Comprehensive view or individual asessment? : Preschool teachers' views and implemations of individual development plans.

This study assesses preschool teachers’ views and implementations of individual development plans. The Swedish National Agency for Education (2005b) has established that the individual development plan should point in a forward direction and give the pupil influence over its own learning and development, and it should be a natural ground work for teachers’ and working teams’ continuous followup and workplanning. The agency (2005b) does not establish how the individual development plans should be practically implemented in preschool since its not stipulated by law. Therefore, the aims of this study is to investigate some preschool teachers’ view on the individual development plans and how they work with them. My question formulation is: How does preschool teachers use the individual development plans? Are there differences in how the preschool teachers in the same working team use the individual development plans? To fulfill these aims a qualitative survey with three preschool teachers was utilized. The results are a compilation from the interview questions asked. The results show that the three participating preschool teachers, view positively on using individual development plans in their work. But earlier studies indicates that there are some risks associated with using individual development plans. The risks are about individual focus and assesments which is in contrast to the government’s intention of a more comprehensive view. Even though the preschool teachers uses the individual development plans to bring out the positive qualities and interests in the children, they feel that there are too little time for planning and discussion together with the other teachers in their working team