Influence of Continued Teacher Professional Development by the County Government on the Implementation of Early Childhood Education Curriculum in Homa Bay County, Kenya

Quality education is anchored on how skilled and motivated teachers are to improve their professional knowledge and skill throughout their careers to ensure effective curriculum development. There has been growing thirst and continuous demand for teachers to enhance their professional knowledge and skills on pedagogy through continued teacher professional development strategies. However, demands for continued teacher professional development are a worldwide issue. There is growing need therefore of teachers professional development beyond their initial training. The thrust of this study therefore was to assess the influence of continued teacher development on the implementation of early childhood education curriculum. The study employed explanatory sequential mixed methods design. From a target population, 236 head teachers, 313 ECDE teachers and 56 County ECDE officers were randomly sampled yielding 588 participants. Data was collected using questionnaire and interview schedules. Quantitative data for the first phase were analyzed with the assistance of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) to generate descriptive and inferential statistic Qualitative data during the second phase were analyzed thematically. Mixed results were obtained indicating that head teachers and ECDE teachers held contrary views regarding teacher’s recruitment and deployment. While the head teachers’ results indicated that there was a significant and positive correlation (p=.001, .05), between professional development of teachers and curriculum implementation. The conclusion reached was that there was inadequate teacher professional development and the understaffing was negatively influencing curriculum implementation. It was recommended that national and county government should put in place a harmonized teacher professional development policy and employ adequate teachers to effectively implement the curriculum.