Explaining kindergarten teachers’ beliefs and practices regarding early visual arts education: a perspective from the theory of planned behavior (Creencias y prácticas docentes en materia de educación plástica y visual temprana: una perspectiva basada en la teoría del comportamiento planificado)

Abstract

Adopting the theory of planned behaviour (TPB), this sequential mixedmethods research investigates Hong Kong kindergarten teachers' reported beliefs and practices regarding early visual arts education (EVAE). The qualitative part (Phase 1) is an interview study of 19 kindergarten teachers in two focus groups, aiming to develop a conceptual structure of teachers' behavioural, normative and control beliefs. The quantitative part (Phase 2) is a survey study of 243 teachers from the randomly sampled 21 kindergartens regarding their EVAE beliefs and practices. Most teachers believe in child-centred teaching while practising teacher-directed instruction and support creativity while delivering closed-ended instruction. Four influential factors are identified to account for this gap: (1) practising child-centred pedagogies as a result of behavioural beliefs; (2) undervaluing visual arts as a result of normative beliefs; (3) instructing children directly as a result of normative beliefs; and (4) delivering subject knowledge in studio teaching as a result of control beliefs. These findings imply that Hong Kong kindergarten teachers struggle between two approaches and suffer from a lack of support from educational authorities and society. There is an urgent need to develop appropriate practices for visual arts education in Hong Kong kindergartens.

Quality Assessors’ Feedback and Recommendations on Music Education in Hong Kong Kindergartens

“…Therefore, we encourage the assessors to emphasize the quality of music teaching and offer detailed recommendations when they write the QR reports, with references to the quality features mentioned in the Literature Review section [2,11]. Such detailed recommendations could assist Hong Kong kindergarten teachers in obtaining ideas to enhance their music classroom practices [48], as reported by Bautista and Ho [44]. The second implication relates to the global need to enhance curriculum guidelines, standards, and regulations pertaining to music education [23].…”

Influence of teachers’ pedagogical knowledge on their classroom practice when solving arithmetic word problems with their students. An exploratory study / Influencia del conocimiento pedagógico del profesorado en su práctica de aula cuando resuelve problemas aritméticos verbales con su alumnado. Un estudio exploratorio

“…This improvement in teacher training should include at least two elements. First, teachers should gain awareness of their own level of knowledge since they often assume that they are providing students with the right way to solve problems through reasoning, even though what they identify as this reasoning may not, in fact, be desirable (Leung et al, 2023; Melhuish et al, 2020). In this sense, a joint analysis between teachers and researcher-trainers of teachers’ educational practices and of the pedagogical knowledge emanating from them could be an excellent tool (Muñoz-Catalán et al, 2022).…”

“…Esta mejora de la formación del profesorado debería incluir, al menos, dos elementos. En primer lugar, una toma de conciencia por parte del profesorado de su propio nivel de conocimiento, puesto que, con frecuencia, el profesorado asume que está proporcionando al alumnado el modo adecuado de resolver los problemas mediante el razonamiento, pero lo que ellos identifican como este razonamiento puede, de hecho, no ser lo deseable (Leung et al, 2023; Melhuish et al, 2020). En este sentido, un análisis conjunto entre profesorado e investigadores-formadores de las prácticas educativas del profesorado, y de los conocimientos pedagógicos que emanan de ellas, podría ser una excelente herramienta (Muñoz-Catalán et al, 2022).…”