper information about participants’ perceptions of motivation and morality in homeroom teacher work in Tianjin, China (see Appendix for interview guidelines).

Participants

The questionnaire was issued to a homeroom teacher education programme (all teachers come from Tianjin City) held in E University in Shanghai in 2018. All teachers (N = 160) enrolled in this programme were junior middle school teachers and received questionnaires, of which 137 were returned (Table 1). A pilot version of the questionnaire was sent to two homeroom teachers before being administered to the study participants. The pilot suggested respondents were able to clearly understand items in the questionnaire and finish the questionnaire within around 20 minutes. All questionnaires were delivered face-to-face by the researchers.

Table 1. Questionnaire respondents’ personal information (N = 137).

Gender				Degree							Number of kids at home
Male		Female		Bachelor				Master			0		1		2
14.6%		85.4%		92.7%				7.3%			5.1%		82.5%		11.7%
CCP member				Student achievement^1							School region
Yes		No		Good		Middle			Bad		Urban		Quasi-urban		Rural
57.7%		41.6%		13%		61.6%			23.9%		49.6%		20.4%		27.7%
Teaching years	0–5years		6–10.years		11–15years		16–20 years			21–25years		26–30years		31–35years
	0%		48.1%		7.4%		20.4%			9.3%		13.0%		0.7%
Homeroom teacher (hr) years	0–5years		6–10years		11–15year		16–20 years			21–25years		26–30years		31–35years
	4.3%		29.2%		24%		19.6%			13.9%		8%		0%
Subject taught
Chinese	Maths		English		Physics		Chemistry			Politics		History		Other
56.2%	19.7%		11.7%		2.2%		2.2%			2.2%		2.2%		2.2%

Ten randomly selected teachers who had participated in the questionnaire agreed to be interviewed and were divided into two five-person groups. Each group interview lasted around 50 minutes and was audio-recorded; the researcher also took notes.

Data analysis

The questionnaire data were analysed using SPSS software. The Cronbach alpha was .724 for the 14 items in entry motivation, .845 for the 13 items in goal orientation for homeroom teacher work, .613 for the seven items on difficulties challenging homeroom teachers’ work, .784 for the 12 items in teachers’ perceptions of help seeking, .644 for the 19 items on perceptions of teacher morality, and .922 for the 25 items on teachers’ civic competence. To address these Research Questions: 1) descriptive statistics were used to summarise teachers’ perceptions; 2) a correlation matrix was applied to explore relationships between these perceptions; and 3) t-test was adopted to examine group differences in teachers’ perceptions. Interview data were used to further understanding teachers’ perceptions and the factors influencing them.

The qualitative data collected from open-ended questionnaire questions (coded Q01, Q02, etc.) and interviews (coded I01, I02, etc.) were subjected to thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke 2006). The author first read the interview transcripts, moral dilemma responses, and metaphor reflections in the questionnaire, then identified key themes related to China’s teacher morality codes, civic competence, teacher moral dilemma, and teacher motivation based on Oser’s (1991) model, the FIT-Choice scale, and the GOT scale. Secondly, the author reviewed, evaluated, and coded the data to supplement and clarify the quantitative findings. The author coded teachers’ responses to moral dilemmas, using five categories emerged from the data (care, truthfulness, justice, authority, and harmony, the first three of which overlapped Oser’s (1991)), coded teachers’ responses to the sacrifice metaphor using two categories (agree and disagree), and coded interviews using two categories (entry motivation and work motivation) to identify their perceptions of teachers’ morality and motivation. Due to its limited sample size, this study makes no attempt to generalise its findings.

Quantitative findings

This section reports on homeroom teachers’ perceptions of six factors: entry motivation (FIT), goal orientation in work (GOT), perception of difficulties (Difficulty) and help (Help), and teacher morality (Morality) and civic-competence (Civic) in homeroom teacher work, based on the quantitative data.

Teachers’ perceptions of the six factors in the survey

Descriptive statistics based on the survey were presented. As seen in Table 2, homeroom teachers generally showed a high degree of agreement with the six factors, while the standard deviations ranging from 1.10 (Factor 3 (Difficulty)) to 0.29 (Factor 5 (Morality)).

Table 2. Descriptive statistics of teachers’ perceptions of the six factors.

