In "Teaching Expertise in Three Countries," Akiko Hayashi shows how teachers from Japan, China, and the United States think about what it means to be an expert teacher. Based on interviews with ...teachers conducted over the span of fifteen years and videos taken in their classrooms, Hayashi gives us a valuable portrait of expert teachers in the making. While Hayashi's research uncovered cultural variations in the different national contexts, her analysis of how teachers adapted their pedagogy throughout their careers also revealed many cross-national similarities. Younger teachers often describe themselves as being in a rush, following scripts, and "talking too much," while experienced teachers describe themselves as being quieter, knowing children better, and being more present. Including a foreword by scholar of early childhood education Joseph Tobin, "Teaching Expertise in Three Countries" provides a foundation for understanding the sequence and pathways of development over the first decade of teaching in three national contexts, demonstrating the value of the field of comparative education in the process.
Polazeći od složenih komunikacijskih zahtjeva s kojima su u svom svakodnevnom profesionalnom radu suočeni odgojitelji zaposleni u području predškolskog odgoja, rad prikazuje teorijska uporišta na ...temelju kojih se navedeno zaključuje i rezultate provedenog primarnog istraživanja na uzorku 106 odgojitelja zaposlenih u dječjim vrtićima u Podravini. Provedeno anketiranje utvrdilo je važnost akademskog obrazovanja na kvalitetu javnog nastupa odgojitelja te utjecaj obrazovanja, no ne i iskustva (radnog staža) na pozitivan doživljaj komunikacijske situacije u kojoj se ostvaruje željeni komunikacijski učinak. Analiza rezultata pokazuje da odgojitelji u Podravini imaju komunikacijske kompetencije utvrđene kao važne za suvremeni odgoji rad. Obzirom na velik postotak onih koji još uvijek javne nastupe doživljavaju kao stresne situacije, rad utvrđuje važnost kontinuiranog obrazovanja u tom smislu.
Work-family conflict is prevalent in preschool teachers, which has increased the risk of turnover intention. However, the effect of work-family conflict on turnover intention may be different between ...beginning preschool teachers and experienced preschool teachers. The present study examined the mediating role of organisational commitment in the relationship between work-family conflict and turnover intention with a sample of 726 beginning preschool teachers and 603 experienced preschool teachers coming from China. Results indicated that (1) Chinese beginning preschool teachers' organisational commitment played a partial mediating role in the relationship between work-family conflict and turnover intention; (2) organisational commitment fully mediated the relationship between work-family conflict and turnover intention among Chinese experienced preschool teachers. These findings have important implications for devising interventions separately to reduce the turnover intention of beginning and experienced preschool teachers.
The article deals with the problem of forming the autocompetence of a preschool teacher as a universal characteristic as a part of the structure of professional competence. The article substantiates ...the idea of the role of auto competence in the dynamic adaptation of the teacher in modern educational realities. The formation of auto competence is presented in the form of a step-by-step model that reveals the logic of the process based on objectively existing contradictions between the understanding of the importance of increasing the level of awareness of the subject’s own personality, and insufficient knowledge of a specific set of means and conditions that motivate him to self-knowledge. The authors trace the features of the formation of auto-competence at each of the stages described in the study. The article summarizes the practical experience of implementing the program for the auto competence formation into the process of psychological and pedagogical support of teachers.
The aim of this study is to determine perceptions of preservice preschool teachers on concept of creativity. Sixty preservice preschool teachers were included in the study conducted with the ...qualitative research design. In the first stage of the data collection process, the preservice preschool teachers were asked to define creativity. In the second stage, they were asked to explain the concept of creativity by drawing a picture. They were allowed to write explanations on their pictures about what they had drawn. The data of the study included definitions and pictures made by the preservice preschool teachers. Content analysis method was employed to analyse the data. The findings of the study indicated that preservice preschool teachers emphasised that an individual should have some personality traits to exhibit creativity, they reflected this on the pictures they drew, they highlighted that a person’s creative ideas during the creativity process should be at most original, they also reflected the creativity process on their pictures they drew, they declared that a creative product should have an original and functional/useful quality, they reflected creativity as the ability to produce a functional (useful) and original product on the pictures they drew for the creative product, and they stated that the environmental features supporting the formation of creativity should be free and natural without any limitation, restriction and direction.
This study investigated the repercussions of the Covid-19 pandemic on preschool education and sought answers to how preschool education is implemented, what kind of activities are held, what kind of ...challenges need to be overcome, and what measures need to be taken to sustain preschool education. The sample consisted of 25 preschool teachers and 30 parents recruited using criterion sampling, a purposive sampling method. The study was based on phenomenology, which is a qualitative research design. Data were collected using a semi-structured interview form and video records of participants performing educational practice within two months. Data were analyzed using inductive content analysis. Participants stated that the Covid-19 pandemic had numerous adverse effects on preschool education and that they held art, science, and mathematics activities and games to sustain education but faced numerous challenges during the process. They also emphasized that measures should be taken to sustain preschool education during pandemics.
