Empirical research in early childhood settings: possible gains for teachers' expertise

The amount and depth of published research relating to the transformation of education settings for the purpose of positively influence children and their functioning in learning environments continues to increase. The basic idea is that research should have social significance and be useful for practitioners (service research) by giving them the tools to improve their classroom environments as well as their personal competencies. One question that could be asked is: what are the implications and the general usefulness of this research in terms of professional development for teachers and others in the field of education? Do these studies provide useful suggestions to teachers who are developing their professional skills? To answer these questions, a systematic literature review was conducted. This article aims to provide a descriptive map of the issues that emerged during the literature review, with a particular focus on elements of empirical research that could be considered for professional development in education. The results from the article analysis show that the descriptions of teachers’ competencies in the published literature are primarily cognitive and instrumental, affective and social; few studies explicitly provided practical teaching advice. During the review, 341 articles were excluded because they did not contain information relevant to teachers’ expertise. Of the articles reviewed, the information useful to teachers is often general and usually placed in a short concluding paragraph at the end of a given article. More useful professional development opportunities occur when teachers are actively involved in research. In conclusion, the review also shows that in recent years more attention has been directed to the exact items that have relevant implications with respect to the expertise of teachers.