Coding and robotics have become increasingly important in early schooling, but their implementation in the Foundation Phase depends not only on curriculum reform and access to resources but also on teachers’ pedagogical readiness to teach these concepts in developmentally appropriate and inclusive ways.
Objectives
This study explored how third-year pre-service teachers at a South African university conceptualised their perceived pedagogical readiness to implement coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase. The study was framed by Pedagogical Content Knowledge and teacher self-efficacy.
Methods
A qualitative interpretive design was used. Data were generated through open-ended online questionnaires completed by 51 consenting pre-service teachers enrolled in a Foundation Phase teacher education module. The data were analysed using thematic analysis, with an inductive coding process and abductive interpretation.
Results
Participants conceptualised perceived pedagogical readiness in three interrelated ways: as the ability to teach coding and robotics through play-based, hands-on and integrated pedagogies; as an inclusive and relational practice requiring attention to learner confidence, language and communication with parents; and as an emerging capacity shaped by resources, support and teacher confidence.
Conclusion
Perceived pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics was understood not as technical competence alone, but as context-sensitive pedagogical enactment. Readiness involved the capacity to translate new curriculum content into teaching practices that are developmentally appropriate, relationally responsive and workable in unevenly resourced classrooms.
Contribution
The study contributes to scholarship on teacher education and coding and robotics in the early years by showing that readiness is pedagogical, relational and contextually conditioned.
coding and roboticsdevelopmentally appropriate practiceFoundation Phasepedagogical readinessplay-based pedagogypre-service teachersteacher educationteacher preparednessFunding information This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.Introduction
Coding and robotics have gained prominence in primary education because they are associated not only with technical skill development but also with problem-solving, sequencing, logical reasoning, creativity and collaboration in the early years (Başaran et al., 2024; South African Department of Basic Education [DBE], 2024; Willemse, 2025). In the Foundation Phase, where learners are between the ages of five and nine, the successful implementation of coding and robotics depends not only on curriculum reform and access to tools but also on teachers’ ability to teach them in developmentally appropriate, meaningful and inclusive ways (Willemse & Callaghan, 2026). Teacher education is therefore central to this work. However, exposure to computational thinking or digital tools does not automatically translate into classroom readiness, and pre-service teachers may still feel uncertain about how to teach coding and robotics through play-based, hands-on and language-responsive pedagogies for young learners (Fegely & Tang, 2022; Yang, 2025; Zivanayi & Malinga, 2025).
Although existing scholarship has examined programme design, intervention outcomes and broad attitudes towards educational technology, less attention has been given to how pre-service teachers themselves conceptualise readiness for classroom enactment in relation to pedagogy, learner support, language, parental engagement and contextual constraints, particularly in the South African context (Boz & Allexsaht-Snider, 2022; Chen et al., 2023; Sunday et al., 2025; Zivanayi & Malinga, 2025). This focus is important because perceptions of readiness offer insight into how future teachers understand the demands of teaching coding and robotics before entering full-time practice. Such perceptions do not stand in for observed classroom competence, but they are valuable because they reveal what pre-service teachers see as enabling or constraining implementation, what forms of support they anticipate needing and how they imagine translating new curriculum content into classroom practice (Başaran et al., 2024; Willemse, 2025; Wu et al., 2024; Yang, 2025). In the South African context, these questions are particularly significant because coding and robotics are taught in multilingual classrooms and across schools with uneven access to resources. Pedagogical readiness, therefore, involves not only knowing about coding and robotics but also understanding how to enact this knowledge in responsive, inclusive, developmentally appropriate and contextually feasible ways (Gerson et al., 2021; Yang, 2025).
This study addresses that gap by asking: How do pre-service teachers conceptualise their perceived pedagogical readiness to implement coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase? It argues that perceived pedagogical readiness is understood not simply as familiarity with coding and robotics, but as a way of thinking about how this curriculum area might be taught in developmentally appropriate, inclusive and contextually responsive ways.
Pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics in pre-service education
Pedagogical readiness in pre-service coding and robotics education is widely understood as more than familiarity with digital tools. It involves the capacity to translate computational ideas into age-appropriate learning experiences, scaffold learner understanding and connect new content to meaningful classroom practice (Taheri & Pennington, 2024; Willemse & Callaghan, 2026; Zivanayi & Malinga, 2025). Yet exposure to coding or robotics during teacher education does not automatically produce readiness, and pre-service teachers often continue to report uncertainty when they have limited opportunities for classroom enactment (Haşlaman et al., 2024; Vasconcelos et al., 2025; Voon et al., 2023). Readiness is therefore shaped by the relationship between Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK), self-efficacy and opportunities for enactment (Bardach et al., 2021; Dragnić-Cindrić & Anderson, 2025).
In the Foundation Phase, this readiness must also be understood in relation to developmentally appropriate pedagogy. Coding and robotics are most meaningful when taught through play, interaction, movement, concrete experience and integration across learning areas rather than as isolated technical content (Chandra & Lloyd, 2020; Ogegbo & Aina, 2024; Willemse, 2025; Willemse & Callaghan, 2026). The literature also shows that confidence and implementation are shaped by contextual conditions such as access to low-cost resources, mentoring, practicum opportunities and ongoing support (Kidd et al., 2025; Martin et al., 2024; Niyibizi, 2025; Patterson & Hartley, 2026).
An important tension in the literature is that pedagogical knowledge and confidence do not always develop at the same pace. Pre-service teachers may value play-based and integrated pedagogies yet still feel uncertain about implementation, while positive attitudes towards technology do not necessarily indicate sufficient pedagogical grounding for meaningful teaching in the Foundation Phase (Boz & Allexsaht-Snider, 2022; Fegely & Tang, 2022; Kidd et al., 2025; Willemse & Callaghan, 2026; Zivanayi & Malinga, 2025). Pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase should therefore be understood as developmental, relational and contextually conditioned. What remains underexplored is how pre-service teachers themselves conceptualise these intersecting demands in relation to their future classroom practice.
Theoretical framework
This study is framed by PCK and teacher self-efficacy as complementary lenses for understanding how pre-service teachers conceptualise pedagogical readiness to implement coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase. Together, these concepts elucidate how participants thought about making coding and robotics teachable for young learners and how they viewed their own capability to enact such teaching in practice.
Pedagogical Content Knowledge, as introduced by Shulman (1986), refers to the specialised knowledge teachers use to transform subject matter into forms that learners can understand. In the context of coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase, PCK is especially relevant because teaching this area requires more than knowing concepts or tools; it requires translating unfamiliar ideas into play-based, concrete, age-appropriate and meaningful learning experiences. Pedagogical Content Knowledge therefore provides a useful lens for examining how pre-service teachers select pedagogies, simplify concepts, scaffold understanding, and integrate coding and robotics with familiar Foundation Phase practices such as storytelling, movement, play and cross-curricular learning (Silva et al., 2021; Willemse & Callaghan, 2026). Although technology-related teaching is often discussed through the Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework, PCK was retained as the primary lens because the focus here is less on technological knowledge in general and more on how participants conceptualised making coding and robotics pedagogically teachable in the Foundation Phase.
The second lens is teacher self-efficacy. Rooted in Bandura’s social cognitive theory, self-efficacy refers to individuals’ beliefs in their capability to organise and execute the actions required to achieve particular goals (Bandura, 1977, 1997). In this study, it is understood as a context-sensitive belief about one’s capability to teach coding and robotics effectively in real classroom conditions. This lens is useful because participants’ accounts frequently reveal confidence, uncertainty, anxiety, cautious optimism, and a sense that readiness develops through support and experience (Bandura, 1977, 1997; Orakçı et al., 2023).
Pedagogical Content Knowledge and self-efficacy together provide an interpretive frame for the findings. Pedagogical Content Knowledge helps to explain how participants understood coding and robotics as teachable through developmentally appropriate pedagogies, while self-efficacy helps explain how they positioned themselves as confident, hesitant or emerging in relation to implementation. This relationship is illustrated in Figure 1.
Conceptual framework for interpreting pre-service teachers’ pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase.
