Peer-reviewed article
Intentional Technology Use in Early Childhood Education
Ishita Chordia, Jason C Yip, Alexis Hiniker ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This observational study examined how teachers use technology intentionally in early childhood education classrooms across ten child-care centers. Researchers interviewed teachers and directors to understand what benefits or 'gratifications' they seek when incorporating technology. The study found six main reasons teachers use technology, including developing technology literacy, managing behavior, and supporting children's independence. The researchers propose design priorities based on these findings and expand theory to include ways teachers resist certain uses of technology.
Key points
- Six clusters of gratifications identified: encouraging technology literacy, regulating children's behavior, supporting child autonomy, and others
- Teachers both embrace certain uses of technology and resist others
- Study distinguishes between direct gratifications (experienced by the user) and indirect gratifications (experienced by others in shared contexts)
- Early childhood is identified as a critical developmental period where technology experiences may have lasting impacts
- Study contributes design priorities for technology tools supporting early childhood education
Limitations
This is an observational study without comparison groups or outcome measurements, so it cannot establish whether technology use actually improves child development or learning outcomes. The study describes teacher intentions and reasoning but does not measure effects on children's wellbeing or development.
Abstract
Early childhood is a critical developmental period when children's experiences have lasting impacts on long-term outcomes. Thus, an evidence-based understanding of how technology can support early childhood education (ECE) classrooms promises to be disproportionately useful to children's long-term wellbeing. We conducted an observational study at ten child-care centers, complemented by interviews with teachers and directors. Using a Uses and Gratifications (U&G) perspective, we found that the gratifications teachers seek when they incorporate technology into the classroom cluster into six categories, such as encouraging technology literacy, regulating children's behavior, and supporting child autonomy. Using these themes, we contribute a set of design priorities for supporting this population. We also contribute an expansion of the U&G perspective to include: 1) gratifications resisted, to account for the ways in which teachers resist gratifying uses of technology, and 2) differentiation between direct gratifications and indirect gratifications to better describe technology use in collaborative contexts.