Effectiveness of Academic Supervision Models in Improving Teacher Performance in Kindergarten Schools

Introduction. Global education initiatives championed by organizations such as UNESCO, the Council of Europe, and the International Association of Universities (IAU) emphasize continuous professional development for educators as the cornerstone of quality education. In line with these initiatives, implementing academic supervision models in early childhood education settings, such as kindergartens, is important in improving teacher performance. Academic supervision is a key mechanism for improving teaching practices, ensuring educators can meet the demands of an increasingly complex educational environment. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of an academic supervision model in improving kindergarten teachers' performance, focusing on the changes observed before and after the implementation of this model. As such, this study contributes to the ongoing global discourse on improving the quality of education through targeted professional development strategies. Study participants and methods. The study involved six kindergarten teachers selected through purposive sampling. Data was collected using pretest and posttest evaluations, measuring teacher performance before and after implementing the academic supervision model. Descriptive statistics, t-tests, and Wilcoxon Signed Rank tests were used for data analysis. The normality of the data was assessed using the Shapiro-Wilk test. N-Gain scores were calculated to determine the relative improvement in performance. KEYWORDS Results. The essence of the pedagogical model used in this study is to improve teacher performance through academic supervision focused on continuous professional development. Improved performance was seen through a comparison of pretest and post-test mean scores; scores increased from 16.33 to 28.33 with a higher variance value (0.667) on the pretest, meaning that pretest scores had a greater spread, indicating that teachers' performance levels were initially highly variable. After implementing the model, the lower variance (0.267) in the posttest indicates that teacher performance scores became more uniform and concentrated at higher scores. This indicates that the academic supervision model effectively improved teacher performance through a t-test with a significance value of 0.000 (p < 0.05), indicating a significant difference between the pretest and post-test scores. The t-test and Wilcoxon signed rank test confirmed that the difference between pretest and posttest scores was statistically significant, further validating the effectiveness of the supervision model. N-Gain analysis, with an average score of 0.8772, highlighted significant and measurable improvements in teacher performance after implementing the academic supervision model. Conclusion. This study confirms the effectiveness of the academic supervision model in enhancing teacher performance. The model improved individual teacher competencies and ensured a uniform teaching quality across the board. These findings suggest that implementing academic supervision consistently could serve as a strategic approach for professional development in educational settings.