Training Needs of Primary School Theater Teachers: A Greek Case Study

Aim of this paper is to investigate the training needs of theater educators who work in primary education. The fact that triggered the inception of this research was that studies concerning aesthetic education in Greece refer to all specialties (musicians, visual artists, theater educators). Consequently, the educational needs of the above specialties may converge in some areas, but, depending on the specialty, they differ in others. Additionally, the in-job-training of theater educators has been at least a minor issue. For this reason, it was considered important to study more specifically the specialty of theater educators. In this context, therefore, a qualitative research was designed and conducted using a sample of thirteen theater educators, who work in primary schools in the prefecture of Heraklion, Crete. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data and the results were analyzed by topic. The thematic analysis showed that there is an urgent need for training programs in certain areas.