Does Professional Development of Preschool Teachers Improve Children’s Socio-Emotional Outcomes?

From 2011 to 2013, a randomised controlled trial was conducted in Danish preschools to investigate whether an intervention aimed at preschool teachers' professional development led to improvements in child socio-emotional outcomes. The intervention was abbreviated VIDA (Knowledge-based efforts for socially disadvantaged children in daycare) and targeted preschool children aged 3-5 years, with special focus on socially disadvantaged children. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of the VIDA intervention on children's socio-emotional outcomes. The research questions are: (1) Does professional development based on the VIDA intervention improve socio-emotional outcomes for children in preschools? (2) If yes, does the effect vary among different groups of children or do the results vary based on differences between preschools (for example staff turnover rate)?

The results show that the intervention led to improvements in the children's socio-emotional outcomes, particularly regarding emotional symptoms and conduct problems. However, the study could not ascertain any greater improvements for socially disadvantaged children compared with the other group of children. Finally, the results indicate that a high staff turnover rate could act as a barrier to a successful outcome of the intervention, but the authors assess that this aspect requires further investigation.

The VIDA intervention was based on professional development for preschool teachers, who were offered a total of 17 days of training over two years. The training focused on improving and knowledge-basing pedagogical practices, and consisted of three elements: knowledge, reflection and activities. Specifically, the training programme included topics such as social inheritance, inclusion/exclusion and reflection tools. After completing the training programme, the preschool teachers were expected to transform their theoretical knowledge into activities developed and implemented locally in the preschools. Each activity lasted for a minimum of one month, in which the entire preschool worked on implementing and evaluating the intervention.

The 58 participating preschools were selected from three different municipalities and divided into an intervention group and a control group, with 29 preschools in each group. A total of 686 children were involved in the study, including 396 children from preschools in the intervention group and 290 children from preschools in the control group.
The data material in the study consisted of background information obtained from the three participating municipalities and Statistics Denmark, as well as preschool teachers' assessments of the children's socio-emotional outcomes measured using the SDQ (Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire). The SDQ contained five areas that were analysed together and separately: emotional symptoms (depressive/anxiety reactions and signs of stress), conduct problems, hyperactivity, peer relationship problems and prosocial behaviour. Assessments of the children's socio-emotional outcomes were carried out immediately before the intervention (pre-test /baseline) and after the intervention period (post-test).

Jensen, B., Jensen, P., & Rasmussen, A. W. (2017). Does Professional Development of Preschool Teachers Improve Children’s Socio-Emotional Outcomes? Labour Economics, 45, 26-39.