English in Inclusive Multilingual Preschools. Kirsten Birsak de Jersey

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      Statistical data 16: Teachers offering English in their preschools themselves

      The following chapters describe the reasons why preschool teachers were in favour or against introducing English in their preschool.

      3.4.1 Preschool teachers’ education in teaching English: offers and needs

      To what extent did the preschool teachers who participated in the survey have the opportunity to take part in a course intended to prepare them to teach English in preschool and did they actually enrol for it? At the time of the research one optional course for preschool teachers’ development in the field of language teaching was offered during their preschool teacher education at the BAfEP school in Salzburg titled ‘Englisch im Kindergarten: Impulse zum interkulturellen Lernen’. It familiarized preschool teachers with basic knowledge on the methodology of teaching English to children. Available data resulted from the following two questions:

      Was the course ‘English in Preschool’ offered during your preservice teacher education? (Wurde der Kurs ‘Englisch im Kindergarten: Impulse zum interkulturellen Lernen’ im Rahmen Ihrer Ausbildung angeboten?) (question 4b).

      Did you take part? (Haben Sie daran teilgenommen?) (question 4b-1).

      The majority of the teachers had not been offered a course on teaching English to children during their preservice education (76 %) (→ statistical data 17) but when it was offered, the vast majority had taken the opportunity to participate (92.9%) (→ statistical data 18).

      Figure 18:

      Statistical data 17: Course on ‘English in preschool’ offered to teachers during their preservice teacher education

      Figure 19:

      Statistical data 18: Teachers taking part in the English course when offered

      For preschool teachers who had the chance to participate, almost all of them were motivated to take part because they felt that English is an international language, which their children would have to be exposed to. They considered English to be a general life skill they would need to be familiar with from an early age:

      “Ich finde Englisch sehr wichtig, eine Sprache, die überall gesprochen wird” (qu. 4b-1: yes).

      “Reiselust, Eigeneinteresse, Fremdsprachen allgemein helfen im Leben” (qu.4b-1: yes).

      The high attendance indicates teachers’ general interest to be educated in teaching English, but as the course was seldom offered, the majority of preschool teachers do not have any teaching skills in this area. Throughout the questionnaire, the preschool teachers repeatedly confirmed that their lack of teaching skills was an issue to them. Preschool teachers demonstrated a generally positive attitude towards learning to teach English through their comments which they linked with ideas of how they could be educated to be able to do it. Teachers suggested that it would be helpful to have a native speaker available to support them to become more secure in their speaking skills, to have a qualified person coming to the preschool to teach English and to provide them with games and materials and they suggested for the preschool to provide some extra time for them to be able to develop the competence to teach English:

      “Infos für die Anwendung im Kindergarten wären hilfreich, Aufbau, ebenso eigene Sicherheit im Sprechen (z. B. durch native speaker), üben können” (final comment).

      “Würde gerne an Fortbildungen teilnehmen” (final comment).

      “Ich fände gut, wenn zusätzlich jemand kommen würde, und wir eine Schulung bekämen. Gut wären Spiele oder Materialien, die uns dabei helfen können” (qu. 4c-4).

      “Zusätzliche Belastung und fehlende Kompetenz, auch Zeitproblem. Deshalb NUR mit Unterstützung!” (qu. 4c-4).

      “Wir müssten erst eingeschult werden” (qu. 4c-4).

      “Die Pädagoginnen könnten das Englischlehren übernehmen, mit entsprechender Ausbildung, entsprechender Englischkenntnisse” (qu. 4c-4).

      “Ich habe mich mit dem Thema Sprache in verschiedenen Formen auseinandergesetzt und (…) einige Kurse dazu besucht. Ich glaube, dass viele Kollegen zu wenig „Handzeug“ dafür haben – eine der effektivsten und erfolgreichsten Methoden ist meiner Meinung nach die KIKUS Methode1. KIKUS- Sprachlehrer / Trainer müssten aber zusätzlich in die Gruppe kommen – die Methode erfordert sehr viel Vor- und Nacharbeit – dies lässt sich nicht im normalen Dienst erledigen. Persönlich arbeite ich aber auszugsweise und sehe die positiven Erfolge, in meinem Fall KIKUS-Deutsch” (final comment).

      3.4.2 Preschool teachers’ communicative English language competence

      Most preschool teachers in Austria are educated within the framework of the state school system of secondary education in which the subject English is a compulsory component. This, however, does not guarantee that the preschool teachers develop a level of communicative English language competence that would enable them to confidently teach English in preschool. Data referring to this issue resulted from the following question, which was asked to those preschool teachers who could not imagine teaching English:

      Do you have the feeling that your English is adequate / not adequate? (Haben Sie das Gefühl, dass ihr Englisch ausreichend / nicht ausreichend ist?) (question 4c-1).

      Of those preschool teachers who answered, more than half of them felt their English competence level was not adequate to teach English (58.2%) (→ statistical data 19).

      Figure 20:

      Statistical data 19: Teachers’ communicative English language competence

      This is a substantial reason why they considered it to be a burden to teach it. Needless to say, a sound communicative English language competence that makes teachers feel competent is an essential part of their professional competence (→ chapter 4.1). The majority addressed this issue – if mostly only very generally – but occasionally to the extent that native-like language competence was considered by teachers to be a basic requirement to teach English in preschool. Throughout, the lack of available time to develop professionally was seen as being one of the general issues in preschool teacher education:

      “Kann selbst nicht so gut Englisch. Fehlende Kenntnisse und Unterlagen” (qu. 4a: burden).

      “Meine Englischkenntnisse sind nicht so gut” (qu. 4a: burden).

      “Mein Englisch wäre zu schlecht” (qu. 4c-4).

      “Es ist eher eine Belastung, da ich die Fremdsprache nicht perfekt spreche” (qu. 4a: burden).

      “Mein Englisch ist nicht gut genug, bei Pädagoginnen muss das freiwillig sein” (qu. 4c-4).

      “Ich bin kein native speaker” (qu. 4c-4).

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