This thesis aims at suggesting the desirable direction that Korean public kindergartens can grope for in the future through analyzing the process of changes in the Korean public kindergartens for 30 years after dividing them into originative process a...
This thesis aims at suggesting the desirable direction that Korean public kindergartens can grope for in the future through analyzing the process of changes in the Korean public kindergartens for 30 years after dividing them into originative process and developmental process and then predicting the developmental direction.
For the aim, this research analyzed the historical background of the public kindergartens through interviews and review researches and tried to find all the conflicts and processes to solving by applying them to Mazzoni's power-influence model.
The process of changes in the Korean public kindergartens for 30 years was studied through review researches, interviews and the problems that they have been confronting could be find and the desirable developmental direction for the Korean public kindergartens could be suggested by way of analyzing and integrating the interviews with the experts and the concerned with them.
The research questions for this goal are as follows:
1. What is the beginning process of public kindergarten?
1-1 What is the historical background of public kindergarten?
1-2 What is the socio-political background of original public kindergarten?
2. What is the developmental process of public kindergarten?
2-1 What is the change of educational scale about the beginning public kindergarten?
2-2 What is the change of educational system in public kindergarten?
2-3 What is the change of administration and finance in public kindergarten?
2-4 What is the change of educational policy in public kindergarten?
3. What is the problem and desirable developmental direction that public kindergarten is confronting?
3-1 What is the problem that public kindergarten is confronting?
3-2 What is the desirable developmental direction for the public kindergarten?
The subjects of this research were 30 experts and the concerned who gave the verbal evidence about the history of the Korean public kindergartens from the beginning of them to the present situation for 30 years. The method of selecting subjects is that of selecting the first 10 experts and the concerned through gathering the opinions about selecting research subjects among teachers and the concerned with the ministry of education that worked then in 1976, to be given the research title and research contents by telephone.
The first 10 experts and the concerned recommended double subjects that devoted to the contemporary situation in which public kindergartens were established and the developmental situation in the early 1980'. To get the objectivity and significance about subjects the final 30 subjects were selected by way of telephone interviews with 3 experts and 3 the concerned among all the above the above subjects.
The review research included 119 articles (10 papers, 109 theses for degrees), the National Assembly records for 30 years, newspapers, the documents of National Educational Ministry and Korean Education Development Institute, and other various kinds of reports. The analysis of scio-political background of public kindergartens was made by Mazzoni's power-influence model.
Through the phases of the problem recognition, research procedure was to find the research model depending upon all the documents about public kindergartens, and to select and collect the objects for review research. And then to select the experts and the concerned, to interview with them, and to transcript and analyze the contents of interview.
The conclusion of this research is as follows.
The first, the originative process of public kindergartens is from 1976 to 1982 before establishing the early childhood education facilitation law in 1982 and the historical background is to make kindergartens public schools according to the global trend, and to give a opportunity of education in kindergarten to the children in low income brackets. This research applied the socio-political background of the public kindergartens, depending to the Mazzoni's model and prospected reciprocal relations among the participants, their influence, and decision-making as political systems and expressed them the phases of agenda setting: interest articulation, alternative formation, decision enactment : interest allocation.
In the phase of agenda setting: interest articulation, the Ministry of education, the Seoul Educational Committee, and the press supported the policy of establishing public kindergartens in the need of making early childhood education public education. In the phase of alternative formation, kindergartens in the big cities were closed by the dominant role of the Cheongwadae (the Presidential Residence of the Republic of Korea) and some of the concerned in private kindergartens. In the phase of decision enactment : interest allocation, it was not until establishing the early childhood education facilitation law that there were political process of government' involvement such as the various strategies and preferential establishment of the public kindergartens in the farming and fishing regions.
The second, the review of the developing process about the public kindergartens in terms of the educational size, system, administrational, financial, and political change, revealed the problem of the quality of education due to the increasing teachers with the enlargement of public kindergartens. The problem of equity in teachers' qualification compared with private kindergartens was suggested and the problems of concurrent position, position of principal and deputy principal were supposed as the problems the public kindergartens ought to solve. In the educational circumstances, thanks to the suddenly increased number of kindergartens, public kindergartens seemed to be developed but the problem was that 70 percentage of public kindergartens were composed of only 1 class.
The change of educational system became the base for the development of early childhood education owing to the establishment of the early childhood education facilitation law and early childhood education law. And the change of teachers' qualification made the position of deputy principle in kindergartens newly come to be. And also The quality of early childhood education was upgraded owing to the replacement of specialized supervisors, revitalization of all day class, and no charge education for 5 year old children. The 6th national revisions of educational curriculum made it possible to run the curriculum appropriate to the child development and the teaching and learning pedagogy was improved through demonstrations. But for the methodological reason, no charge education for 5 year old children ended in useless system and a small number of 54 supervisors who majored in early child education were not helpful to promoting the quality of supervision and the discrepancy of financial aid for all day class in each province and city caused some problem. The change of administration and finance helped to turn kindergartens into regular schools and for 3 year old children to enter the kindergartens, and to make the early childhood education laws. But there were still many problems to solve ? the Korean kindergartens were not acknowledged as real schools, and the departments in cities and provinces to support the early childhood education were not newly established because of short financial aids.
The change of educational policy contributed to promote the national assembly' and the Korean government's interest in the early childhood to raise the quality and encouragement for the early childhood education. But the problems for more reinforcement of the national public information and parent education were still suggested.
The third, the problems that public kindergartens were confronting were higher private establishment dependency, teachers' passive attitude, large class size in educational circumstances. The problems in educational system were the necessity of systemic regulation about private kindergartens and the lack positions to ask for the major in early childhood education. The administrative and financial problems were the dual system between education and nursery, attachment system, few opportunity for promotion in the position of principals and deputy principals, and short financial aids. The problems in educational policy were the loose unity power of teachers' and the lack of public relations for public kindergartens.
The desirable direction of public kindergartens is as follows: in the education and circumstance the quality of teachers, a sense of duty in teachers, the investment for modernized facilities, the increase of single kindergartens, the increased positions for principals and deputy principals in kindergartens were suggested. In the educational system, the role of public kindergartens as centers, normalized curriculum, thorough evaluation, confirmed positions for experts, continued support for all day classes were suggested. In the administration and finance, changing names as early childhood schools, regular educational system for 3-5 aged children, the promotion in early childhood education department, the increase of the number of classes in public kindergartens were suggested. In the economy, necessity of education for parents, more public relation for public kindergartens, extended influence of early childhood educators, the model role of public kindergartens, compulsory education of early childhood education were suggested.
Suggestions to solve the problems resulted from the above are as follows:
The first, public kindergartens for making the early childhood education more reenforced public education should be increased. The second, the system of early childhood education should be changed. The third, the financial aid for early childhood education should be greater. The fourth, the proactive, systemic, organized public information for the essence of early childhood education in the dimension of national assembly, government, people, and the press should be supported. The fifth, the consisted efforts to find the method for upgrading kindergartens as regular schools, the primary role of early childhood education as public education should be needed. The sixth, the research to compare private kindergartens with public kindergartens afterwards should be necessary because this research is about the changes of public kindergartens.