Beliefs of Teacher Candidates Toward Science Teaching

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis study aimed to compare the beliefs of teacher candidates from preschool teaching, classroom teaching and science teaching programs have toward their science teaching. A correlational survey model was applied for the design of the study. The study sample consisted of 236 teacher candidates who were selected using the maximum variation sampling method in the 2018–2019 academic year. The candidates were selected from undergraduate students of varying socio-economic backgrounds who were enrolled in different departments of public universities in Turkey’s eastern, western and central regions. The study data were collected using DASTT-C. Results from the study indicated that a large proportion of the preschool teacher candidates had an exploratory teaching style, that classroom teacher candidates obtained similar scores in traditional and conceptual teaching methods, and that a majority of the science teacher candidates had a traditional teaching style. The scores obtained from the drawings of the teacher candidates were subjected to descriptive analysis based on the sub-scales constituting the DASTT-C, and it was found that the teacher candidates from different departments achieved high scores, especially on the “teacher” sub- scale, which indicates that the teacher candidates adopted a traditional teaching style. Furthermore, the teacher candidates obtained lower scores on the “student” sub-scale, which means that they adopted an exploratory teacher style. Finally, the study analyzes showed that the male teacher candidates had higher DASTT-C scores, an indication that they tended to apply traditional teaching styles in the sciences.