Kindergarten Teachers’ Understanding on Multimedia Application

Abstract

The study conducted a survey targeting a total of 161 currently in-service teachers in early childhood education institutes in Daejeon and Chungnam area in order to understand the teachers’ recognition and present status on multimedia activity that would be frequently performed in the early childhood education institutes. For the data analysis, frequency analysis was carried out with SPSS 17.0. First, the teachers’ interest level in multimedia educational activity in the early childhood education institutes was examined. According to the results, most of the teachers answered that they would have average interest in such activity which proved that the teachers are willing to know about multimedia educational activity in some degree. Second, how the multimedia is being actually used in the real field was observed. The findings reported that in a classroom, no multimedia region as an interest region was discovered, and as a result, more than half of the institutes were reported to possess computers. In addition, when multimedia activity is conducted, the teachers would basically choose a large group type the most while most of the activities for those preschoolers are instructed by homeroom teachers. When it comes to give instructions during multimedia activity, the teachers were observed to mostly use references and data from the Ministry of Education and the Internet. Third, the teachers understand that three, four and five-old preschoolers would benefit the most from the multimedia education. They added that they are adopting the multimedia activity into teaching because such activity feels convenient to conduct as the preschoolers would take a great interest in the activity. Moreover, the teachers understand that those multimedia activities in current practice are proving their necessity to be used in teaching and learning to some degree saying that the preschoolers would have certain experiences that would be available only through multimedia activity. Fourth, regarding benefits that the preschoolers would receive during multimedia activity, the teachers mentioned that the preschoolers would have various experiences even if they are indirect ones. The teachers also understand that the preschoolers would not feel distant from multimedia as they get to have an interest in learning with multimedia provide them with chances to learn with various learning materials.