World Journal of Engineering Research and Technology

*Mr. Paul Oduor Oyile, Dr. Constance M. Amusala, Prof. Anselemo P. Ikoha, Ms. Yuvalier Anjao

ABSTRACT

Kenya's Competency-Based Curriculum places digital literacy among the core competencies expected of teachers from Pre-Primary Two onwards, yet the specific challenges that early childhood development teachers face in integrating digital tools into daily instruction remain poorly documented at the classroom level. This paper reports findings from a ten-month convergent mixed-methods study conducted across six Kenyan counties, examining the challenges early childhood development teachers encounter when integrating digital tools and testing whether these challenges predict effective implementation of the curriculum. Data were drawn from 51 early childhood development teachers who completed a structured questionnaire following school-level focus group discussions, and from 16 school heads who participated in semi-structured interviews. Tests of normalityconfirmed non-normal distributions across the composite scales, justifying the use of Spearman's rho. Descriptive analysis showed that limited device availability and weak administrative support were the most strongly endorsed challenges, at 66.7 percent and 62.8 percent respectively. Principal component analysis extracted two sub-constructs, Infrastructure and Technical Barriers and Institutional and Pedagogical Barriers, which together explained 71.0 percent of variance. Contrary to expectation, the composite challenge score showed only a weak, non-significant association with effective curriculum implementation (rho = .171, p = .230). Qualitative data from focus group discussions and school head interviews corroborated the descriptive severity of the challenges while clarifying why challenge exposure does not, on its own, suppress implementation outcomes. The paper concludes that infrastructure investment alone is an insufficient policy lever and that digital integration challenges must be addressed alongside, rather than instead of, competency development.

[Full Text Article] [Download Certificate] https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22952785