Kindergarten Teachers’Competencies For Inclusive Education:The Research Of Structures,Characteristics And Promotion

Kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education refer to the individual characteristics that kindergarten teachers must possess to efficiently complete the teaching work under the background of inclusive education and maximize the promotion of all children’s complete development to provide a strong teacher guarantee for high-quality preschool inclusive education.The existing research has made some achievements in the structure,characteristics and promotion of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.However,there is still room for development,such as the structure is not yet clear,characteristics need to be systematically reviewed,and the research on promotion needs to be expanded.In this context,this paper intends to form a relatively scientific structure of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education through exploration,verification and weight determination and compile the Scale of Kindergarten Teachers’ Competency for Inclusive Education with good reliability and validity to investigate the current characteristics of kindergarten teachers’ competencies inclusive education.Then based on the existing research literature and the actual need of kindergarten teachers,we develop and implement a training program to explore the effect of training on the improvement of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education,to enrich the theoretical research of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education,and provide a reference for the teacher training for inclusive preschool education in China.This study used a mixed research design,through a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods to implement the study,divided into three parts and five sub-studies.The first part consists of Research 1,Research 2 and Research 3,which aims to clarify the structure of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.In Research 1,based on the interview results of 46 teachers and the opinions of 17 experts obtained by the Delphi method,the structure of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education was proposed.In Research 2,the existing structure was verified and adjusted by compiling the Scale of Kindergarten Teachers’ Competency for Inclusive Education and implementing an extensive sample questionnaire survey.Research 3 used the analytic hierarchy process to determine the weight of each dimension of the structure of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education and further improved the structure.The second part is the fourth study,which examines the characteristics of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.In the fourth study,1476 kindergarten teachers were surveyed to investigate the level of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education and the differences in related factors.The third part is the fifth study,which explores the effect of training on improving the kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.The fifth study developed a training program based on the structure of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education,and selected 17 kindergarten teachers in the fourth study whose scores were in the bottom 27% as the training objects,and collected data through questionnaires and interviews to explore the effect of training on the improvement of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.The conclusions of this study are as follows:First,the kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education in China consist of disposition of inclusive education,knowledge of inclusive education,and skills of inclusive education.Among them,disposition of inclusive education includes the belief of inclusive education,the belief of teachers and children,and teacher’s moral cultivation;knowledge of inclusive education includes the basic knowledge of inclusive education,knowledge of children’s development and knowledge of educational intervention;skills of inclusive education include the accommodation of curriculum and teaching,creation of an inclusive atmosphere,and cooperation and development.Secondly,the Scale of Kindergarten Teachers’ Competency for Inclusive Education,which is compiled based on the competency structure of inclusive education of kindergarten teachers,meets the requirements of psychometrics with good reliability and validity and can be used as a tool to measure the level of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.Thirdly,the relative importance of each dimension of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education is different.According to the weight values,the results of the second-order dimensions are as follows: disposition of inclusive education,skills of inclusive education,and knowledge of inclusive education;the results of the first-order dimensions are as follows: teacher’s moral cultivation,accommodation of curriculum and teaching,belief of teachers and children,knowledge of children’s development,creation of an inclusive atmosphere,knowledge of educational intervention,belief of inclusive education,cooperation and development,and basic knowledge of inclusive education.Fourthly,the level of kindergarten teachers’ competency for inclusive education is above the middle level,but the development of each dimension is not balanced.The score of disposition is the highest,the score of skill is the second,and the score of knowledge is the lowest.There are significant differences in individual background factors(age),teacher work factors(teaching age,professional title,length of work experience in inclusive education and cumulative length of training)and environmental factors(region,class size and kindergarten inclusive atmosphere).Fifthly,the training designed based on the structure of kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education can effectively enhance kindergarten teachers’ competencies for inclusive education.Based on the above conclusions,this study puts forward educational suggestions from three aspects: improving relevant professional standards to clarify the requirements for teachers’ competencies for inclusive education,creating an inclusive atmosphere to promote teachers’ competencies for inclusive education,and focusing on providing continuous and practical professional training for kindergarten teachers.