What does an early childhood teacher do?
An early childhood teacher specializes in handling and teaching young learners as they prepare for their formal schooling stage. Their responsibilities revolve around addressing and meeting the needs of students, organizing recreational activities for learning processes, and devising strategies to help the learners with their interpersonal and emotional growth. Furthermore, as an early childhood teacher, it is essential to monitor the children's progress and provide updates to their parents, all while maintaining a safe and healthy learning environment for everyone.
Early childhood teacher responsibilities
Here are examples of responsibilities from real early childhood teacher resumes:
- Design and apply activities to help children in achieving their goals and objectives in accordance with IFSP 's
- Co-developed activities and art projects for development -ensure developmental milestones and on-track development for infants moving into the toddler room
- Receive proficient training to become CPR certify.
- Evaluate children's progress in meeting UPK standards.
- Screen topics, compose PowerPoint presentations, and prepare teaching materials.
- Implement the Montessori and UPK curriculum in children's daily activities.
- Obtain a CPR certification in order to best serve responsibly and safely.
- Design an integrate mathematics unit on shapes involving cooking, music, and language.
- Plan and implement hands-on, differentiate lessons to a classroom of pre-K students with various abilities.
- Arrange and execute graduation ceremonies, for those students that are transitioning from preschool to kindergarten.
- Exceed all NAEYC guidelines for teaching standards in order to keep students ahead of the learning curve.
- Help pre-k students understand and use basic concepts and skills, to demonstrate responsible emotional and cognitive behaviors.
- Ensure that children are prepared for kindergarten with a knowledge of numbers and the alphabet and letter sounds.
- Provide high quality education through the use of differentiate instruction in order to provide supportive intervention to master IEP goals.
- Utilize knowledge of Spanish to aid ESL students in their acquisition of English, as a second or third language.
Early childhood teacher skills and personality traits
We calculated that 21% of Early Childhood Teachers are proficient in CPR, Child Development, and Professional Development. They’re also known for soft skills such as Creativity, Organizational skills, and Interpersonal skills.
We break down the percentage of Early Childhood Teachers that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- CPR, 21%
Certified in Early Childhood Education I, training in stress management, CPR, First Aid and Administration of Medication.
- Child Development, 15%
Provided information to parents regarding child development in parent meetings.
- Professional Development, 8%
Planned and conducted professional development workshops for preschool teachers, assistants and administrators.
- Classroom Environment, 7%
Develop and analyze organization strategies in order to achieve maximum productivity in the classroom environment while maintaining engagement with students.
- Classroom Management, 5%
Complete classroom management and maintenance including general cleaning, organization and light repair of classroom fixtures and furniture.
- ECE, 4%
Served as a leader and coach for ECE II student off campus internships.
Common skills that an early childhood teacher uses to do their job include "cpr," "child development," and "professional development." You can find details on the most important early childhood teacher responsibilities below.
Creativity. The most essential soft skill for an early childhood teacher to carry out their responsibilities is creativity. This skill is important for the role because "preschool teachers must plan lessons that engage young children." Additionally, an early childhood teacher resume shows how their duties depend on creativity: "deliver creative learning and play activities to up to 15 preschool children. "
Organizational skills. Another essential skill to perform early childhood teacher duties is organizational skills. Early childhood teachers responsibilities require that "teachers need to be organized to plan lessons and keep records of the children." Early childhood teachers also use organizational skills in their role according to a real resume snippet: "utilized organizational skills and time management skills to focus on early childhood development. "
Interpersonal skills. This is an important skill for early childhood teachers to perform their duties. For an example of how early childhood teacher responsibilities depend on this skill, consider that "preschool teachers must understand children’s emotional needs and be able to develop relationships with parents, children, and coworkers." This excerpt from a resume also shows how vital it is to everyday roles and responsibilities of an early childhood teacher: "developed and implement programs that assist in early childhood development including interpersonal skills, hygiene and proper eating habits. ".
