Preschool teachers’ perception of curriculum reform in Taiwan’s early childhood education

Abstract

The Taiwanese kindergartens and nurseries are integrated in the New Curriculum reform to improve the quality of early childhood education. This study employed the narrative inquiry method to study the perception of preschool teachers in Taiwanese kindergartens and nurseries, to evaluate their experiences and emotions towards the implementation of the New Curriculum. A purposive sampling method was used to identify 30 participants, who were all females and worked as pre-school teachers. The data was collected through narrative interviews. Although Taiwan’s early childhood education curriculum reform was flawed, most of the participants expressed a high degree of acceptance of the curriculum. They opined that the quality of early childhood education has gradually improved; the quality of early childhood education and the provision of syllabi should also be discussed in Taiwan’s early childhood education discourse. The study recommends promoting preschool teachers’ understanding of the new mandatory curriculum policies, increasing the number of study sessions for the New Curriculum, increasing the diversity of the New Curriculum, among others.