Many teachers have begun to adopt information and communication technologies (ICT) in early childhood education (ECE) settings to support children’s learning. However, research shows that ECE ...teachers’ ICT implementation practice is not always appropriate, and their limited professional learning opportunities is one reason for this. Researchers worldwide have called for more understanding of professional learning that supports ECE teachers’ use of ICT in the kindergarten curriculum. In China, although ECE teachers’ ICT competencies and skills are required in national documents, little has been reported about how they are supported in learning about implementing ICT in the current curriculum. Drawing on the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) model, this study investigates how a small group of ECE teachers in China have experienced professional learning regarding ICT-related curriculum. By conducting individual interviews and analyzing public and teachers’ personal documents, this study finds that teacher participants had received diverse types of professional learning opportunities related to ICT implementation. These opportunities were provided by different organizations; however, one shared feature was a focus on the technical level of how to use ICT devices. This study also discusses the teaching-research culture underpinning participants’ professional learning. This article provides significant implications for advancing current professional learning programs.
V predšolskem obdobju je medpodročno povezovanje pomembno, saj spodbuja celosten razvoj otrok, omogoča jim, da svet spoznavajo širše in življenjsko uporabnejše, posledično je znanje, ki ga pridobijo, ...trajnejše in celovitejše. Načrtovanje medpodročnih dejavnosti od vzgojitelja zahteva dobro poznavanje posameznega področja, tudi z didaktičnega vidika, saj le tako lahko izbere in uporabi vse komponente (metode, oblike, in pripomočke) in didaktične stopnje glede na cilje področij, ki vstopajo v povezave. Pri tem pa mora paziti, da povezave ne osiromašijo katerega od vpletenih področij. Zato je smiselno bodoče vzgojitelje že na fakultetni ravni usposabljati za povezovanje različnih področij dejavnosti. Namen raziskave je bil ugotoviti, kakšen učinek imajo neposredne izkušnje z medpodročnim učenjem v času usposabljanja študentov bodočih vzgojiteljev. Želeli smo ugotoviti, ali načrtno medpodročno izvajanje matematike in naravoslovja vpliva na odnos študentov bodočih vzgojiteljev do medpodročnega povezovanja in njihovo znanje o tem. V ta namen smo oblikovali začetni in končni vprašalnik, s katerim smo ugotavljali, ali so se pojavile statistično pomembne razlike pred izvedbo izbirnega predmeta Medpodročno povezovanje matematike in naravoslovja ter po njem. Analiza odgovorov je pokazala, da so se študenti po izvedbi predmeta bistveno bolj zavedali, daje medpodročne povezave treba skrbno načrtovati, poleg tega so po izvedbi predmeta ocenili, da se čutijo kompetentnejší za povezovanje tako matematike kot tudi naravoslovja s preostalimi kurikularnimi področji.
In 2001, the Chinese Ministry of Education issued Guidelines for Preschool Education (GPE) (trial version) to call on early childhood practitioners to use a child-centred and play-based approach to ...teaching and learning. In order to implement the requirements, many kindergartens in China have carried out the play-based kindergarten curriculum reform. Among them, there are three successful trial cases in China on putting play as the core and base activity in kindergarten. They are Anji play in Zhejiang province (south east China), Lijin play in Shandong Province (east China) and Gamification of the curriculum in Jiangsu Province (east China). All the kindergartens there whether private or public start to change the old group teaching and return play to young children. The similarities of three play modes are: open and constantly changing play environment, adequate play time, multiple teachers' roles and child-centred play evaluation. Play-based curriculum in these three cases are top-down reform, which is the most effective way in China.
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Many recent articles have focused on reading instruction in kindergarten, but few have solicited the beliefs of the experts—kindergarten teachers. This study examined California teachers’ perceptions ...of teaching reading to kindergarten students. Kindergarten teachers from northern to southern California were surveyed (N = 103). Teachers reported on student oral language competence, reading achievement, and mastery of six of the English Language Arts Standards. Due to numerous standards, teachers reported that there was less time for traditional kindergarten activities and subject area instruction, both of which promote language development. Participants believed that students with advanced language skills at the beginning of kindergarten became proficient readers. Some students, with underdeveloped language, found learning to read frustrating and confusing. Other students, with underdeveloped language, may have grasped the decoding aspect of reading, but were lacking in comprehension.
