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Understanding and Enhancing Early Childhood Educators’ Well-Being and Readiness to Implement, in Professional Learning Communities

Shafer, Ashley, E. (2023) Understanding and Enhancing Early Childhood Educators’ Well-Being and Readiness to Implement, in Professional Learning Communities. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Pittsburgh. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

At a time when teachers are facing increasing demands to implement new teaching practices (Briggs et al., 2018; Hargreaves, 2004; Zucker et al., 2021), and research shows implementation quality is often highly variable and yet critically important for child outcomes (Durlak, 2015), research on ways to increase teacher capacity to implement is needed. Although successful implementation of intervention practices by teachers depends on various factors, including school resources, leadership, and teacher well-being. Fortunately, developing teachers’ psychological safety, “the feeling that taking interpersonal risks will not result in embarrassment, ridicule, or shame, but enables people to engage, connect, change, and learn” (Wanless, 2016, p. 6) may make it more likely for teachers to take on new learning experiences, and may increase their readiness to implement new interventions (Wanless & Domitrovich, 2015; Zinsser & Zinsser, 2016). While teacher readiness to implement has been thought of as something that is assessed before new interventions are implemented (Halle & Nagle, 2019), in reality, teachers are always learning and implementing new practices. Therefore, developing readiness is an ongoing process as new practices are regularly learned and tried out in the classroom. In fact, it is possible that a Professional Learning Community is exactly the kind of atmosphere that cultivates teachers’ psychological safety and readiness to implement future practices (Hallam et al., 2015; Tam, 2015; Watson, 2014). The purpose of this dissertation, comprised of two stand-alone studies, is to deepen an understanding of the construct of psychological safety in early childhood education and explore how a Simple Interactions Professional Learning Community can support teachers’ well-being and implementation.

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Details

Item Type: University of Pittsburgh ETD
Status: Unpublished
Creators/Authors:
CreatorsEmailPitt UsernameORCID
Shafer, Ashley, E.aes100@pitt.eduaes1000000-0002-9716-5690
ETD Committee:
TitleMemberEmail AddressPitt UsernameORCID
Committee ChairWanless, Shannon, B.swanless@pitt.eduswanless
Committee MemberAkiva, Tom, M.tomakiva@pitt.edutomakiva
Committee MemberBartow Jacobs, Katrinakbjacobs@pitt.edukbjacobs
Committee MemberLi, Junleijunlei_li@gse.harvard.edu
Date: 22 May 2023
Date Type: Publication
Defense Date: 30 March 2023
Approval Date: 22 May 2023
Submission Date: 10 April 2023
Access Restriction: 2 year -- Restrict access to University of Pittsburgh for a period of 2 years.
Number of Pages: 138
Institution: University of Pittsburgh
Schools and Programs: School of Education > Psychology in Education
Degree: PhD - Doctor of Philosophy
Thesis Type: Doctoral Dissertation
Refereed: Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords: early childhood education, teacher well-being, psychological safety, community of practice
Date Deposited: 22 May 2023 12:53
Last Modified: 22 May 2023 12:53
URI: http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/id/eprint/44488

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