Factors	N	Min	Max	Mean	SD
FIT	131	1.79	7.00	4.29	.86
GOT	136	2.38	7.00	5.55	.87
Difficulty	136	2.00	7.00	5.27	1.10
Help	136	2.67	7.00	4.96	.96
Morality	137	3.32	5.00	4.36	.29
Civic	134	2.92	5.00	4.45	.45

Generally, homeroom teachers had a high degree of agreement with items on entry motivation (FIT) and goal orientation for teaching (GOT) factors. The two most agreed-on FIT items were: “I like to work with children” (M = 5.95) and “working as homeroom teacher will allow me to influence the next generation’s values” (M = 5.84). The two most agreed-on GOT items were: “I feel it is a successful day if I got the parents’ understandings and supports” (M = 6.34) and “I feel it is a successful day if I developed good relationship with students” (M = 6.15).

Homeroom teachers also showed a high degree of agreement with factor of difficulties in their work. The two most agreed-on items were: “I have too many responsibilities” (M = 6.69), and “I have too many tasks” (M = 6.17). The two most agreed-on help seeking items were: “When I have a difficulty I will ask for help” (M = 5.13), and “Asking for help is a good way to solve difficulties” (M = 5.77).

Homeroom teachers also showed positive attitudes towards state-regulated teacher professional ethic codes and civic competence. The two most agreed-on teacher morality codes items were: “All subject teachers should pay attention to students’ moral education” (M = 4.88) and “A student’s character is more important than his/her academic performance” (M = 4.85). The two most agreed-on teacher civic competences items were: “we should anti-terrorist” (M = 4.88) and “I always line up in line” (M = 4.81).

Correlations between teachers’ perceptions of the six factors

Table 3 shows the Pearson correlation coefficients for teachers’ perceptions. Except for Factor 3 (Difficulty), the perceptions were significantly correlated. Factor 4 (Help) was strongly and significantly associated with Factor 1 (FIT) (r (130) = 0.58, p = 0.00) and Factor 2 (GOT) (r (135) = 0.5, p = 0.00), while Factor 5 (Morality) was strongly and significantly associated correlated with Factor 6 (Civic) (r (134) = 0.62, p = 0.00), supporting the theoretical cohesiveness between these two constructs.

Table 3. Correlations between teachers’ perceptions.

	FACTOR1	FACTOR2	FACTOR3	FACTOR4	FACTOR5	FACTOR6
FACTOR1	1.00
FACTOR2	0.48***	1.00
FACTOR3	−0.04	0.08	1.00
FACTOR4	0.58***	0.5***	0.08	1.00
FACTOR5	0.3***	0.38***	0.16	0.28***	1.00
FACTOR6	0.3***	0.48***	0.05	0.4***	0.62***	1.00

*** p < 0.001

Teachers’ perceptions across groups

Teachers’ perceptions about the six factors were examined across groups, based on different background variables. The t-test results for these perceptions across such variables as gender, years of teaching, educational level, number of children at home, teaching major, etc. revealed that, for Factor 2 (GOT), teachers with a master’s degree had a significantly higher score than teachers with a bachelor’s degree, indicating teachers’ perceptions of GOT varied across educational levels. No significant difference across groups was found for the remaining factors.

Qualitative findings

Teachers’ perceptions of teacher morality and sacrifice

In the interviews, homeroom teachers reported a high degree of agreement with the need to meet the state’s teacher morality and civic competence requirements in their daily work. For example, interviewees suggested, “In homeroom teacher work, we highlight cultivating good characters, political identity in the class … however, it’s not easy to be a homeroom teacher, dozens of eyes looking at you … Once your words don’t match with your behaviour … your image may be destroyed” (I01). All interviewed teachers reported that, despite having busy schedules, they were willing to emphasise teacher morality, had a selfless dedication to teaching and caring for students, and were willing to spend extra time on class management; “As the homeroom teacher, you have to be the first teacher to arrive at your class, to ensure students are not late for class, focus on their study, etc … and the last to leave the classroom to ensure all students have safely left … This is a very long working time … Always, by the time I’m home, my family is asleep” (I02). Moreover, homeroom teachers reported that, “as a matter of fact, we devote all time we can find to our students … to help them made achievement, we try all kinds of methods, to develop reward and punishment systems that work on our students to push them to progress” (I07).

In the survey, around 43.8% of respondents agreed the ‘silkworm’ metaphor presented a fair standard for teacher sacrifice. Of these, some stressed that dedication is necessary to the teaching profession, and that those wishing to be teachers should make sacrifices; some reported that the metaphor reflected society’s expectation of teachers and that teachers were, in return, respected by society; some even reported that “to be deeply commitment to the profession is the source of happiness of working as a teacher” (Q01). Of the 33.6% who disagreed with the metaphor, few disagreed with teachers’ commitment to work; instead, they argued for a balance between teachers’ rights and responsibilities in China. Typical sentiments included, “I think this metaphor is out of step now; a good relationship should be both beneficial to teachers and students” (Q02).