In this study, PCK is used especially to interpret the first and second dimensions of the findings, while self-efficacy is used particularly to interpret the third. Together, these lenses support the argument that pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase is not simply technical competence, but the perceived capacity to transform new curriculum content into meaningful teaching under real and often uneven classroom conditions.
Research methods and designResearch design
This study is located within an interpretivist paradigm, which assumes that reality is socially constructed and that knowledge is generated through interpreting participants’ meanings in context. This paradigm was appropriate because the study sought to understand how pre-service teachers made sense of their pedagogical readiness to implement coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase.
This article forms part of a broader qualitative inquiry into pre-service teachers’ experiences of learning to teach coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase. The questionnaire generated data on a range of issues, including understandings of coding and robotics, digital literacy, learner engagement, assessment, language, parental communication, advocacy, professional development and resource needs. During the initial reading and coding of the dataset, a recurring pattern emerged in participants’ accounts of how ready they felt to teach coding and robotics in practice. This article therefore focuses specifically on responses that illuminated pedagogical readiness in relation to pedagogy, learner support, language, parental communication, confidence and contextual conditions.
Context and participants
The study was conducted in a Foundation Phase teacher education module focused on the teaching and learning of coding and robotics at a South African university. Participants were third-year undergraduate pre-service teachers enrolled in the module. Of the approximately 200 students in the cohort, 51 provided informed consent for their questionnaire responses to be used for research purposes. Participants’ demographic characteristics are presented in Table 1 to provide contextual detail relevant to the South African setting. These characteristics included gender, ethnicity and home language. For this article, all 51 consenting responses were analysed to identify dominant patterns in how students described their pedagogical readiness. Six especially detailed responses were selected for extended quotation because they provided particularly clear illustrations of themes identified across the full dataset; they were used for exemplification only and were not treated as a separate sample.
Demographic profile of participants (N = 53).
Variable
Category
n
Gender
Female
50
Male
3
Race and/or ethnicity
African people
25
White people
22
Mixed race people
4
Indian people
2
Home language
English
21
Afrikaans
9
Sepedi
7
isiZulu
6
Sesotho
2
Siswati
2
Tshivenda
2
Xitsonga
2
isiXhosa
1
Setswana
1
Data generation
Data were generated through an online questionnaire administered via Google Forms. The online format afforded participants time and flexibility to reflect on their experiences in writing and may also have enhanced privacy when sharing views and experiences. The questionnaire included background items as well as qualitative open-ended questions about understandings of coding and robotics, digital literacy, future classroom practice, learner engagement, assessment, language, parental communication, professional development, advocacy, and the resources and support needed for implementation in the Foundation Phase. A sample of the questionnaire is included in Appendix A. The questionnaire was completed at the end of the module. Although it generated data on a broad range of issues, this article presents a focused analysis (Deterding & Waters, 2021) of responses most directly related to pedagogical readiness. These included responses dealing with classroom pedagogy, learner support, language, parental communication, confidence and resourcing. The asynchronous written format did not permit immediate probing or follow-up clarification, which may have constrained the depth of some responses.
Data analysis
Data were analysed using thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006). The analysis was inductively oriented in that no predetermined coding framework was applied, but it also involved an abductive movement between data and theory as emerging patterns were interpreted in relation to the literature and the concepts of PCK and teacher self-efficacy. The analysis proceeded in several stages. Firstly, all responses were read repeatedly to build familiarity with the dataset and identify early patterns. Secondly, initial codes were generated directly from the data, with attention to classroom practice, learner confidence, language, parental concerns, resources, support and implementation. Thirdly, related codes were compared and clustered into broader categories. Through this iterative process, a more focused analytic direction emerged around pedagogical readiness rather than broader attitudes towards coding and robotics. The categories were then refined into higher-order themes that captured readiness in pedagogical, relational and contextual terms. All 51 consenting responses contributed to theme development, while six particularly rich excerpts were foregrounded because they most clearly illustrated the pedagogical reasoning central to the research question. Throughout the process, emerging themes were checked against the full dataset to ensure that interpretation remained grounded in participants’ accounts.
