NURTURING COMPASSION EARLY: FOUNDATIONS AND PRELIMINARY FINDINGS OF ANIMAL WELFARE EDUCATION IN MALAYSIAN PRESCHOOLS

Early childhood is a formative stage for fostering empathy and prosocial behaviour, yet structured animal welfare education is largely absent from Malaysian preschools. To address this gap, the Animal Welfare Resource Pack was developed in collaboration with the Department of Veterinary Services (DVS) and the Ministry of Education (MOE). This paper presents preliminary findings on the effectiveness of the resource pack in enhancing children’s knowledge and awareness of animal welfare and examines teacher perceptions of its usability. A total of 70 preschool teachers from Perlis, Negeri Sembilan, and Johor completed a questionnaire consisting of Likertscale and open-ended items. Descriptive statistics summarised responses, while Kruskal–Wallis and Mann–Whitney U tests compared responses across states and between urban and rural preschools. Spearman’s correlation examined associations between teacher perceptions and observed child outcomes, and thematic analysis of open-ended responses identified implementation challenges. Results indicated that teachers rated the resource pack positively (mean = 4.0–4.3), and children were observed to demonstrate improved recall, awareness, and empathy toward animals. No significant differences were found across states or school settings (p > 0.05), while strong positive correlations were observed between teacher perceptions and child outcomes (ρ = 0.53–0.67, p < 0.001). Reported challenges included limited teaching time, insufficient supplementary materials, and variability in teacher confidence. As these are preliminary findings drawn from initial implementation in three states, further longitudinal evaluation is required to confirm the sustained effectiveness of the resource pack at the national level.