Technologies and teacher’s motivational style: A research study in Brazilian public schools

Information and Communications Technology (ICT) is increasingly a part of discussions on educational innovation and teaching practices. Research from the last decade points out the difficulty of integrating technologies in education and highlights the variety of elements favouring/preventing change in teaching and learning methods. In this article, we defend that the methodology adopted by teachers, their approach with regard to students in the class- room and what literature calls educational professionals’ «motivational style» (Decy & Ryan, 1985 and 2000; Reeve, Bolt, & Cai, 1999; Guimarães & Boruchovitch, 2004; Pischetola, 2016) are the elements that most lead to a significant role for ICT in teaching practices. The discussion relies on self-determination theory and the assumption of the existence of more autonomy-supportive or more controlling teacher’s motivating styles. Based on this premise, we present here a qualitative study undertaken between 2014 and 2016 at eight municipal primary schools in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. As a whole, we undertook 64 semi-struc- tured interviews with teachers from the selected schools. The obtained results have allowed us to demonstrate a relationship between teachers’ motivational style with the use of technology and the creation (or otherwise) of a dialogue-based and democratic space in the classroom.