Teachers’ perceptions of motivation

In the interview, teachers reported that they had limited selection rights in their entry decision. According to the Primary and middle school teacher promotion regulations in Tianjin city, experience working as a homeroom teacher for at least two years, and preferably for 10 or more, is a must for promotion. Moreover, school leaders assigned teachers to work as homeroom teachers. Interviewees explained that “to work as a homeroom teacher or not is not your own decision” (I03).

In the interviews, teachers highlighted the importance of mastery goals and relational goals in their daily work to solve the interpersonal moral conflicts. They suggested that teachers should master subject knowledge well, as one reported that “a homeroom teacher, in managing his/her class, has to first show excellent teaching competencies in his/her subject, to make students trust his/her teaching abilities, so they will follow his/her management and trust his/her ability as a homeroom teacher” (I07). Another interviewee suggested that “A homeroom teaching who not only can teach his/her subject well, but can also answer students’ problems in other subjects will be worshiped by students … his/her class management will certainly go more smoothly” (I08). Therefore, “teachers who hold a master’s degree or graduate from famous universities are very popular among students and face higher expectations from students, principals, etc.” (I10).

On the other hand, homeroom teachers highlighted the need to develop good relationships with students and families. As one interviewee reported, “once I have developed a good relationship with students, they like me, and it will be easier for me to manage the class and push them to higher achievement” (I08). Interviewees even suggested good relationships with students benefitted their class management with parents, stating that, “in some cases, the parents challenged our work. I prefer to convince the children, then let them convince their parents” (I05).

Teachers’ perceptions of moral conflicts

Based on survey participants’ responses to the questionnaire’s open questions about dilemmas in work, this study found the following patterns in homeroom teachers’ purported responses to the conflicts. Like Oser (1991), this study found homeroom teachers stressed moral claims, such as care, justice, and truthfulness, in their reflective responses to conflicts (see Table 4). Unlike Oser, this study revealed homeroom teachers’ struggles to exert their authority while keeping harmonious relationships with students and their parents.

Table 4. Homeroom teachers’ responses to conflicts.

Conflicts	Concerns
	Caring	Justice	Truthfulness	Authority	Harmony
Classroom misbehaviour	48.9%	27.7%	0.7%	19%	1.5%
Hurtful colleague	24.1%	2.2%	7.3%	36.5%	24.8%
59 scores	72.3%	2.2%	21.2%	1.5%	0.7%
Violent parents	33.6%	–	0.7%	24.8%	36.5%
Parental criticism	0.7%	–	–	24.8%	68.6%

In handling the ‘violent parents’ and ‘parental criticism’ dilemmas, homeroom teachers mainly considered authority and harmony, with around 36.5% and 68.6% emphasised harmony and another 24.8% and 24.8%, respectively, were inclined to promote teacher authority between school and parents. In the interviews, teachers also reported that challenges caused by parents were “among the major difficulties in our work” (I01). One even expressed frustration, saying “I really felt tired [with parents’ challenges].” (I09) While homeroom teachers also expressed that “a harmony relationship with student families is very important for successful education in school” (I06).

In teacher-student relationships, in responding to each of the first three dilemmas, 24.1% or more of homeroom teachers highlighted their preference to care for students. In this study, 36.5% of surveyed homeroom teachers addressed teacher authority in responding to the ‘hurtful colleague’ dilemma. For instance, they explained that “even when the teacher is wrong, as a homeroom teacher, I have to protect the teachers’ authority before students … to ensure his/her smooth teaching with these students in the future” (Q07).

Possible explanation and discussion

Homeroom teachers’ moral manager roles explained their high degree of agreement to teacher morality

In this study, homeroom teachers’ acting as moral managers explained their high degree of agreement with teacher morality. Homeroom teachers in this study acted as moral managers. Teachers’ visibly and intentionally role modelling ethical behaviour, and rewards and discipline, hold students accountable for their ethical conduct. Thus teachers arouse students’ motivation and morality, and consequently transform their behavioural outcomes (Antonakis and House 2013).

Homeroom teachers are required to carry out moral education activities in China, ranging from supervising individual students’ moral development, to shaping a class-wide positive culture and organising daily class activities (e.g. class council) (MOE 2009). In this study, homeroom teachers reported devoting of a lot of time to setting up a reward and punishment system to facilitate students’ progress (including their moral development) and ensure their achievement.

