Developing leadership self-belief in early childhood preservice teachers: flexible learning approaches.

The field of early childhood education and care [ECEC] is such that often teachers are required to move into formal leadership roles early in their career. It is understandable, therefore, that preparation for leadership responsibility and understanding has received increasing attention in recent years (Ebbeck & Waniganayake, 2003; Rodd, 2006). In pre-service teacher education one challenge is to engage student teachers in theory related to leadership while also developing skills in management . In particular student teachers need to build the capacity to engage in leadership activity mindful of the professional contexts they enter.