How does domain-specific preschool teacher training work best? – An intervention study for mathematical and science-related situation-specific skills

学前教育的目标之一是提供适合年龄的、特定领域的幼儿教育。目前，德国的大多数幼儿园教师都是在专业学院（Fachschulen）接受培训的。这些中学后教育机构提供基础广泛的培训，使学生为各种职位做好准备。特别是，据认为，幼儿教师需要特定领域的能力（如在早期数学或科学），以履行其工作。关于在学前教师培训中对具体教育领域的关注的数量和质量，没有经验数据。培训计划似乎更强调实用知识和技能，而不是教孩子特定领域的内容。研究表明，特定领域专业能力的发展需要一定的知识基础。虽然学前教师培训涉及广泛的教学主题，但不可能每个主题都有足够的学习时间。可以认为，幼儿教师已经能够将他们在一个领域发展的能力转移到另一个领域（例如，将早期数学教育的能力转移到早期科学教育）。第一个实证结果表明，这是很难从一个域转移到另一个域的能力。拟议的项目解决了开放的问题，这种缺乏学习的机会是否可以通过支持幼儿教师转移专业能力从一个域到另一个域（在本研究中：从数学域到科学域），或者如果他们需要在这两个域的学习机会。为了实现这一目标，将两个治疗组（“最佳实践”和“有转移支持”）与两个对照组（“照常营业”和“等待名单”）进行比较。“最佳实践”组有机会学习数学和科学方面的能力。相比之下，“有迁移支持”组只有机会学习数学能力和迁移支持。对照组“一切照旧”代表了德国幼儿教师培训的实际状况。这些研究问题的答案将有助于我们了解未来的幼儿教师如何在他们的初始培训和跨领域发展技能。在国家或国际一级都没有这方面的证据。本研究的发现具有一定的理论和实践意义，为幼儿教师专业化水平的提高提供了理论依据，为幼儿教师专业化水平的提高提供了理论依据。

One of the goals of a preschool is to provide age-appropriate, domain-specific early childhood education. At present, most preschool teachers in Germany are trained at specialized colleges (Fachschulen). These post-secondary institutions provide a broad-based training to prepare students for various types of positions. In particular, it is assumed that preschool teachers need domain-specific competence (e.g. in early mathematics or science) in order to perform their jobs. No empirical data are available on the amount and quality of attention given to specific educational domains in preschool teacher training. Training programs appear to put more emphasis on practical knowledge and skills, rather than on teaching children domain-specific content. Research has given hints that a certain knowledge base is needed for the development of domain-specific professional competence. While preschool teacher training addresses a wide spectrum of pedagogical themes, it is not plausible that each theme is addressed with adequate learning time. It can be assumed that preschool teachers have been able to transfer their developed competence in one domain to another domain (e.g. transfer of competence in early mathematics education to early science education). First empirical results indicate that it is difficult to transfer competence from one domain to another.The proposed project addresses the open question whether this lack in opportunities to learn can be addressed by support preschool teachers to transfer the professional competence from one domain to another (in the present study: from the domain of mathematics to the domain of science) or if they need opportunities to learn in both domains. To address this aim two treatment groups ("best practice" and "with transfer Support") are compared to two control groups ("business as usual" and "wait list"). The "best practice" group gets opportunities to learn competence in mathematics and science. In contrast the "with transfer Support" group gets only opportunities to learn competence in mathematics and a support for transfer. The control group "business as usual" represents the actual state of the art in preschool teacher training in Germany. The answers to these research questions will contribute to our understanding of how prospective preschool teachers develop skills within and across domains during their initial training. No evidence of this kind is yet available at either the national or the international level. Our findings will be of theoretical as well as practical significance because the study will generate information about the possibility of transfer of competences and thereby play an important role in improving programs to raise the level of professionalism among preschool teachers.