Investigators
Alanna Sincovich
Project description
Pedagogical approaches associated with positive child development include high quality interaction, play-based learning, and opportunities for children to self-direct their learning. The Government of Uzbekistan has committed to reforming preschool education, prioritising upskilling teachers to use international best practice. The World Bank Project, Promoting Early Childhood Development (P165737), has financed the improvement of preschool education, including activities to promote child-centred practices. The pandemic spurred the need for innovative approaches to ensuring ~2.7 million children aged 3-7 in Uzbekistan have access to best practice preschool pedagogy.
The Innovative Playful Learning Approaches activity aims to boost the capacity of preschool teachers to use play-based learning approaches, thus improving children’s school readiness. Implementation will prioritise children in rural and under-served areas and will endeavour to reach half of preschool teachers nationally.
The activity includes: (1) development of interactive, video-based teacher training; (2) design of a mobile/tablet/web-based application to facilitate teacher training, disseminate learning resources and support implementation of playful learning approaches; (3) parental engagement in learning through play in the home environment, supported by teachers; and (4) evaluating the extent to which innovations advance child-centred, play-based practices at preschool and home, and the relationship with child development.
Evaluation will investigate the elements of training most effective in shifting teacher and parent practices, and to what extent this influences children’s development. Importantly, is the innovation inclusive and does it promote equitable education? Learnings will inform the Ministry of Preschool Education’s design of pre- and in-service teacher training, and resources developed will facilitate scale up of training for all 56,000 preschool teachers in Uzbekistan.
Funders
Early Learning Partnership