Current Needs of Preschool Teachers for Professional Development in Greece: A Focus Group Study

• Autor(a) principal: Vatou, Anastasia
• Data de Publicação: 2023
• Outros Autores: Krousorati, Katerina, Oikonomides, Vasilios, Manolitsis, George, Kypriotaki, Maria, Evangelou-Tsitiridou, Maria, Grammatikopoulos, Vasilis
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.25767/se.v30i.29478
• topic: Professional development; Quality of education; Preschool teachers’ needs; Early childhood education and care

This paper presents a brief overview of the literature regarding preschool teachers’ careers and professional development. The main purpose of the part of the study presented here was to conduct a needs-assessment exercise to identify the specific needs for professional development of early childhood teachers’ in Greece. Data were collected through a focus group. Results highlighted the challenges of moving forward in a teaching career and the need for increasing professional development opportunities that match teachers’ needs and interests. Professionals indicated that the absence of teacher-parents’ collaboration and structured practices for dealing with children’s discipline issues are their basic concerns. Implications of the study’s results are also discussed This project has been funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union. Project Number: 626146-EPP-1-2020-2-EL-EPPKA3-PI-POLICY