Abstract:

In a rapidly developing society, along with the increasing flow of information, every educational institution undergoes major changes that are influenced by both external and internal factors. The essential task of improving educational institutions is to develop such collaborative culture that would encourage to seek better results and inspire more efficient organization of work by learning from one’s experience.

It should be emphasized that the culture of collaboration determines the systematic change of educational institutions, solving the problems of change in the educational process, sharing best practice of teaching, and learning from each other. Collaboration stimulates teachers’ professional development and school improvement from inside and is widely recognized as ensuring success in implementing externally initiated change (Hargreaves, 1999). Promoting reflection, the analysis of and learning from one’s experience, experiential teaching and learning at the same time inspires to know oneself as a person.

By looking for answers to the questions of concern and applying possessed knowledge, teachers acquire new experience and improve professional competencies, constructing personal knowing. In order to ensure teachers’ experiential learning, the heads and teachers of pre-school educational institutions must take the initiative to develop the culture of collaboration both inside and outside the institution. The problem question is formulated: How does teachers’ experiential learning in the pre-school educational institution manifest itself/take place in developing the culture of collaboration?

In order to answer the problem question, two remote focus group discussions were held with the pre-school education teachers of the purposefully selected institution. The obtained data were processed applying the qualitative content analysis.

The results reveal that experiential learning is related to the acquisition of new experience, while the elements of experiential learning most often manifest themselves through collaboration. The performance of the functions by the head of the educational institution, the response to the principles of management and leadership determine the behaviour of pre-school education teachers and the whole educational institution, which allows to seek the organizational goals. Teachers’ experiential learning is determined by such factors as: the leader’s role in the organization, the motivation system, the attitude of teachers and the whole organization, which must respond to the principles of the learning organization, the microclimate of the educational institution, the relations between the community members, and the features of the modern educational organization. Difficulties (colleagues’ negative traits, competition, indifference, difference, the abundance of collaboration offers, lack of time) hindering the development of the collaborative culture in the implementation of teachers’ experiential learning were also identified. The perspectives of improving the creation of the collaborative culture while implementing pre-school teachers’ experiential learning were identified. Change in this area is needed in various spheres such as: creation of a positive microclimate, the increase of the social interaction, openness and promotion of initiatives, the response to the teachers’ needs, and creation of conditions for sharing and learning from one’s own and others’ experiences.

Keywords:

Teacher, pre-school education, experiential learning, culture, collaboration, collaborative culture.