Digital competencies of early childhood educators: A theoretical framework for research and media-pedagogical professionalisation

The use of digital technologies has transformed many aspects of society, including the lives of young children. This shared digital reality means that adaptations to early childhood education and care are required to ensure children’s right to education. It requires early childhood educators to develop digital competencies. While competencies in various domains of early childhood education are well documented, the specific digital competencies required of early childhood educators have not yet been clearly defined. Although existing frameworks for digital and media pedagogical competencies focuses often on educators for schools or higher education, they fail to address the needs for everyday early childhood education and care practice. Competencies refer to the attributes that educators need to meet the demands of their work. In the context of digital technologies, this involves integrating digital technologies into pedagogical practices to support children’s digital learning and their learning with digital technologies across other domains. This paper introduces a theory-driven, conceptual framework tailored to early digital competencies of early childhood educators. Building on existing teacher competence models, it incorporates the specific needs of early childhood educators. This framework differentiates early childhood educators’ individual dispositions: professional knowledge and non-cognitive characteristics, situation-specific skills, and performance. The model emphasises interaction processes that promote children’s skills, recognising the importance of child-centredness, spontaneity and responsiveness to situational dynamics. Designed for everyday early childhood education and resaerch, the framework should be understood as a dynamic framework that will be continuously developed.