Kindergarten education in the Division of Catanduanes, Philippines continues to face challenges in translating teacher preparedness into effective instructional delivery and classroom management within resource-constrained rural schools. Despite policies promoting developmentally appropriate practices, variations remain in teachers’ professional competence and instructional implementation. This study examined kindergarten teachers’ preparedness, teaching strategies, and classroom management practices. Specifically, it assessed preparedness in terms of professional knowledge, readiness, and participation in professional development; teaching strategies in terms of learner-centered, hands-on and play-based activities, and use of instructional materials; and classroom management practices in terms of promoting positive behavior, maintaining order, and creating supportive learning environments. A quantitative descriptive-correlational design was employed involving 92 kindergarten teachers selected through stratified random sampling. Results showed that teachers were generally prepared (M = 3.13), implemented teaching strategies to a very great extent (M = 3.31), and demonstrated a very great extent of classroom management practices (M = 3.48). Readiness emerged as the highest-rated preparedness dimension, whereas professional knowledge received the lowest rating. Similarly, learner-centered strategies obtained the highest rating among teaching strategies, while the use of instructional materials ranked lowest. Correlation analysis further indicated that teacher preparedness had a significant but weak positive relationship with classroom management (r = 0.186, p = 0.042), whereas no significant relationships were found between preparedness and teaching strategies, and between teaching strategies and classroom management. The findings highlight the need to strengthen teachers’ professional knowledge through targeted professional development. More importantly, the study provides localized empirical evidence from rural Philippine kindergarten classrooms, contributing to the limited body of research on how teacher preparedness supports effective classroom management in early childhood education.

Keywords: kindergarten education, teacher preparedness, teaching strategies, classroom management, descriptive-correlational, Philippines