Teachers' Views On Preschool Guidance Services

The aim of the current study is to investigate teacher perspectives on the guidance and counselling activities they do in classroom. Within this scope, the guidance and counselling activities they do in classroom, the activities they do with parents, the problems they face during the activities and their coping strategies were examined. In addition, preschool teachers’ cooperation with school management and school counselors and the extent they make use of the guidance and counselling program were evaluated. Qualitative method was employed in order to investigate the situation in depth. The participants were retrieved by snowball sampling. 25 female and 4 male preschool teachers volunteered to participate in the study across Turkey. A demographic form with 9 items and a survey with 9 questions developed by the researchers were used for the data collection. The average response time of the participants were 18 minutes, and the date was collected in two weeks. Content analysis was used for the collected data. The results of the study indicated that the majority of the preschool teachers reported that they used observation as an informal method and technique to evaluate the guidance and counselling practices in classroom. When the guidance and counselling activities teacher do in classroom were classified based on the competencies in the preschool education guidance and counselling program; we found that most of the activities were aimed at self-acceptance, followed by interpersonal relationships. The results also showed that the teachers did not do any activities targeting the competencies in the family and society area. The teachers stated that they did their activities in the form of play and Turkish (language) activities by making use of play and drama. Family involvement was also one of the most resorted subjects that the teachers used in the activities they did with parents.