THE EFFECT OF FAMILY ENVIRONMENT CONDITIONS ON THE EMERGENCE AND / OR THE CULTIVATION OF LEARNING DIFFICULITIES IN PRE-SCHOOL AND PRIMARY-SCHOOL AGED CHILDREN: GREEK KINDERGARTEN TEACHERS VIEWS

Authors

  • Athina Ntziavida MA in Special (Inclusive) Education, European University, Cyprus
  • Evanthia Tsaliki PhD in Intercultural Education, Scientific Collaborator, European University, Cyprus

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.46827/ejse.v0i0.1437

Keywords:

Learning Difficulties (LDs), pre–school age, family environment, emergence, cultivation

Abstract

The study investigates the empirical aspects of Greek kindergarten teachers regarding the topic of the existence of the effect that the family has on the emergence and / or the cultivation of Learning Difficulties in pre – school and primary – school aged children. The research involved 23 teachers (22 women and 1 man) who, citing the possibility of early detection of Learning Difficulties (LDs) offered to them due to the daily contact with the children as part of the classroom, reported on whether the relationship between the two parents, but also between them and the child itself, may affect the appearance and / or the cultivation of Learning Difficulties in it. Furthermore, this work investigates the relevance of the provided parental stimuli and the educational level of the parents with the LDs of these children. The survey was conducted through semi-structured interviews the results of which were analyzed using qualitative content analysis. According to the findings, effective identification of children LDs is achieved by the kindergarten teachers through observation of the children's response to free and organized activities. In addition, the relations between the couple of mother and father, as well as the relationship between the parents and their child were considered by teachers worthy predictors of the effect that the institution of family has on the learning process and career of pre – school and primary school children. Finally, the stimuli that parents provide with their children were associated with the LDs that the offspring have or might develop in the future, as opposed to the educational level of both parents which teachers did not associate with the good or poor academic performance of students.

 

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Author Biographies

  • Athina Ntziavida, MA in Special (Inclusive) Education, European University, Cyprus
    Athina Ntziavida graduated from the Department of Pre – school Education of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and holds a Master's Degree in Special Inclusive Education from the European University Cyprus. She has a two-year teaching experience as special education kindergarten teacher in Inclusive Units in state kindergartens in Greece.
  • Evanthia Tsaliki, PhD in Intercultural Education, Scientific Collaborator, European University, Cyprus
    Evanthia Tsaliki has graduated from the Department of Primary Education, University of Crete, Greece. She holds a Master’s Degree in Educational Studies from the University of York, UK and a PhD Degree from the UCL Institute of Education, University of London. She has got a fifteen-year teaching experience in state primary schools in Greece and she acts as a visiting research associate in the International Centre for Intercultural Studies, UCL Institute of Education.

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Published

2018-02-09

Issue

Vol 3, No 2 (2018)

Section

Articles

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