Can a college course be the answer to improving teaching and learning in preschool classrooms?
For the past couple of decades early education research has converged on effective teacher-child interactions as being the key to promoting young children’s development. These interactions are the daily back-and-forth exchanges between teachers and children throughout each day, which can be both social and instructional in nature. High quality interactions in which teachers provide ongoing feedback to children, facilitate children’s language and vocabulary, and encourage students to think, for example, lead to greater growth in preschoolers pre-reading and math skills.
Evidence that college coursework in early childhood education is correlated to these kinds of high-quality interactions has been slim so far. Teachers holding a bachelor’s degree in early childhood education are typically no better at these interactions than are teachers holding only an associate’s degree.
Developing college courses that can be shown in a rigorous, randomized control trial to improve teacher behavior in this area has been a goal among early education researchers concerned about improving children’s school readiness. In a study published in the February 2012 issue of the American Educational Research Journal, researchers at the University of Virginia’s Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning (CASTL) announced that they have found early evidence of success.
CASTL is a partner in the National Center for Research on Early Childhood Education (NCRECE), a project funded by the Institute for Education Sciences. Led by Bridget Hamre, associate director of CASTL, a team of researchers is working to develop cost-effective, professional development programs for early childhood educators that are supported by empirical evidence and can be disseminated widely.
The research team tested a semester-long course with 223 preschool teachers in ten cities across the U.S. The course is based on the framework of the Classroom Assessment Scoring System™, an instrument used to measure observed teacher-child interactions, as well as on the associated MyTeachingPartner™ professional development coaching model.
The courses focused on analysis of videos from real classrooms and building skills in identifying high quality interactions. “We hypothesized that it was not sufficient for teachers only to learn about effective interactions,” Hamre said. “If they can identify effective interactions in other teachers with a high degree of specificity, they are more likely to be able to transfer that skill and make changes in their practice.”
Hamre said that early childhood teachers rarely use effective strategies for explicitly teaching early literacy and language skills, despite evidence that these practices are essential for children at risk of school failure. The course, therefore, focused on providing examples of instructional interactions directly addressing children’s development of language and literacy skills.
Instructors at each course site were provided with curriculum that included PowerPoint presentations, videos, and written assignments. They attended a weeklong training and were provided with ongoing support by NCRECE staff. Their classes were periodically videotaped to ensure they were teaching according to plan.
Written end-of-course assessments were compared to a control group of 217 teachers who received no coursework on the topic of teacher-child interactions. The researchers found that teachers in their course displayed better knowledge about effective interactions and were better able to identify multiple aspects of effective instruction in videos. They also were more likely to report a belief that language and literacy skills were essential to young children’s development and displayed greater knowledge about these skills.
To determine if teachers’ knowledge and beliefs translated into action, teachers in both groups were also required to videotape their teaching periodically for analyses by the researchers using the CLASS instrument. Teachers who took the course were observed using more emotionally supportive interactions and more strategies that facilitate children’s higher order thinking skills. They provided more intensive and frequent feedback and better supported children’s language development—all aspects of the classroom environment that appear to have the strongest associations with children’s early literacy, language, and cognitive development. The course was equally effective across teachers with less than an associate’s degree as well as those with advanced degrees.
“This study demonstrates that a college course can improve the quality of teachers’ interactions with children,” said Jason Downer, another member of the CASTL/NCRECE research team. Additional research is underway that compares the effects of the college course versus the MyTeachingPartner individualized coaching model versus effects with a combination of the two.
“As the field looks for ways to improve the quality of teacher-child interactions across the nation and not only in small isolated contexts, we need professional development opportunities that can be disseminated broadly,” Hamre said. “Courses offer an advantage over more intensive options such as coaching in that they are less expensive to implement and easier to integrate into existing systems for teacher licensure. The ultimate goal is to help teachers do what’s best for the kids.”
NCRECE focuses on conducting research, disseminating research findings, and carrying out leadership activities aimed at improving the quality of early childhood education across the United States. The Center is based at the University of Virginia and is directed by Robert C. Pianta, dean of the Curry School of Education.
By Lynn Bell