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DOBA, EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, IZUM, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, ODKLJ, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
Research has consistently demonstrated that self-regulation is essential for the development and preservation of health and well-being in the early years and across the lifespan. Based on the ...emerging literature on the important role of self-regulation in promoting healthy child development, policymakers have made efforts to include self-regulation skills in practice and policy documents worldwide. Despite efforts to include self-regulation skills in early years curriculum documents, there is limited understanding by teachers, scholars, and policymakers of what self-regulation is and how best to support it in the day-to-day classroom. This limited understanding is perpetuated by a lack of a unified definition of self-regulation. Thus, it becomes important to examine these efforts in a critical way. In Ontario, where the research was completed, a revised play-based full-day kindergarten program was introduced in 2016. In this research we use a qualitative document analysis approach to compare the conceptualization of self-regulation in Ontario’s revised play-based kindergarten program with theory-driven models of self-regulation from empirical research. Analysis was iterative, and themes emerged based upon a coding scheme developed by the research team. Results suggest that co-regulation has a powerful influence on student learning. In addition, the policy document de-emphasizes behavioral regulation and expands cognitive regulation to include more than inhibitory control. Lastly, the kindergarten program discusses metacognition in relation to the use of language to articulate one’s thinking with little attention to goal-directed behaviors. In this paper, explicit recommendations for policymakers and practitioners are provided to ensure that emerging conceptualizations of self-regulation are promoted in early years curricula. Further, empirical evidence is needed to support why it is necessary to understand emerging conceptualizations of self-regulation and outline implications for current early years curricula.
This study examines how origami has been implemented, practised, and developed in the early childhood education of Japan over the past 140 years. Historically speaking, paper-folding has been part of ...Japanese symbolic art, craft culture, and religious ceremonial artefacts since paper and paper-folding techniques were first imported from China during the seventh century. By the eighteenth century, paper-folding provided a form of mass entertainment in Japanese society. During the 1870s, paper-folding was dramatically transformed into a pedagogical tool within Japanese kindergartens after Friedrich Froebel's (1782-1852) kindergarten system and its curriculum was transferred to Japan from the West. "Papier-Falten" (paper-folding) comprised an element of Froebel's Occupations - which was a series of handiwork activities - in his kindergarten curriculum, whereby various folding techniques and models were derived from European traditional paper-folding and introduced into a Japanese kindergarten curriculum that was associated with the concept of Froebel's kindergarten. Particularly seen in early childhood education in Japan, what we now call origami developed as a new form of paper-folding. This gradually emerged through the marriage of Western (German) and Eastern (Japanese) paper-folding cultures. The study highlights the benefits and uniqueness of cultural transmission and transformation when developing origami in early childhood education in Japan.
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This article describes the practical application of an innovative bilingual preschool program that involves two-way immersion of both English and Chinese in classrooms. This has not been written ...about extensively, especially in the context of early childhood classrooms in Asian countries. The primary goal of the two-way immersion kindergarten is to offer children aged 3 to 5 the opportunity to achieve their maximum potential in all aspects of personal growth by using an enriched bilingual education model and an integrated learning curriculum. This initial curriculum plan has been developed for a two-way immersion kindergarten in Beijing, China. This framework articulates the goals of the program, program planning, implementation and design, as well as the expectations for these children. Samples of preschool and kindergarten schedules, Kindergarten Year 1 (K-1) curriculum projects, and Kindergarten Year 2 (K-2) curriculum maps are included in Supplementary A, B, and C. A detailed description of different type of activity centers is given in Supplementary D.
