A typology of kindergarten teachers based on their didactic strategies

this study focuses on the identification of didactic procedures of kindergarten teachers. The introduction presents modern trends in kindergarten education. It also discusses possible paradigmatic starting points for the transfer of educational content by a teacher and perspectives on child learning, which determine teachers’ choices of their own didactic procedures. A qualitative research design was carried out using participatory observation of the didactic activities of four teachers, whose practices range from 1 to 39 years, followed by a semi-structured interview with these teachers. The aim of the study is to describe the choices of didactic procedures made by the kindergarten teachers through empirical data from didactic situations. The data obtained from participatory observation reveal different didactic strategies employed by the teachers and disclose a personal inclination of each teacher, namely an inclination towards a goal-oriented curriculum, an inclination towards a child-oriented curriculum, and an inclination towards the role of a teacher as a facilitator. A subsequent analysis of interviews identifies specific categories of teachers’ procedures, which reflect their different conceptions of the transfer of educational content. Overall processing of the obtained data leads to a compilation of didactic typology of kindergarten teachers. This study will be followed up by further work, and the typology presented will be subjected to more extensive verification.