Abstract
The culture of an educational institution is a set of individual values and norms, attitudes, beliefs, rituals, expectations, and actions of its members. Without changing the basic assumptions (implicit theories) of individuals working in an institution, there are no fundamental changes in the quality of the educational process. Professional development is understood as continually testing the quality of our own educational interventions, and redefining and modifying them based on the feedback from practice. In this chapter, the authors will focus on the results of preschool teachers' attitudes towards the different aspects of the educational process and the results of the frequency of using modern forms of professional development, obtained by survey method. There is a positive correlation between the modern educational paradigm of the preschool teacher and her participation in the contemporary forms of professional development, which testifies of the mutuality and interdependence of these two dimensions of the culture of the institution of early education.
TopIntroduction: Determining The Culture Of The Educational Institution
The culture of an educational institution is a set of individual values and norms, attitudes and beliefs, rituals, traditions, expectations, and actions of its members. The term institutional culture, in addition to the curriculum, spatial-material and temporal dimensions, and means of solving problems and decision-making, also encompasses social interactions that are simultaneously largely determined by the culture. Namely, there is an unwritten consensus in each institution on what its employees deem important, how to behave in the institution, how to perform the work, when, how and where to do it. For these reasons some authors describe institutional culture as the way things are done there (Deal & Kennedy, 1983, p. 4 as cited in Hopkins, 2001, p. 155) or as a lens through which we observe the world (Hargreaves, 1999), because the culture defines the reality for the members of an organization and provides them with support and identity. Each institution has a set of externally prescribed rules and procedures that make up the conscious level of the culture, but it is also made up of that unconscious part of everyday life of people in it. This deeper level of culture comprises the basic assumptions and beliefs shared by the members of an institution that are taken for granted and that act at the unconscious level (Schein, 1985, as cited in Stoll, 1999). They make the essence of the institutional culture, which makes it difficult to understand and change, as well as directly observe and research, because it is, in addition to explicit norms and structure, subtly intertwined with unprecedented expectations, beliefs, undefined rules, established patterns of behavior, and social interaction between the members of the institution. It is thus possible that, despite the same visible structures (space, time, roles) each educational institution has its own unique, distinct culture that differs from other institutions. Relationships between the participants in the educational process are of key importance for creating a “good” or “bad” preschool, regardless of the similar spatial and material conditions. This distinction is precisely made by the culture of an institution that either helps or doesn’t, and it has an impact on the success and excellence of children who attend it (Baden & Maehr, 1990, as cited in Miljak, 1996).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Preschool Education in Croatia: Croatian curriculum of early and preschool education is based on two theoretical programs: humanistic-developmentally and socio-constructivist models. The purpose of institutional early and preschool care and education presents a successful satisfaction of the children needs and children self-actualization in the age range from six months until the age of entering the primary school. It is an integrated system of early and pre-school education, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Science and Education.
Professional Development: A lifelong process in which professional knowledge is questioned, revised, and gradually improved by collective research of their own practice in concrete institution. It is common, collaborative, networked research, interpretation and understanding of the existing, and joint construction of better education practice.
Reflective Practitioner: An educator who builds and develops his own knowledge through direct research of his educational practice and creates a theory about it.
Socio-Constructivism: Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of human learning which describes learning as a social process and the origination of human intelligence in society or culture. Human development is socially situated. Social interaction plays a fundamental role in the development of cognition and knowledge is constructed through interaction with others.
Educational Paradigm: An educator’s theory about child’s education and upbringing which includes an image of a child, his intellectual, emotional, physical and other abilities, and opportunities for his learning and education.
Documenting Educational Practice: A collective name for gathering various testimonies (anegdotic notes, diaries, conversation transcripts, various subjects and other narrative forms, children's artwork, graphic representations and designs, audio and video recordings, photos) about the learning process of children and the educational process, which are the basis for the reflection process.
Implicit Theory: Conscious and unconscious set of person’s attitudes, opinions, and values which govern his/her behavior and social action he/she performs.
Institutional Networking: Cooperation between the educational institutions aimed to encourage educators and all other subjects of educational process of continuous exchange of their professional expertise, insights and knowledge, as the basis of their mutual learning and development.
Culture of Educational Institution: A set of individual values and norms, attitudes, beliefs, rituals, traditions, expectations, and actions of members of a particular institution, recognizable through the mutual relationships between people, their mutual work, institutional management, organizational and physical environment, and the degree of focus on continuous learning and research of the educational practice for the purpose of its improvement.