Early childhood assessment and observation of educators’ knowledge of learners in Sissala East Municipal, Ghana
Keywords:
lesson plans, lower level, early childhood educators, instructional materials, child-centred learning activities, literacy skillsAbstract
The aim of the study was to assess the early childhood educators’ knowledge of learners. The research employed the mixed methods approach as the research design. The target population for the research included all early childhood educators in the Sissala East Municipal in the Upper West Region of Ghana. The total sample for the study was 164 early childhood educators. The researcher utilized three data collection instruments. The first was a questionnaire, the second instrument was the interview and the third was observation. The quantitative data analysis was done using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 20. The descriptive statistics (figures, percentages and frequencies) and percentages were used to analyse the respondents’ responses to the questionnaire after they had been coded. The data was presented in tables and percentages. The study revealed that the early childhood educators demonstrated awareness of learners’ challenges they bring to class but lack knowledge of how to address these challenges. The study suggests that foundation teachers need to create-literate-rich environments to enhance teaching and learning at the lower level.
References
Al-Hazza, T. C., Fleener, C., & Hager, J. (2008). Primary teachers' knowledge and knowledge calibration of early literacy practices. Reading Matrix: An International Online Journal, 8(1), 1 - 11. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1066623.
Andoh-Mensah, C. (2013). Teachers’ Content Knowledge and Its Effects on the Teaching of Social Studies in Schools in the Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis (Doctoral Dissertation).University of Education, Winneba, Ghana. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/107.
Andrews, S.(2001). The Language Awareness of the L2 Teacher: Its Impact Upon Pedagogical Practice. Department of Curriculum Studies, Pokfulam Road, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
Burns, N. & Grove, S. K. (2009). The Practice of Nursing Research: Appraisal, Synthesis and Generation of Evidence. Maryland Heights, Missouri: Saunders Elsevier.
Carlisle, J., Kelcey, B., Berebitsky, D., & Phelps, G. (2011). Embracing the complexity of instruction: A study of the effects of teachers’ instruction on students’ reading comprehension. Scientific Studies of Reading, 26, 1-27. doi:10.1080/10888438.2010.497521.
Cohen, L., Manion, L., & Morrison, K. (2007). Research Methods in Education (6th ed.). London, UK: Routledge.
Creswell, J. W. (2005). Educational Research: Planning, Conducting and Evaluating Quantitative and Qualitative Research (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.
Crim, C., Hawkins, J., Thornton, J., Rosof, H., Copley, J., & Thomas, E. (2008). Early childhood educators’ knowledge of early literacy development. Issues in Teacher Education, 17(1), 17-30.
Cirino, P., Pollard-Durodola, S., Foorman, B., Carlson, C., & Francis, D., (2007).Teacher characteristics, classroom instructions,, and student literacy and language outcomes in bilingual kindergartners. The Elementary School Journal, 107(4), 341-364). doi: 10.1086/516668.
Djiwandono, P. I. ( 2017) The Learning Styles Of Millennial Generation In University: A Study In Indonesian Context Universities Ma Chung, Malang, Indonesia.
Elliott, J. (2014). Writing instruction at the Early childhood level: Teachers use of individual student writing conferences and other strategies to motivate students to write. A Dissertation Retrieved online November, 24 2018.
Faisal (2015) Pedagogical Content Knowledge in Indonesian English Language Teaching. Asia Pacific Journal of Multidisciplinary Research Vol. 3 No.5, 103-110 December 2015 Part II P-ISSN 2350-7756 E-ISSN 2350-8442.
Foss, A. (2002). Peeling the onion: Teaching critical literacy with students of privilege. Language Arts, 79(5), 393-403.
Freeberg, L. & Frey, S. T. (2016). Dual language learners: The essential role of early childhood education programme. Edsource Report, June 2016 Retrieved 10/12/2018.
Hand, J. A., Nourot, M. P.(1990) First Class: A Guide for primary education. California Department of Education press .ISBN O-8011-1475-6
Koehler, M. J. (2011). TPACK – Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge 19th November, 2018 Retrieved from http://www.tpck.org/
Lee, J.-Y. (2011). English learning styles of East Asian Countries: A focus on reading strategies. International Education Studies, 4(2), 74-81. https://doi.org/10.5539/ies.v4n2p7.
Lilly, E. & Green, C. (2004). Early Literacy. Excerpt from Developing Partnerships with Families through Children’s Literature.
Lonigan, C. J. & Shanahan, T. (2010). Developing early literacy skills things we know we know and things we know we don’t know. NIH Public Access Author Manuscript 39(4): 340–346. doi:10.3102/0013189X10369832
Mather, N., Bos, C.& Babur, N(2001). “Perceptions and Knowledge of Preservice and In-service Teachers about Early Literacy Instruction.” Journal of Learning Disabilities 34: 472–482.
McNaughton, S., Phillips, G., & MacDonald, S. (2002). Picking Up the Pace: Effective Literacy Interventions for Accelerated Progress over the Transition into Decile 1 Schools. Wellington, NZ: Ministry of Education.
McCall, J. (2005). Spotlight on Comprehension: Building a Literacy of Thoughtfulness. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
Nidhi & Helena (2017) Styles of learning based on the Research of Fernald, Keller, Orton Gillingham, Stillman , Montessori and Neil D Fleming. International Journal for Innovative Research in Multidisciplinary Field, 3(4), ISSN – 2455-0620.
Pihie, Z. A. L., & Sipon, M. (2013). Implementing Pedagogical Content Knowledge in teaching and Learning Entrepreneurship at Community College: an Instructional Enrichment. Procidia Graduate Research in Education , pp. 532539.
Polit, D.F. & Hungler, B. P. (2013). Essentials of Nursing Research: Methods, Appraisal, and Utilization (8th edn). Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
Polit, D. F., Beck, C.T. & Hungler, B. P. (2001).Essentials of nursing research: Methods ,appraisal and utilization (5th Ed.). Philadelphia: Lippincott.
Shulman, L. S. (1987). Knowledge and teaching: Foundations of the new reform. Harvard Educational Review, 57(1), 1-22. 212.
Shulman, L. S. (1986). Those who understand: Knowledge growth in teaching. Educational Researcher, 15, 4-14.
Short, D., & Echevarria, J. (2005). Teacher skills to support English Language Learners. Educational Leadership, 62(4): 8-13.
Sibuyi (2012). Effective Teachers’ Pedagogical Content Knowledge in Teaching Quadratic Functions in Mathematics : Published Thesis Retrieved from
Smith, M. W. (2001). Children’s experiences in preschool. In D. K. Dickinson & P. O. Tabors (Eds.). Beginning literacy with language (pp. 149-174). Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co.
Spear-Swerling, L., & Brucker, P. O. (2004). Preparing novice teachers to develop basic reading and spelling skills in children. Annals of Dyslexia, 54, 332-364.
Svinicki, M. (1994). What they don’t know can hurt them: the role of prior knowledge in learning. Teaching Excellence, 5(4), pp. 1-2.
Sweeney, R. (2006). Millennial Behaviours and Demographics. Newark: New Jersey Institute of Technology.
Wasik, B. A. & Bond, M. A. (2001). Beyond the page of a book: Interactive book reading and language development in preschool classrooms. Journal of Educational Psychology, 93, 243-250.
Wray D., Medwell J., Poulson, L. & Fox, R(2004).Teaching Literacy Effectively in the Primary School. Routledge Falmer Taylor& Francis Group. London and New York.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2021 Wasila Mahamud
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
This open-access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license.
You are free to: Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format. Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms. Under the following terms: Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use. No additional restrictions You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