Moreover, as suggested by social learning theory, (Bandura 1986), moral leaders likely sources of guidance in the moral education process, because their attractiveness and credibility as role models draw attention to their modelled behaviour, and followers learn by paying attention to and emulating the attitudes, values and behaviours of attractiveness and credible models. In this study, surveyed homeroom teachers showed a higher degree of agreement with such teacher morality items as “Be careful about my daily behaviours.” Interviewees reported that fulfiling their teacher morality requirements was important to becoming students’ role models.

In their responses to the sacrifice metaphor, 33.6% disagreed but none denied teachers’ commitment to teaching and students, but most highlighted the need to ensure their rights during China’s social transition. More than 40% agreed with the metaphor, saying the concepts of commitment/dedication/sacrifice to teaching and students reflected another important aspect of moral leadership – i.e. that leaders should demonstrating caring and concern for people (Brown and Trevino 2006).

High expectations to teachers explained their emphasis on mastery goal in work motivation

Chinese society has very high expectations of teachers, viewing them as knowledgeable authorities who are vital to students’ achievement. Homeroom teachers, due to their close contact with students and parents, were pushed to live up to these expectations, thus explaining their high degree of agreement with GOT items relating to mastery and relational goals. Homeroom teachers in this study noted this high expectation of teachers’ knowledge, thus explaining their high degree of agreement with work motivation in the survey and interviews.

Moreover, in this study, teachers with a master’s degree showed a higher degree of agreement with GOT factors, reflecting Chinese society’s high expectations for teachers with higher degrees. According to MOE statistics, only 11% and 4% of senior middle school teacher and junior middle school teachers, respectively, had a master’s degrees in 2019 (MOE, 2019a, MOE, 2019b). Teachers in this study reported feeling that their students and principals had higher expectations of them. Extant studies echo this, reporting that Chinese society has more interest in recruiting teachers with higher degrees and places higher expectation on them. The studies add that, as students nowadays have more talent than their predecessors, schools should provide teachers with a deeper mastery of subject knowledge and broader horizons (Min 2020).

Homeroom teachers re-forge their relationships with the society but maintain authority with students

Teachers’ valuing of relational goals in work motivation and their struggles to exert their authority while keeping harmonious relationships with students and parents in conflicts can be explained by the fact that homeroom teachers re-forge their relationships with the society but maintain authority with students.

The decentralisation and marketisation of China’s education system has changed the traditional “teacher-society” relationship. The social transition in contemporary China brought changes to tradition teacher authority; teachers no longer had sole authority in the teacher-student-parent relationship, but now shared that authority with parents. Teacher perceived their status change which was reflected in the interviews, where teachers reported that parents are a major source of difficulties in their work. Therefore, in this study, interviewees suggested that developing good relationships with students and parents was important for class management and students’ achievement. Teachers even reported that good relationship helped them to ease their moral conflicts with students and parents.

Moreover, as a response to interpersonal disagreements, harmony is also emphasised in teachers’ parent-handling in the interview. In traditional Chinese culture, Confucius stressed the importance of cooperation and harmony among people. Leung et al. (2011) pointed out that, due to Confucian influence, many East-Asian people deal with disagreements by maintaining interpersonal harmony, rather than through confrontation (e.g. Gabrenya and Hwang 1996).

However, despite the transition, teacher authority is still obvious and is ensured by several mechanisms in the PRC’s education system, especially in teacher-student relationships. Teacher authority is perpetuated by the education system, which gives teachers, especially homeroom teachers, the power to praise, criticise, reward, or punish students, influence class council members and “three good students” selection, and control seating arrangements, all of which give them control over students’ school life (Shen 2012). In addition, as Shen (2012) suggested, teacher authority is an important part of teacher morality, and a vital basis for teaching. As reflected in this study, 36.5% of surveyed homeroom teachers addressed teacher authority in responding to the ‘hurtful colleague’ dilemma.

Conclusion

With specific reference to homeroom teachers in Tianjin, China, this article has explored 137 homeroom teachers’ motivation and perceptions of morality in classroom-level management. It has reported that the participating homeroom teachers saw themselves as having high levels of both motivation and morality, and found the variable – teacher with a master’s degree – to be significantly correlated with their perceptions of motivation. This can be attributed to homeroom teachers’ moral manager role, society’s high expectations of homeroom teachers, and homeroom teachers’ re-forging their relationship with society, while maintaining their authority over students.

