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Three iterations of an online PD course, “Chat with Children,” used identical content but varied designs of autonomy and relatedness. The exploratory study involved 417 in-service Hong Kong kindergarten teachers, analyzing enrollment, participation, and completion, and using interviews to capture experience differences. Higher participation and completion appeared in autonomy- and relatedness-fostering designs, while enrollment was lower; design elements shaped teachers’ autonomy and relatedness experiences. Results inform PD design for teacher education.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/autonomy-and-relatedness-motivating-kindergarten-teachers-in-an-online-professional-development-issue-4-article-2/594335/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/autonomy-and-relatedness-motivating-kindergarten-teachers-in-an-online-professional-development-issue-4-article-2/594335.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Kurz","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-23","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":24},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"What theory guides this study’s focus on motivation in online PD?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"The study is guided by self-determination theory (SDT), emphasizing psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness as core motivational factors.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"How were the online professional development course iterations designed?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"Three iterations of “Chat with Children” kept content identical while varying the design features that foster autonomy and relatedness.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"What were the main findings about participation and completion?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"Participation and completion were significantly higher in course iterations that fostered autonomy and relatedness, even though enrollment was lower.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},594335,1792167545,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":24,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":139,"language":140,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":144,"read_time":145},2336478945635,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_6f874abed73319feea01a86fa6f0fab8","Australian Journal of Teacher Education  \nVolume 50  Issue 4 Article 2  \n1-31-2025  \nAutonomy and Relatedness: Motivating Kindergarten Teachers inan Online Professional Development  \nXuanyi Eliza WU  \nThe Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR  \nAlfredo BAUTISTA  \nThe Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR  \nMarc Clarà  \nUniversitat de Lleida  \nFollow this and additional works at: [https://ro.ecu.edu.au/ajte](https://ro.ecu.edu.au/ajte)  \n Part of the Early Childhood Education Commons, Online and Distance Education Commons, and the Teacher Education and Professional Development Commons  \nRecommended Citation  \nWU, X., BAUTISTA, A., & Clarà, M. (2025) . Autonomy and Relatedness: Motivating Kindergarten Teachers in an Online Professional Development. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 50(4) . [https://doi.org/](https://doi.org/)[ ](https://doi.org/)10.14221/1835-517X.6781  \nThis Journal Article is posted at Research Online.  \n[https://ro.ecu.edu.au/ajte/vol50/iss4/2](https://ro.ecu.edu.au/ajte/vol50/iss4/2)  \nAutonomy and Relatedness: Motivating Kindergarten Teachers in an  \nOnline Professional Development  \nXuanyi Eliza WU  \nAlfredo BAUTISTA  \nThe Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China  \nMarc CLARÀ  \nUniversitat de Lleida,(Spain  \nAbstract: Drawing on the self-determination theory, this paper focuses on two factors that are essential for individuals to be motivated,  \nnamely the psychological needs of autonomy and relatedness. We implemented three different iterations ofan online PD course, entitled Chat with Children. While content was identical, the designs of  \nautonomy and relatedness varied. Participants of this exploratory  \nstudy were 417 in-service Hong Kong kindergarten teachers. We  \nanalyzed teachers’enrollment, participation, and completion in the  \nthree iterations, and also interviewed teachers to explore their experiences of different autonomy and relatedness designs. We found that participation and completion were significantly higher in the  \niterations that fostered autonomy and relatedness, although enrollment was lower, and that certain aspects of the design of the PD were central for the participants’experience of autonomy and relatedness. These results provide new insights for PD designers and teacher educators. Implications, limitations, and future research are discussed.  \nKeywords: Teacher PD, autonomy, relatedness, motivation, teacher-child interaction, online PD  \nIntroduction  \nWhile an ample body of research has identified the features of high-quality PD initiatives for teachers (Desimone, 2009; West & Bautista, 2022), little is known about what factors motivate teachers to participate in and complete PD initiatives (Ng et al., 2010) . Although research on teacher learning is spanning diverse fields and theories, the component of motivation is teachers’ largely missing from existing literature, as it is usually conceptualized separately from teachers’professional learning experiences (Appova & Arbaugh, 2018) . In addition, the investigation of the outcomes and mechanisms of teacher’s learning is centered on PD studies, and teachers are implicitly assumed to be motivated when they participate in PD programs (Cook & Artino Jr, 2016; Goddard et al., 2015) . To fill in the literature gap, researchers such as West et al. (2022) are exploring the connection between teacher motivation and teacher PD. For example, Appova and Arbaugh (2018) developed a unified framework to explore the factors that influence teachers’motivation to learn in a PD course. One of the areas of this framework is educational psychology, which examines if teachers’ learning experiences increase their confidence and capacity to make a change  \neffectively (Schunk & DiBenedetto, 2020) .  \nIn the domain of educational psychology, one of the major theories related to teachers’motivation to learn is self-determination theory (SDT) (Deci et al., 2017). Although developed in the Western context, sp","cbCaieFv8Bfng621","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaieFv8Bfng621","pdf",357278,23,"English","# Introduction\n## Self-determination theory and teacher motivation\n## Autonomy and relatedness as key needs\n# Study design and outcomes\n## Course iterations of “Chat with Children”\n## Enrollment, participation, and completion","[{\"question\":\"What theory guides this study’s focus on motivation in online PD?\",\"answer\":\"The study is guided by self-determination theory (SDT), emphasizing psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness as core motivational factors.\"},{\"question\":\"How were the online professional development course iterations designed?\",\"answer\":\"Three iterations of “Chat with Children” kept content identical while varying the design features that foster autonomy and relatedness.\"},{\"question\":\"What were the main findings about participation and completion?\",\"answer\":\"Participation and completion were significantly higher in course iterations that fostered autonomy and relatedness, even though enrollment was lower.\"}]","Autonomy and Relatedness: Motivating Kindergarten Teachers in an Online Professional Development - Issue 4 - Article 2 | PDF",1792078966,58]