Digital disruption in early childhood education: A qualitative research from teachers’ perspective

Abstract

In the digital era, teachers need to behave more positively attitude about ICT. In this study, we investigated the perception of early childhood teachers regarding the use of ICT in the online learning process during the Covid-19 pandemic through a qualitative interview. For the data collection, we interviewed 53 early childhood teachers in Indonesia. The data collected from interviews were analyzed using thematic coding techniques. The research obtained particular information on how the perception of the teachers to digital disruption during the Covid-19 pandemic within five main themes: 1) ICT benefits (8 sub-themes), 2) the importance of ICT competencies (2 sub-themes), 3) promotion of the ICT training (5 sub-themes), 4) the uses of ICT (6 sub-themes), and 5) barriers in using ICT (5 sub-themes). The results indicated that ICT training that supports ICT use among early childhood teachers needs to be promoted more. This study contributes to the body of knowledge on the use of ICT in the early childhood teaching process. In addition, this study also increases the empirical study findings that are useful for reporting the online learning practice in early childhood education.