Poster #68 - Preschool Classroom Learning Opportunities and the Roles Teachers Play

• In Event: Poster Session 05

Abstract

In recent years, the number of children enrolled in preschool has steadily increased, as a result of large-scale initiatives that seek to expand universal access to early childhood education (Friedman-Krauss et al., 2021; NCES, 2021). Yet, little empirical work has explored how early childhood teachers structure the instructional and more informal portions of the day, or whether this might vary by school type (i.e., in public schools vs. early childhood centers). Gaining insight into the realities of the preschool day structure is necessary, as extensive research has demonstrated the critical role early childhood teachers’ practices play in shaping children’s learning (Hamre & Pianta, 2001; Yoshikawa et al., 2013), with high-quality instruction throughout all classroom activities predicting greater gains in children’s outcomes (Curby et al., 2009; Hamre & Pianta, 2005; Mashburn et al., 2008). Moreover, in addition to the instructional portions of the day, there are countless teaching opportunities throughout the day, including during mealtime, center-time, and while transitioning between activities (Ryan et al., 2021; Whorrall & Cabell, 2016). However, these different times of the day are often not taken advantage of as opportunities to support children’s learning, with limited overall instructional support offered during mealtime and general classroom routines (Cabell et al., 2013; Thorpe et al., 2020). The current study thus explores the following research questions: (1) What are the opportunities for learning in 3-year-old and 4-year-old classrooms in public schools and early education centers? (2) What roles does each member of the classroom teaching team (i.e., lead teachers, assistant teachers, and classroom aides) assume during these times?

Fifty early child educators are participating in this study. Participants include teaching teams from ten 3-year-old and ten 4-year-old classrooms serving children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Educators were asked to complete an adaptation of the Teaching Team Dynamics Self Report (TDS; Niño, 2019), which elicits information about who in the classroom assumes various roles and responsibilities (e.g., greeting children at drop-off, leading circle time, reading books). In addition, each teaching team was asked to complete a joint time diary, delineating the formal and informal opportunities for learning across a “typical” day, in thirty-minute increments. Furthermore, in the coming weeks, each classroom will be visited over the course of a “typical” day, and trained observers will write detailed field notes, as well as complete an adaptation of the Teacher Observation in Preschools (TOP) survey (Bilbrey et al., 2007) to capture the formal and informal learning opportunities provided, and the interactions between the teaching staff and the children during these times.

Time diaries, along with observers’ field notes, will be qualitatively coded using inductive, open-coding procedures, following a Grounded Theory approach (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Frequencies will then be run, to highlight emergent patterns in learning opportunities and the various roles teaching team members assume. Analyses (e.g., t-tests, chi-squares) will also focus on similarities and differences between 3-year-old and 4-year-old classrooms, as well as explore differences by various classroom characteristics. Findings will be discussed in relation to implications for early childhood teacher professional development.

Authors

• Adina Schick, New York University
  Presenting Author

• Nathalia Sanchez, New York University

• Cassie Wuest, New York University