This study supplements the extant literature on classroom teacher leadership by identifying a “morality-motivation-management” model to understand the dynamics of homeroom teachers’ motivation and morality in managing classes in the Chinese context, highlighting the interplay between motivation and morality in classroom-level management.

First, class management work pushed homeroom teachers to experience three levels of morality in their work – meeting state-regulated morality codes, carrying out moral education as a role model, and making a commitment to or sacrifice for their work – that were bases for their management work. As homeroom teachers, they were required to abide by the state’s teacher morality codes and ensure their students’ moral education. In accordance with social learning theory, many homeroom teachers in this study agreed with the importance of their being role models for their students to facilitate students’ moral education. In the third level of this study, many homeroom teachers, despite having complains about the lack of balance between Chinese teachers’ rights and responsibilities, acknowledged that such virtues as sacrifice and commitment to their management work were a must.

Second, conflicts in class management pushed teachers to highlight different moral values in their relationships with parents and students. In the case of conflicts with parents, homeroom teachers in this study highlighted the value, harmony, as reflected in their perceptions of teachers’ declining status in contemporary China; in the case of conflicts with students, however, homeroom teachers relied on their classroom management powers to maintain their teacher authority.

Third, class management work allowed teachers in this study limited freedom in position entry decision-making, while raising two major motivation requirements for homeroom teachers: mastery goals and relational goals. On the one hand, homeroom teachers perceived Chinese society’s high social expectations that teachers be knowledgeable authorities, and suggested being so was important, even a prerequisite for class management work. On the other hand, developing good relationships with students was viewed as helpful in homeroom teachers’ other main class management duty – pushing students to attain better academic performance – and as helpful for resolving challenges raised by students’ parents.

Some implications can be drawn from this study, in terms of involving teachers in classroom-level leadership, and promoting and sustaining their motivation and morality, which is a theme all countries are concerned about, regardless of cultural backgrounds. First, given the important role the management position plays in shaping teachers’ understanding of, and agreement with, teacher morality and moral education in China, schools and new teacher education programme should provide new teachers opportunities to work in (classroom) leadership positions, and push them to explore the relationship between three levels of morality: abiding by regulated codes, carrying out moral education, and dedicating themselves to or making sacrifices for their work. This echoes the international literature’s interest in involving teachers in leading roles for school improvement (e.g. Leithwood, Mascall, and Strauss 2009). However, due to the pressures associated with classroom-level leadership, including interpersonal conflicts, related supports are needed, such as assigning experienced homeroom teachers as mentors and providing workshop on handling conflicts with (for instance) parents and students. Second, this study provides a cultural lens to understand some characteristics of classroom leaders’ work motivation in China. Homeroom teachers in this study echoed suggestions (in existing studies) that leadership fills a need for growth that maintains motivation in the profession (e.g. Gajda and Cravedi 2006). They felt the high societal expectations placed on teachers’ knowledgeable authority role and students’ academic achievement in society; as a result, they showed greater interest in mastery and relational goals in their work. This provides educational administrators and homeroom teachers with useful insights into the development of class leader motivation. Because it focuses on understanding the impact of interaction and expectation in a particular social and cultural context, which may afford them a greater understanding of classroom-level leaders’ work-related motivation, when formulating practical strategies to enhance the level of classroom leaders’ motivation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The article is funded by Shanghai Planning Office of Philosophy and Social Science Project (2019BKS019 Experiment of teacher ethical dilemma case teaching).

Notes on contributors

Wangbei Ye

Wangbei Ye is an associate professor of the moral-political education section, School of Teacher Education, Faculty of Education, East China Normal University, Shanghai, China. Her teaching and research focus on China’s moral-political education curriculum and instruction, and moral-political education teacher education (Grades 1-12). email address: [email protected]

Liping Zhu

Liping Zhu is a moral-political education teacher, Baoshan Middle School, Shanghai, China. Email address: [email protected]

Wangqiong Ye

Wangqiong Ye is a doctoral research fellow of the Centre for Educational Measurement, University of Oslo, Norway. email address: [email protected]

Notes

1. Based on teachers’ self-report.

Appendix

INTERVIEW GUIDELINE

1. Why do you work as a homeroom teacher?

2. Did you experience any changes in motivation after working as a homeroom teacher? If so, why?

3. What major challenges and success do you confront in your homeroom teacher work?

4. How do you evaluate your: a) students and class management; b) supports provided by your school?