Reflexivity
The researcher was also the lecturer of the module from which the participants were drawn. This dual role required reflexive attention because it may have shaped participants’ sense of the research context and introduced the possibility of bias in interpretation. To reduce this risk, participation was voluntary, only consenting responses were included, and the questionnaire was administered at the end of the module. The analysis focused on patterns across the dataset rather than the evaluation of individual students, and interpretations were checked against participants’ written responses.
Trustworthiness
Trustworthiness was strengthened in three ways. Firstly, themes were developed across all 51 consenting responses rather than from a small selected subset. Secondly, the analysis remained interpretive and inductively oriented, with themes refined through repeated reading and checking against participants’ written responses. Thirdly, verbatim quotations are used for transparency, while the six extended excerpts serve only to illustrate patterns established across the full dataset.
Ethical considerations
Ethical clearance for the study was obtained from the University of Pretoria’s Faculty of Education ethical clearance committee (clearance number: EDU034/24). Participation was voluntary, and responses were collected electronically; only those from students who provided informed consent were included in the analysis. To protect participants’ identities, all identifying information was removed from the dataset during analysis and reporting. Anonymous participant reference identifiers are used throughout the article when presenting verbatim quotations to enhance traceability while preserving confidentiality.
Results
Analysis of the qualitative questionnaire data showed that pre-service teachers’ perceived pedagogical readiness to implement coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase was expressed through three interrelated higher-order themes. Firstly, participants imagined coding and robotics as a play-based, hands-on and integrated pedagogy suited to the developmental needs of young learners. Secondly, their responses revealed that pedagogical readiness was also understood as an inclusive and relational practice, requiring sensitivity to learner confidence, language and communication with parents. Thirdly, participants conceptualised readiness as conditional on support, resources and teacher confidence, indicating an awareness that successful implementation depends on more than positive attitudes alone. Participant responses are identified using the following format: participant code, age at the time of data generation, gender (female [F] or male [M]) and home language (HL).
Coding and robotics as a play-based, hands-on and integrated pedagogy
A dominant finding was that participants did not view coding and robotics as abstract or purely technical content. Rather, they consistently described it as something that should be taught through play, movement, stories, tangible resources and integration across learning areas. This suggests that their pedagogical readiness was grounded in an understanding of Foundation Phase teaching as active, concrete and developmentally appropriate.
For some participants, readiness was visible in their ability to describe specific classroom enactments. For example, one participant explained how coding could be integrated into literacy through storytelling:
‘I [would] integrate coding to boost storytelling and literacy. The main activity would be “Animate Your Favourite Story,” where students use a tablet app like Scratch Jr. to drag-and-drop simple blocks and make characters move and talk, teaching them sequencing and instruction-giving. Additionally, we can use Bee-Bot floor robots to let them physically program the character’s path, which is a hands-on way to teach logic and finding errors [debugging] in a fun, active manner.’ (P36, 21, F, HL: Setswana)
Similarly, one participant described using robotics to support narrative teaching in a playful way:
‘I will do a scenario that is play-based. I will create a story, and the learners must then build the path as the story continues.’ (P34, 21, F, HL: Afrikaans)
Another also framed engagement in explicitly embodied and concrete terms:
‘I will make activities and tests more hands-on, play-based learning, as this is the best way that children learn using tangible … or even let them move around and be their own human robot.’(P39, 21, F, HL: English)
This orientation was also evident in shorter responses from P5, who described coding and robotics as involving ‘games, the bee bot, and any other coding tools which are fun and engaging’, as something that ‘can be easily included in lessons’, and as learning that can begin through ‘simple, low-cost activities linked to subjects like mathematics and Life Skills’.
These excerpts show that participants were beginning to translate coding and robotics into familiar Foundation Phase forms such as storytelling, play, embodiment and curriculum integration. Readiness was therefore expressed less as technical specialism than as the ability to make new content pedagogically compatible with early-years practice.
