Abstract
The aim of this study is to determine the views of Turkish social studies teacher candidates about history lessons, as taught in the social studies teacher education program of the Faculty of Education at Karadeniz Technical University. Survey research based on a qualitative research methodology was used in this study. An open-ended questionnaire and semi-structured interviews were used in the research as data collection instruments. 100 final-year teacher candidates participated in the questionnaire and 12 candidates were interviewed. The data collected showed that the history lessons they were taught did not provide them with enough benefits, because of insufficient time and because of teacher-centered approaches. Apart from this, more than half of the teacher candidates thought that the education they were given gave them adequate ability to teach history topics in the social studies curriculum effectively in social studies lessons when they became teachers. History lessons about Turkish history, especially the Seljuks, Ottomans and the Turkish Republic, were seen as the most important lessons. Teacher candidates thought that these lessons were important for transmitting knowledge of Turkish history and culture, which reflects the classic history teaching tradition in Turkey.
Highlights
Social studies is an important subject for transmitting skills, attitudes and knowledge about social life to students, and emerged first in the United Sates (Martorella, 1996); it entered the Turkish education system in 1968, with the name ‘social studies’ (Öztürk, 2015; Aslan, 2016)
Teacher candidates were asked about the sufficiency of the teaching approaches used in history lessons
25 teacher candidates declared that teaching methods and approaches which did not provide active learning were not sufficient
Summary
Social studies is an important subject for transmitting skills, attitudes and knowledge about social life to students, and emerged first in the United Sates (Martorella, 1996); it entered the Turkish education system in 1968, with the name ‘social studies’ (Öztürk, 2015; Aslan, 2016). There have been different applications of it in terms of its content and aims in the Turkish education system since 1968. This subject is called social studies in the Turkish education system, the content of the curriculum mainly consists of the topics history, geography and civics (Aslan, 2016). An important decision was taken about the subject, and social studies was removed from the curriculum in Turkey in 1985; national history, national geography and knowledge of civics replaced it The main aim of this development was to increase love of country and the patriotic values of students
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