The Relationship Between Pre-Service Teachers’ Critical Thinking Tendencies and Problem Solving Skills

Abstract

The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between pre-service teachers’ critical thinking tendencies and problem solving skills. Besides, the other problem of the study is whether problem solving skills show significant difference according to the critical thinking tendency level and according to the compound effect of critical thinking tendency level with gender, department and grade level respectively. The sample of the study consists of 224 1st and 2nd grade pre-service teachers studying at Afyon Kocatepe University Education Faculty. The California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory, which was developed by Facione and Giancarlo (1998) and adapted into Turkish by Kokdemir (2003) and Problem Solving Inventory, which was developed by Heppner and Petersen (1982) and adapted into Turkish by Sahin, Sahin and Heppner (1993) are used as means of data collection in the study. According to the findings of the study, a significant and positive relationship between pre-service teachers’ critical thinking tendencies and problem solving skills was found. According to the pre-service teachers’ critical thinking tendency level (low, positively, high), problem solving skills and sub-dimensions show a significant difference. However problem solving skills show no significant differences according to the compound effect of critical thinking tendency level with gender, department and grade level