Physical stamina. A big part of what early childhood teachers do relies on "physical stamina." You can see how essential it is to early childhood teacher responsibilities because "preschool teachers should have a lot of energy, because working with children can be physically demanding." Here's an example of how this skill is used from a resume that represents typical early childhood teacher tasks: "facilatated preschool, pre-k and kindergarten age children emotion, intellectual, social, academic and physical developmental skills. "
Communication skills. Another crucial skill for an early childhood teacher to carry out their responsibilities is "communication skills." A big part of what early childhood teachers relies on this skill, since "preschool teachers need good writing and speaking skills to talk to parents and colleagues about children’s progress." How this skill relates to early childhood teacher duties can be seen in an example from an early childhood teacher resume snippet: "sustained ongoing, open communication with parents/ caregivers and provides a classroom environment, which encourages parent participation. "
Patience. Another skill commonly found on early childhood teacher job descriptions is "patience." It can come up quite often in early childhood teacher duties, since "working with children may be stressful." Here's an example from a resume of how this skill fits into day-to-day early childhood teacher responsibilities: "decorate bulletin boards change diaper/potty train and have a lot of patience and tender loving care. "
The three companies that hire the most early childhood teachers are:
- Chester Community Charter School
83 early childhood teachers jobs
- Early Learning Indiana56 early childhood teachers jobs
- Learning Care Group26 early childhood teachers jobs
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Compare different early childhood teachers
Early childhood teacher vs. Teacher aide
Teacher aides help lead teachers in managing the classroom. They assist teachers in conducting classroom sessions by setting up the classroom in advance, sourcing materials needed for class activities, helping in presentations, and guiding students during class activities. Teacher aides are also responsible for maintaining classroom cleanliness and helping clean up after the children. They also help manage the students during breaks and during classes. They help the lead teacher keep the students'students' attention. They also assist the students in any other tasks that they may need.
While similarities exist, there are also some differences between early childhood teachers and teacher aide. For instance, early childhood teacher responsibilities require skills such as "child development," "professional development," "ece," and "math." Whereas a teacher aide is skilled in "child care," "art projects," "administration policies," and "class rooms." This is part of what separates the two careers.
Teacher aides tend to reach lower levels of education than early childhood teachers. In fact, teacher aides are 10.0% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 0.4% less likely to have a Doctoral Degree.Early childhood teacher vs. Teacher
Being a teacher is one of the most passionate professions, among others. Teachers educate, motivate, and guide every generation of learners to prepare them for the real world. Every teacher is unique and has their own teaching styles and methods depending on the subject they teach and the age of their students. Oftentimes they also function as a parent, counselor, coach, friend, and even a lawmaker. There is essentially no limit to the roles a teacher portrays.
While some skills are similar in these professions, other skills aren't so similar. For example, resumes show us that early childhood teacher responsibilities requires skills like "child development," "ece," "emotional development," and "english language." But a teacher might use other skills in their typical duties, such as, "esl," "handle scheduling," "curriculum development," and "geography."
In general, teachers achieve similar levels of education than early childhood teachers. They're 0.7% more likely to obtain a Master's Degree while being 0.4% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.What technology do you think will become more important and prevalent for early childhood teachers in the next 3-5 years?
Dr. Diana Jones
Chair, Department of Kinesiology, Anderson University
Early childhood teacher vs. Student teacher
A student-teacher is responsible for assisting their supervising instructors in maintaining the class orderliness during lectures and class activities. Student teachers' duties include helping with lesson plans, organizing learning activities, managing student behaviors, observing classroom procedures, preparing visual materials and other educational equipment, providing feedback for students, and keeping students' records for evaluation. A student-teacher must maintain excellent communication and decision-making skills to set goals and make consistent progress to the class while keeping students engaged.
Some important key differences between the two careers include a few of the skills necessary to fulfill the responsibilities of each. Some examples from early childhood teacher resumes include skills like "cpr," "child development," "ece," and "kids," whereas a student teacher is more likely to list skills in "language arts," "kindergarten," "bulletin boards," and "student teaching. "
When it comes to education, student teachers tend to earn similar degree levels compared to early childhood teachers. In fact, they're 0.9% less likely to earn a Master's Degree, and 0.1% less likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.Early childhood teacher vs. Science teacher
A science teacher is responsible for teaching scientific concepts and disciplines, helping learners to understand systems, procedures, and generate ideas using scientific evidence and approaches. Science teachers create engaging lesson plans and activities for the learners, including laboratory works, group research, and field experiments. They also demonstrate methods and present scientific research to support their observations. A science teacher evaluates the students' learning by giving them written or practical exams, including problem-solving and scientific methods.
Types of early childhood teacher
Updated January 8, 2025
