BELIEFS AND EXPECTATIONS OF THAI TEACHERS AND PARENTS ABOUT IMPORTANT AREAS OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT

The purposes of this research were to explore the beliefs of teachers and parents about important areas for young children’s development, and to determine each group’s expectations about the responsibilities of the other group. Areas of child development were divided into eight skill areas: language skills, motor/physical skills, pre-academic skills, self-assessment skills, self-expression skills, self-sufficiency skills, social skills with adults, and social skills with peers. The findings from the interviews of 53 teachers and 212 parents in 17 provinces of Thailand were as follows: (1) Teachers ranked self-sufficiency skills, self-expression skills, and pre-academic skills as the three most important skill categories. Parents agreed with teachers about the first two, but included language skills as the third category. Teachers' and the parents' rank-orderings of the 8 skill categories indicated high agreement. However, both had moderate agreement for sub-skills under various skill categories. (2) Teachers and parents did not view the major responsibilities of teachers similarly. However, there was some agreement between teachers and parents about the major responsibilities of parents.