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NUK, OILJ, SAZU, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The purposes of this research are: 1) to get the picture of student’s creativity in science activity by implementing contextual approach to kindergartens’ students; 2) to get the picture of ...student’s creativity in science activity by implementing conventional approach to kindergartens’ students; 3) to know the different of kindergarten’s student’s creativity between the students taught by implementing contextual approach and the other ones taught by implementing conventional approach in science activity. Data are analyzed with the descriptive and inferential statistics; The result of this research shows that 1) In the science activity, the creativity of kindergartens’ students; taught by implementing contextual approach having a higher average point to the ones taught by implementing the conventional approach; 2) In contextual approach teaching, thenumber of students having higher point than the average point are higher to the ones having lower point than the average point. The same result is obtained in conventional approach teaching as well; 3) The number of students having higher point than the average point in contextual approach teaching are higher to the ones in conventional approach teaching; ABSTRAKPenelitian ini bertujuan untuk 1) mengetahui gambaran tentang kreativitas anak didik dalam kegiatan sains dengan pendekatan Kontekstual pada TK; 2) mengetahui gambaran tentang kreativitas anak didik dalam kegiatan sains dengan pendekatan konvensional yang diterapkan guru pada TK; 3) mengetahui perbedaan antara kreativitas anak didik yang diajar menggunakan pendekatan kontekstual dengan kreativitas anak didik yang diajar menggunakan pendekatan konvensional pada kegiatan sains di TK. Data dianalisis dengan analisis statistik deskriptif dan analisis statistik inferensial; Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa 1) Kreativitas anak didik TK; dalam kegiatan sains yang diajar dengan pendekatan kontekstual mempunyai skor rata-rata lebih tinggi dari pada yang diajar dengan pendekatan konvensional; 2) Dari hasil penelitian dengan pendekatan kontekstual diketahui anak didik yang mempunyai skor di atas skor rata-rata lebih banyak dari pada yang memiliki skor dibawah skor rata–rata, dan hasil penelitian dengan pendekatan konvensional diketahui anak didik yang mempunyai skor diatas skor rata-rata juga lebih banyak dari pada anak didik yang memiliki skor di bawah skor rata-rata; 3) Anak didik yang memperoleh skor di atas rata-rata pada pendekatan kontekstual lebih banyak dibanding anak didik yang memperoleh skor di atas rata-rata pada pendekatan konvensional.
Kindergarten curricula (Bahovec et al. 1999, 37) cover different areas of education that are sensibly interconnected and integrated. Science is one of the areas that represent child’s first learning ...about the surrounding world and the first introduction to nature. Science education is a very suitable approach of introducing children into basic research work, since in nature objects and phenomena are more concrete, and hence the children are instinctively attracted. Therefore, science education could act as a starting point for all other areas of education. Teaching science comprises several difficulties, which are mainly connected with the way how contents are introduced to children. This is often a great challenge and great responsibility for pre-school teachers, because the scientific content needs to be explained in an appropriate way taking into consideration the child's age, the use of correct terminology, and at the same time avoiding inadequate generalization and over-simplification. Buoyancy is a natural phenomenon that is experienced by every child, but which, on the other hand, is quite difficult to explain. With the present study we wished to assess the knowledge considering buoyancy of the part-time students within the Pre-school Teaching educational programme at the Faculty of Education of the University of Primorska, which is performed on different locations throughout Slovenia. These students already teach in the kindergartens and should be well acquainted with buoyancy from previously passed physics courses at the Faculty of Education. We examined how they explained the buoyancy to children in kindergartens, and whether the knowledge about buoyancy is affected by their working experience or the location of their study. The results show that the students’ knowledge about buoyancy is insufficient and incomplete. In addition, many misconceptions about buoyancy are transmitted to the children in the process of teaching. Furthermore, it can be stated that neither the working experience nor the location of the study affects the interpretation of buoyancy (p<0.05).
The natural sciences teaching objects that are included in curricula do not constitute simplifications of scientific knowledge, but arise as the result of certain “didactic transpositions” that ...constitute objects of research. In this article we present an approach to Greek kindergarten curricula texts, which was attempted through qualitative text analysis and aimed to define the official teaching proposals regarding the “States and Properties of Matter”. The specific teaching object was selected among others as a discipline representative example. We describe the process of text analysis, the categories that emerged, as well as the possibilities of data interpretation offered by the use of a data presentation table, in conjunction with the aims of the study.
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