Teacher Professional Development Supports, Classroom Practices, And Child Outcomes In Low-Income Preschool Programs

• In Event: 1-160 - ECE Workforce Supports, Experiences, and Wellbeing: Determinants and Consequences for Classroom Processes and Child Outcomes

Integrative Statement

At the forefront of debates about early childhood education (ECE) policy is a focus on raising the quality of learning environments in ECE centers as a means of promoting child development, particularly for low-income children and children of color. Central to this discussion is how policymakers and practitioners can support the early childhood workforce. One way is by promoting teachers’ professional practice through ongoing professional development (PD). Intervention and evaluation research demonstrate that PD in the form of training and coaching can improve teacher practice (e.g., Joyce & Showers, 2002; Sheridan et al., 2009), but less work has focused on how much PD a teacher typically receives or how these levels are related to observed teacher practice and children’s learning.
The current study uses a conceptual model hypothesizing associations from levels of PD to classroom practice to children’s learning (see Figure 1). The bioecological framework (Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 2006) guides this model, where proximal influences shape child development via the quality of the classroom environment. The distal context of PD received by the teacher is another influence on the classroom environment and, subsequently, on child development. If ECE teachers need more training and support on how to effectively implement practices that promote individual learning needs in diverse classrooms, then the promise of preschool may not be realized.
This study examines whether PD supports often provided by ECE programs predicts different aspects of observed teacher practice and preschoolers’ language, math, and executive function competencies. Typical PD supports include the amount of training teachers received from their center and district, amount of coaching teachers received, and amount of preparation time they had to plan for lessons. Multiple aspects of classroom practice were examined: overall quality of classroom interactions (Classroom Assessment Scoring System), time spent on language and literacy activities, time spent on math activities, and time spent in different instructional groupings (i.e., small group, whole group, transitions).
Sample. This is a secondary analysis of the Making Pre-K Count (MPC) study, a cluster-randomized control trial evaluating the effect of an evidence-based math curriculum with teacher training and in-classroom coaching on children’s outcomes. The sample included 173 full-day preschool classrooms in 69 public and community-based centers, including Head Start, serving low-income populations in NYC.
Preliminary findings. Multilevel structural equation modeling was used, and the models control for teacher characteristics and treatment status. Findings suggest small to moderate associations between PD and some aspects of classroom practice: more teacher training and coaching are associated with better classroom quality, with the latter association being stronger. Coaching was moderately associated with more time in transitions, and more teacher prep time had a small, negative association with time in whole group. No significant associations between PD and children’s gains or between classroom practices and children’s gains were found. The presentation will discuss implications of this work for the literature and the field, including implications for the kinds of PD provided and how it is tailored to meet the needs of the ECE workforce.

Authors

• Michelle Maier, MDRC
  Presenting Author

• Anne Kou, MDRC
  Non-Presenting Author