This study explores 10 pre-service English foreign language (EFL) teachers' motivation change in a Government-funded Normal Program in China. The findings reveal that the participants’ motivations experienced ups and downs in the process of learning to teach, which ultimately led to their enhanced intrinsic motivations towards teaching. Further, the authors found that the pre-service teachers' engagement with their peers and the teacher educators in the coursework facilitated their cognitive learning with positive influences on their self-efficacy and also brought them a sense of social connectedness, which together contributed to their motivational development.