The Study On Kindergarten Teachers In Rural Areas Using Natural Materials In Educational Activities

Kindergartens in countryside are surrounded by plenty of natural materials. It is available as well as suitable for children’s learning. Rural kindergarten can make full use of natural materials to carry out educational activities to meet with the purpose of constructing the low cost and high quality characteristics of the kindergarten. The child-care teacher, who is the closest to the rural education, needs to recognize the advantages of kindergarten development, and learn how to use the natural materials to carry out educational activities.The author conducted this research from a perspective that the preschool teachers in countryside use natural materials to carry out educational activities. Using questionnaires and interviews as major research method, the author chose rural preschool teachers from six counties of three provinces to study-Sichuan, Guizhou and Guangxi. The author also investigated the status of using natural materials to carry out educational activities, and looked for the difficulties they encountered in the process. What’s more, the reasons behind the difficulties were also studied, and the author came up with some suggestions to help the rural preschool teachers.Conclusions and suggestions can be drawn from this research as follows.Firstly, the frequency of using the natural materials by the rural preschool teachers to carry out educational activities is low, and the way is single.Secondly, note that the difficulties that rural preschool teachers use the natural materials to carry out educational activities are:unavailable for new ideas, lack of usage, energy and space, no security environment for children, nonsupport for natural materials in educational activities, lack of self-confidence about using natural materials in education.Thirdly, difficulties in summary are:misunderstanding of what the kindergarten education really is; lack of initiative between rural child-care teachers to choose to carry out educational activities with natural materials; rural preschool teachers are unclear for their roles; safety becomes the obstacle for introducing natural material into traditional kindergarten; rural kindergarten teachers have less necessary serious consideration and attempt on the applying natural materials application to educational activities; the increasing overlook for natural materials in poverty-stricken area.Fourthly, the corresponding suggestions are below:clear all related preschool staff duties; rural preschool teachers need try to change the situation; provide rural child-care teachers with more training opportunities,especially the natural materials training; education authorities need encourage teachers as well as make countermeasures to use natural materials to carry out education.