Preschool teachers’ learning opportunities in their initial teacher education and in-service professional development – do they have an influence on preschool teachers’ science-specific professional knowledge and motivation?

ABSTRACT

Preschool teachers’ science-specific competences have been shown to influence their science instruction, which in turn appear directly related to the development of children’s science competences. Initial teacher education and in-service professional development may include learning opportunities to acquire science-specific competences necessary for teaching science in preschool. Knowledge about the effects of learning opportunities in initial teacher education and in-service professional development on preschool teachers’ science-specific competences is limited but highly relevant for research, policy and practice. This paper examines the effects of learning opportunities in preschool teachers’ initial teacher education and in-service professional development on their science-specific professional knowledge and motivation regarding early science education. Controlling for preschool teachers’ socio-demographic and educational background and their learning opportunities in their initial teacher education, regression analysis revealed significant positive relations between in-service professional development courses and their self-efficacy beliefs, enthusiasm and science-specific content knowledge. With regard to science courses in initial teacher education, controlling for preschool teachers’ socio-demographic and educational background and the number of professional development courses taken, we found significant positive relations between the courses in initial teacher education and their science-specific pedagogical content knowledge and self-efficacy beliefs. These results indicate that the provided learning opportunities provided could promote preschool teachers’ competences. However, due to the heterogeneity in the learning opportunities and science-specific competences, policymakers and professional development providers may ensure that all preschool teachers receive sufficient learning opportunities to further their professional competences.

KEYWORDS:

• Learning opportunities
• preschool teacher
• early science education
• PCK
• content knowledge
• self-efficacy
• enthusiasm
• teacher education
• professional development

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

ORCID

Julia Barenthien http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0641-4461

Elisa Oppermann http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1286-5725

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the ‘Little Scientists’ House’ Foundation together with the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research.