Pedagogical readiness as inclusive, confidence-building and relational practice
A second major theme, and a particularly distinctive contribution of this study, was that participants understood implementation as requiring sensitivity to learners’ emotional, linguistic and social needs. Responses suggested that pedagogical readiness involved more than planning activities or selecting teaching strategies; it also required the ability to build learner confidence, explain concepts through home language where appropriate, and communicate the value of coding and robotics to parents. This is significant because it shows that participants conceptualised readiness not only as instructional competence but also as relational mediation across classroom, language and home contexts. For instance, one participant opined:
‘Learners may feel very overwhelmed and [think] that coding is a big word and may be hard for them, but I would start off simple and fun, like using unplugged coding activities, before moving to digital devices.’ (P39, 21, F, HL: English)
Similarly, Participant P34 linked readiness to scaffolding and encouragement:
‘I will address resistance from learners when they are reluctant to participate in activities by relating the activities to their interests and starting the activities off with being very simple to build their confidence and encourage them to keep trying and to do their best.’ (P34, 21, F, HL: Afrikaans)
Other participants similarly emphasised emotional accessibility, describing coding and robotics as giving learners:
‘… confidence and a strong foundation to the ever-evolving world.’ (P39, 21, F, HL: English)
Another noted that:
‘… some [learners] need extra support.’ (P35, 23, F, HL: Sepedi)
Participant P36 emphasised the role of home language in conceptual understanding:
‘Teaching in a student’s home language [like Setswana or Afrikaans] makes complex ideas immediately accessible and helps remove the barrier of having to learn a new technical concept while simultaneously processing it in a second or third language. This can significantly boost confidence and participation.’ (P36, 21, F, HL: Setswana)
Likewise, another reflected on the significance of multilingual explanation for complex concepts:
‘Being able to explain concepts in a child’s home language is crucial, especially for complex ideas like conditional statements.’ (P13, 21, F, HL: Sepedi)
The relational dimension of pedagogical readiness was also evident in participants’ responses about parents and guardians:
‘For parents, I [will] explain the real-world skills they are learning [such as] logical thinking and problem-solving; and show them how these skills apply to any future career, not just computer science.’ (P36, 21, F, HL: Setswana)
Similarly, another participant recognised that parental concern may need to be addressed through active communication:
‘Parents may be worried about too much screen time or simply have a lack of familiarity with coding and robotics, so I would inform and educate parents on the subject, host parent sessions where I explain the benefits.’ (P39, 21, F, HL: English)
This concern was not isolated. Other participants also referred to the following as important in reinforcing the value of coding and robotics:
‘… coding and robotics programmes for parents and teachers.’ (P12, 22, F, HL: Sesotho)
‘… teacher and parents conference.’ (P34, 21, F, HL: Afrikaans)
‘… strong support from the community and parents.’ (P39, 21, F, HL: English)
These excerpts position pedagogical readiness as relational work. Participants conceptualised teaching not merely as the accurate transmission of content, but as a process of reducing fear, widening access, and making coding and robotics understandable and worthwhile to learners and families. Particularly noteworthy is that learners’ confidence, home language and parental communication emerged here as central rather than peripheral concerns. Together, these findings suggest that pedagogical readiness in this context is shaped not only by what pre-service teachers know about coding and robotics, but also by how they imagine making it emotionally accessible, linguistically meaningful and socially legitimate in the lives of young learners.
