Perceptions and Attitudes Towards Cultural Heritage and Its Education Among Preschool Educators: A Convenience Sample from 11 Chinese Provinces

Ran Zheng (), Wei Zhang and Liangjing Guo
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Ran Zheng: Faculty of Education, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China
Wei Zhang: Jinan University—University of Birmingham Joint Institute, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China
Liangjing Guo: School of Education Science, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing 210024, China

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 19, 1-20

Abstract: Cultural heritage education promotes sustainability by fostering children’s emerging identity with local heritage and internalizing shared cultural values. In early childhood settings, these formative processes are shaped by preschool educators’ perceptions and attitudes toward cultural heritage and its teaching. This study employs a structured questionnaire to investigate preschool teachers’ cultural heritage literacy and their views on cultural heritage education, gathering data from a convenience sample of 64 valid responses from 11 provinces. Results indicate that teachers generally possess a superficial understanding of local cultural heritage and demonstrate limited emotional engagement, which affects their perceptions of the relevance and value of cultural heritage for young children. They often lack awareness in selecting meaningful content, experience contradictory expectations, and hold low expectations for fostering cultural identity. Notably, difficulty interpreting heritage meanings is associated with lower expectations. Over half of the teachers report challenges in “goal setting and evaluation” and in finding “appropriate methods to achieve goals”. Targeted training to enhance cultural heritage literacy and strengthen goal setting is therefore a priority.

Keywords: cultural heritage education; preschool educators; teacher training; SDG 11.4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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