•Family/friends support was related to young preschool teachers’ turnover intention.•Independent mediating role of organizational commitment was significant.•Independent mediating role of work-family ...conflict was not significant.•Serial mediation of work-family conflict and organizational commitment was found.
High turnover rates of preschool teachers threaten the stability and quality of teaching staff and restrict the overall development of national preschool education. As young teachers become the main force of Chinese preschool teaching staff, their high turnover intention at the beginning of teaching careers have become a serious problem. With a sample of 1121 Chinese young preschool teachers born in or after 1990, the current study examined whether family/friends support was related to turnover intention and whether this relation was mediated by work-family conflict and organizational commitment. The results of structural equation model showed that: (1) family/friends support was significantly and negatively related to teachers’ turnover intention; (2) organizational commitment mediated the relationship between family/friends support and turnover intention, while the independent mediating role of work-family conflict was not supported; and (3) serial mediating role of work-family conflict and organizational commitment was observed in the relationship between family/friends support and turnover intention. These findings indicated that supportive family/friends could help young preschool teachers deal with work-family conflict, improve organizational commitment, thereby mitigating their turnover intention.
The teacher-child relationship plays an important role in children’s future development. However, the existing research mainly focuses on the influence of preschool teachers’ external conditions on ...the teacher-student relationship, while the research on the influence of teachers’ internal psychological characteristics on the teacher-student relationship is relatively lacking. In this study, three hundred and seventeen preschool teachers were tested were tested with Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, Emotional Intelligence Scale, Chinese Interpersonal Response Index, and Teacher-student Relationship Scale. The results showed that trait mindfulness positively predicted the quality of parent-teacher relationship (β = 0.173,
p
= 0.026). Emotional intelligence played a mediating role in trait mindfulness and teacher-child relationship quality (β = 0.118,
p
= 0.004), and empathy played a mediating role in trait mindfulness and teacher-child relationship quality (β = 0.112,
p
= 0.001). Meanwhile, emotional intelligence and empathy played a chain mediating role in trait mindfulness and parent-teacher relationship quality (β = 0.044,
p
= 0.038). On the one hand, this study enriches attachment theory. The conclusions of this study verify the diversity of proximal factors in attachment theory, and confirm the influence of teachers’ own characteristics and abilities on the teacher-child relationship quality. On the other hand, by exploring the factors affecting the teacher-child relationship quality, we can find ways to improve teacher-child relationship from a new perspective, and then provide some new methods and approaches for improving the quality of preschool teacher-child relationship.
Online education has become a major reaction to the COVID-19 epidemic, which requires preschool teachers to quickly adapt to online education and accept educational technology. In this emergency ...background, research on the preschool teachers’ technology acceptance provides clues to improve preschool teachers’ intention to use educational technology. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is widely used to examine the process of individuals’ technology acceptance in the previous literature. Therefore, this study seeks to examine preschool teachers’ technology acceptance with the adapted TAM and their determinant factors. The proposed model was empirically validated by using survey data from 1,568 preschool teachers during the COVID-19. Results indicate that preschool teachers’ behavioral intention was moderate to high level. Perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use are direct significant predictors of preschool teachers’ behavioral intention. Perceived usefulness is affected by perceived ease of use and job relevance. Computer self-efficacy and perceptions of external control are the positive factors toward perceived ease of use. Our findings present powerful evidence for the applicability of the adapted TAM in a sample of Chinese preschool teachers under emergency circumstances. These results highlighted some potential avenues for interventions aimed at improving preschool teachers’ acceptance toward educational technology.
This study aimed to explore preschool teachers’ actions in order to support children’s learning processes in a context where an interactive whiteboard (IWB) is used. Five preschool teachers and 22 ...children aged 4–6 were video observed in 2017 and early spring 2018 over a period of 5 months. The findings of the study revealed 21 scaffolding actions which preschool teachers used including: Concretizing, Questioning, Instructing, Providing space, Affirming, Providing feedback, Inviting, Watching, Laughing together, Approaching, Standing/sitting beside, Simplifying, Filling in the blanks, Confirming, Participating, Challenging perception, Challenging thought, Explaining facts, Displaying, Explaining solutions, and Referring back. By characterizing teachers’ actions in relation to different scaffolding functions, the relationship between action and scaffolding function was particularly clarified. Six of the functions, including recruitment, direction maintenance, marking critical features, reduction in degrees of freedom, frustration control and demonstration were aligned with Wood et al.’s (Child Psychol Psychiatry 17:88–100, 1976) theoretical framework. By identifying two additional functions, i.e., mutual enjoyment and participation in the activity, more importantly the study contributed to the development of Wood et al.’s (Child Psychol Psychiatry 17:88–100, 1976) theoretical framework. It can be said that the findings of the study expanded and deepened our understanding regarding scaffolding processes and the ways they can be implemented in teaching practices.
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