Readiness as being conditional on resources, support and emerging teacher confidence
The third theme showed that participants did not present pedagogical readiness as an individual quality alone. Instead, they acknowledged that readiness is shaped by resource availability, teacher development and a growing sense of confidence in their ability to teach coding and robotics. One of the clearest findings was that participants valued low-cost and unplugged approaches, suggesting an awareness of contextual constraints. One participant reflected:
‘It has taught me that technology can be integrated into lessons in an unplugged manner, and you do not need expensive equipment to make lessons fun or to teach learners about technology.’ (P34, 21, F, HL: Afrikaans)
Similarly another described unplugged learning as transformative for their own sense of readiness:
‘The biggest relief was learning about unplugged activities. I thought I needed fancy computers to teach coding, but now I know I can teach computational thinking concepts through play-based activities.’ (P13, 21, F, HL: Sepedi)
At the same time, participants were clear that effective implementation still depends on practical and institutional support. One articulated this in detail:
‘The essential support for effectively teaching coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase requires three things. First, we need simple, hands-on tools … and easy-to-use block-coding apps … that are developmentally appropriate. Second, teacher training is critical; educators need ongoing support on how to teach … core concepts, such as sequencing and logic, through play, not just on how to operate the devices. Finally, schools must allocate dedicated time and flexible space so children can freely build, test their code, move their robots, and collaborate effectively.’ (P36, 21, F, HL: Setswana)
Another echoed the importance of continued support, noting that:
‘Teachers need ongoing training and support to build their confidence as well as curriculum integration, which can link coding and robotics to all subjects in the FP.’ (P39, 21, F, HL: English)
The data also showed that participants were beginning to narrate themselves as future teachers of coding and robotics, moving from uncertainty towards confidence. One participant described this shift directly:
‘I’d share my transformation story [with other teachers] from [being] anxious to cautiously confident.’ (P13, 21, F, HL: Sepedi)
Shorter responses from additional participants reinforced this sense of readiness as emerging rather than fixed, with some calling for:
‘… ongoing support from colleagues.’ (P32, 24, F, HL: Setswana)
‘… professional development that starts from basics and builds confidence gradually.’ (P21, 24, F, HL: Setswana)
While others highlighted the value of:
‘… hands-on workshops where I can practice and make mistakes safely.’ (P13, 21, F, HL: Sepedi)
This movement from apprehension to possibility is important because it suggests that pedagogical readiness in this study was not understood as complete mastery, but as an emerging capacity shaped by experience, support and reflection. Readiness, then, was imagined as emergent and contingent: strengthened by unplugged approaches and practical exposure, but still dependent on institutional time, material resources and continued professional support.
Discussion
This study found that pre-service teachers conceptualised pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics not as technical competence alone, but as context-sensitive pedagogical enactment. Across the data, readiness was understood in three interrelated ways: as developmentally appropriate pedagogy, as inclusive and relational practice, and as an emerging capacity shaped by contextual conditions. Perceived pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics therefore involves more than exposure to digital tools or computational concepts. It also requires the ability to transform coding and robotics content into pedagogically meaningful and developmentally appropriate classroom practices, as supported by the literature (Taheri & Pennington, 2024; Willemse & Callaghan, 2026; Zivanayi & Malinga, 2025). At the same time, the study adds theoretical nuance by showing how such readiness is imagined specifically within Foundation Phase teaching, where play, language responsiveness and contextual adaptation are central.
The first theme suggests that participants were beginning to demonstrate pedagogical reasoning consistent with PCK. Rather than treating coding and robotics as abstract technical content, they imagined it through storytelling, play, movement, hands-on learning and integration across learning areas. This aligns with literature showing that coding and robotics are more meaningful in the early years when taught through developmentally appropriate and inquiry-oriented pedagogies (Chandra & Lloyd, 2020; Falloon, 2024; Vasconcelos et al., 2025; Willemse, 2025). It also supports literature arguing that pedagogical readiness involves the ability to transform new curriculum content into forms that young learners can access (Silva et al., 2021; Willemse & Callaghan, 2026). What this study adds is a more specific insight into the nature of that transformation in the Foundation Phase: participants were already imagining how coding and robotics might be pedagogically recontextualised through familiar early-years practices. In this context, PCK is not only a matter of explanation or simplification, but of translating an unfamiliar curriculum area into forms that fit the developmental and pedagogical logic of early childhood education.
The second theme highlights the relational and inclusive dimensions of readiness and is one of the more distinctive contributions of the study. Participants linked implementation to learner confidence, home language and communication with parents, suggesting that readiness involves more than instructional strategy. This resonates with literature showing that engagement with coding and robotics is shaped by mediation, support and social context (Boz & Allexsaht-Snider, 2022; Gerson et al., 2021). However, this study extends this literature by showing that, in the South African Foundation Phase, multilingual explanation and parental communication are not peripheral concerns but central features of pedagogical readiness itself. In this context, making coding and robotics teachable also involves making it emotionally accessible to learners, linguistically meaningful across home languages and socially legitimate to families. Readiness is therefore not only cognitive or instructional but also affective, linguistic and relational.
