Supervisory Process in Pre-school Education in Turkey

Abstract

It was the responsibility of primary education supervisors to oversee the activities of pre-school education (PE) schools. All stakeholders in the education system, including teachers, principals and supervisors, were used to experiencing problems in the supervisory process related to early education. To address the issue, the Ministry of National Education (MONE) enacted new legislation that took the responsibility for auditing pre-school education teachers away from primary education supervisors, passing the duty to school principals. In the study, instrumental case study method, one of the qualitative research designs, has been adopted. The current study aims to shed light on functional and dysfunctional aspects of supervision in pre-school education. In order to scrutinize the new regulations related to the supervisory process in pre-school education, the researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with eight independent pre-school principals working in Van, Turkey. The current study utilized the instrumental case study approach, with the case being the principals’ understanding and implementation of new regulations in the supervisory process in a pre-school setting. This case is bounded by both time, having started immediately after Ministry of National Education issued a new regulation on supervisory processes, and by context, being the accounts of principals who work only in independent schools. The data obtained from the study were subjected to content analysis. The findings of the study revealed that while the previous supervisory process did not function as intended, the respondent principals had some reservations related to the new supervisory process.