Renewing Approaches to Evaluating Early Childhood Teachers Knowledge of and Beliefs about Literacy (Poster 37)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Friday 3:20 p.m.
  In Invited Poster Session: 2025 AERA Undergraduate Fellows Research Poster Fair

Abstract

Teacher knowledge of and beliefs about early childhood literacy impacts classroom practices (Bingham & Kenyon-Hall, 2013). This study seeks to improve teacher practices by gaining deeper insights into measurement of teacher beliefs, practices, and knowledge. Data for this project were collected from 38 preschool teachers who completed the Early Writing Knowledge Assessment (EWKA; Bingham et al., 2022), including three contextualized child writing samples. Responses were coded using a two-step process with an a priori code set based on early writing theories and synthesized open-ended responses from teachers of a previous sample. Descriptive statistics show significant variation among teachers in self-reported writing skills (M = 10.33, SD = 2.96, Range = 4-16) and ability to teach writing (M = 14.14, SD = 3.98, Range = 7-26). Teachers had more positive beliefs about teaching writing than their own skills. Using a contextualized choice-category response format, teachers reported variability in their knowledge of children’s writing skills showing higher knowledge for more advanced writers and lower knowledge when writing samples were less sophisticated. Teachers’ knowledge demonstrated little agreement regarding approaches to supporting children’s writing and minimal individualization for children. This innovative contextualized assessment of knowledge permits a deeper understanding of teachers’ strengths and areas for professional learning. Pearson correlations suggested a negative relationship between teacher knowledge and practices, warranting further analysis. Future work will examine teachers’ knowledge more deeply and compare the response approach of using two types of elicitation materials a) contextualized, open-ended response format and b) a contextualized, choice-category response format.

Author

• Samantha Hart-Ihnken, Texas A&M University