Attitudes towards the use of educational robotics: Exploring pre-service and in-service early childhood teacher profiles

Abstract

The introduction of STEM education, and specifically the implementation of educational robotics (ER), has drawn researchers’ attention and has shown that teachers play a crucial role in leading this innovation. The present study concerns in-service and pre-service early childhood teachers, focusing on their perceptions and attitudes about ER use in daily teaching practice. The data were collected via a questionnaire (N = 201) and explored using latent class analysis, which detected distinct clusters/profiles of participants based on their pattern of responses. Two clusters were identified: Cluster1 was relatively homogeneous, including those who share a positive attitude towards ER, while Cluster2 was heterogeneous, comprising participants with inconsistent responses and expressing negative and skeptical thinking. The cluster memberships were associated with external covariates, such as age, years of teaching experience, and variables measuring their technological competencies. The results showed that teaching experience and age were negatively associated with cluster1-membership, while educational robotics knowledge was positively associated. The findings are interpretable, and the implications for education are discussed considering the current literature.