The third theme complicates narrow understandings of self-efficacy. Although participants described growing confidence, they did not present it as a fixed personal quality. Instead, confidence was tied to whether teaching coding and robotics seemed practically possible in real classrooms, especially through unplugged activities, simple tools, time, space and ongoing support. This is consistent with literature showing that readiness is shaped by confidence, context and opportunities for supported enactment (Kidd et al., 2025; Martin et al., 2024; Niyibizi, 2025; Patterson & Hartley, 2026). Yet the study adds a more nuanced understanding of self-efficacy by showing that participants’ confidence was closely linked to pedagogical and material feasibility. Self-efficacy in relation to coding and robotics is therefore best understood not only as an individual belief, but also as a situated belief shaped by the conditions that make enactment seem possible.
Taken together, the findings show that, in the Foundation Phase, readiness is not simply a matter of knowing content or feeling confident enough to teach it. Rather, it emerges at the intersection of pedagogical transformation, relational mediation and context-sensitive confidence. This clarifies what is newly learned from the study: pre-service teachers do not conceptualise readiness for coding and robotics as a generic form of technology preparedness, but as a specifically early-years form of readiness shaped by play-based pedagogy, multilingual realities, learner affect, parental communication and unequal material conditions. While this study examined perceived pedagogical readiness rather than observed classroom enactment, these perceptions remain important because they reveal how pre-service teachers understand the demands of implementation and the support they believe they will need in practice.
Limitations
This study has several limitations. Firstly, the findings are based on written questionnaire responses, which did not allow for follow-up probing. Secondly, only 51 students from one module consented to participate, so the findings reflect a self-selected group in a single institutional context. Thirdly, the study focused on expressed perceptions of pedagogical readiness rather than observed classroom enactment.
Recommendations and implications for policy, practice and future research
Teacher education programmes should prepare pre-service teachers for coding and robotics through pedagogical enactment rather than technical exposure alone. This requires opportunities to design integrated Foundation Phase lessons, employ play-based and language-responsive pedagogies, engage meaningfully with parents, and work with unplugged or low-cost approaches appropriate to unevenly resourced contexts. Such programmes should also incorporate structured opportunities for practice, reflection and feedback to strengthen both pedagogical knowledge and professional confidence.
At the policy level, the meaningful implementation of coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase requires more than curriculum inclusion. It also depends on access to age-appropriate resources, guidance for multilingual and inclusive teaching, and sustained support for teachers working in under-resourced schools. Policy frameworks should therefore recognise that successful implementation is shaped by both material provision and continuing pedagogical support.
Future research should examine how perceived pedagogical readiness is enacted in practice once pre-service teachers enter school settings. Longitudinal research would be particularly valuable in tracing how such readiness develops, shifts or is challenged during the early years of teaching. Comparative studies across institutions and school contexts may also offer further insight into how multilingualism, resourcing and school-level support shape the implementation of coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase.
Conclusion
This article has shown that, for pre-service Foundation Phase teachers, pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics is best understood as the capacity to translate, mediate and adapt new content for young learners in context. The findings move the discussion beyond technical competence by showing that readiness is developmental, inclusive, relational and materially conditioned. The study therefore reinforces the need for teacher education programmes to prepare students not only to know coding and robotics but also to teach it in ways that are age-appropriate, language-responsive and workable in unevenly resourced classrooms.
AcknowledgementsCompeting interest
The author declares that she has no financial or personal relationships that may have inappropriately influenced her in writing this article.
CRediT authorship contribution
Kayla Willemse: Conceptualisation, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. The author confirms that this work is entirely their own, has reviewed the article, approved the final version for submission and publication, and takes full responsibility for the integrity of its findings.
Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Kayla Willemse, upon reasonable request.
Disclaimer
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and are the product of professional research. They do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any affiliated institution, funder, agency or that of the publisher. The author is responsible for this article’s results, findings and content.
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How to cite this article: Willemse, K. (2026). South African pre-service teachers’ perceived pedagogical readiness for coding and robotics in the Foundation Phase. African Journal of Career Development, 8(1), 221. https://doi.org/10.4102/ajcd.v8i1.221