Educators’ perceptions of early childhood working memory capacity and its implementation in outdoor learning activities (OLA)

Abstract

Children aged 5-6 years need cognitive executive function (EF) skills to be ready to learn in elementary school. Working memory (WM) is one aspect of EF that is very important in children's academic abilities. The research aims to identify the working memory capacity of early childhood children based on teachers' perceptions and to understand the implementation of Outdoor Learning Activity (OLA) in early childhood education. This research is a descriptive study. Data was collected using questionnaires distributed during the Forum Group Discussion (FGD) activities. 35 Early Childhood Educators filled out the questionnaire. The data analysis was conducted by providing an in-depth description of the research results. The research results show that based on educators' perceptions, children's working memory (WM) capacity is not yet optimal, reaching only 65.23%, which falls into the sufficient category. The implementation of OLA is carried out 7 times every month. Currently, WM stimulus is implemented by 54.29% of educators in Indonesia through recalling during the closing learning activities. The results of this study serve as a basis for future researchers to develop the OLA model in stimulating children's WM.