Preschool Teachers' Use of Digital Technologies for Educational Purposes: Documentation, Assessment, Parent Participation and Communication

This research aims to examine the digital technologies and applications used by preschool teachers for educational purposes in terms of documentation, assessment, parent communication and participation. A qualitative study was designed and semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 preschool teachers employed in Istanbul. The data was analyzed with the content analysis technique, and as a result, four main themes emerged: general use of technology for educational purposes, storage and sharing, assessment, parent participation and communication. Findings show that digital technologies offer benefits such as educational content, children's active participation, the opportunity to monitor and review, sharing and storing documents for a long time, making children's learning visible, peer learning, gamification, content diversity, increased participation, and instant and easy communication. On the other hand, reservations such as lack of materials and equipment, misuse, pedagogical difficulties, and challenging attitudes and demands of parents were also expressed. The findings were discussed in the light of related research and practices in the literature. In particular, attention was drawn to the integration of the use of digital technology for educational purposes in early childhood education in the dimensions of documentation, assessment and parent participation and communication, and the need for integrity among these dimensions.