Fen Bilgisi Öğretmen Adaylarının Öğretme ve Öğrenme Sürecine Yönelik Yeterlikleri

Abstract

Öğretmenlik mesleği yeterliliği öğretmenin öğretmenlik mesleğini yerine getireceği hizmet alanına yönelik gerekli bilgi ve beceriyi kazanmasıdır. Öğretmenlik mesleğinin genel kültür bilgisi, alan bilgisi ve öğretmenlik meslek bilgisi olmak üzere üç yeterlik boyutuna da sahip olacak şekilde yetiştirilmesi önemlidir. Öğretme-öğrenme sürecine yönelik yeterlik alanları: Planlama, Öğretim Süreci, Sınıf Yönetimi, Ölçme ve Değerlendirmedir. Öğretmenlerin mesleki yeterliklerinin tam ve eksiksiz olması için bu özellikleri uygun olarak yerine getirmesi kalıcı ve anlamlı bir öğrenme için önemlidir. Etkili öğretmenlerin bazı özellikleri: "etkili öğretim yöntemleri kullanma", "sınıf yönetiminde uzman olma", "ölçme ve değerlendirmede adaletli olma" dır. Kısacası öğretme-öğrenme sürecinde öğretmen yeterlikleri etkili ve anlamlı bir öğrenme için önem arz etmektedir. Bu çalışmada dördüncü sınıf fen bilgisi öğretmen adaylarının görüşlerine dayalı olarak fen bilgisi öğretmen adaylarının öğretmen yeterlikleri alanında öğretme-öğrenme sürecini uygulamaya yönelik yeterliklerinin ortaya çıkarılması amaçlanmaktadır. Araştırmada veri toplama yöntemi olarak yarı yapılandırılmış görüşme tekniği kullanılmıştır. Araştırmada kullanılan soruların yanıtlarını bulabilmek amacıyla Muğla Sıtkı Koçman Üniversitesi dördüncü sınıfta öğrenim görmekte olan 16 Fen Bilimleri öğretmen adayı ile görüşme yapılmıştır. Araştırma bulgularına göre fen bilgisi öğretmen adaylarının çoğu aktif öğretim yöntemlerini bilmemektedir. Yapılan görüşmeler sonucunda öğretmen adaylarının her öğrencide var olan yeteneği geliştirmeye dönük olmayan diğer bir deyişle öğrencilerin bireysel farklılıklarını göz önünde bulundurmayan bir öğrenme süreci oluşturma eğiliminde olduğu saptanmıştır

The teaching profession competence requires the teacher’s acquiring the necessary knowledge and skills with regard to his/her teaching area. It is important that teachers should be trained in a way that they become competent in three competency areas which are general knowledge about the teaching profession, field knowledge, and pedagogical knowledge. Competence fields in the process of teaching and learning are Planning, teaching process, classroom management, communication, assessment and evaluation. It is crucial that teachers should apply these features properly for lasting and meaningful learning process in order to have a complete professional competence. Some characteristics of an effective teacher include "use of effective teaching methods in the classroom", "being an expert at classroom management," and "being just in terms of assessment and evaluation”. In sum teacher competence in the teaching learning process is therefore important for meaningful and effective learning. This research aims to reveal competence of teacher candidates regarding application of teaching and learning process based on views of the fourth grade pre service science teachers. The semi-structured interview technique was used to collect data. In order to answer the research questions, interviews were conducted with 16 fourth grade pre service science teachers who took courses during the spring at Muğla Sıtkı Koçman University. Findings of the study demonstrate that majority of the pre service science teachers don’t know many of the active teaching techniques. The interviews also revealed that they tend to create a learning process that does not intend to develop talents that each student has; in another words it does not take the individual differences into consideration The educational process consists of three basic elements which are teachers, students and curriculum. Teacher qualifications are important for the success of education. The teaching competence is defined as teachers’ having necessary knowledge and skills with regard area he/she is expected to teach. It is important that teachers should be trained in a way that they become component in three competency areas which are general knowledge about the teaching profession, field knowledge, and pedagogical knowledge. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE RESEARCH The shaper of the teaching and learning process is the teacher because it is planned, implemented and directed by the teacher. A teaching and learning process which includes lesson planning, preparation of the materials, arrangement of learning settings, organization of out of class activities, diversifying of instruction according to individual differences, and effective use of time and behavior management will provide students with meaningful and lasting learning. Consequently, it is important to reveal competency of teacher candidates regarding teaching and learning process by determining at which level the science teacher candidates apply the aforementioned features and specify the existing defects. METHOD In this study qualitative research methods have been used. The participants of the study consist of 16 fourth grade teacher candidates who receive education in Muğla Sıtkı Koçman University 2014-2015 school year. Teacher candidates have been selected via maximum variation sampling method which is one of the purposeful sampling methods. 16 teachers were interviewed with meetings lasting about twenty minutes each. The interviews were recorded with a tape recorder. A semi-structured interview form was used during the sessions. In the preparation of the interview form expert opinions were received from 8 experts, 4 of whom from the area of science education while the remaining 4 are from the area of measurement and assessment. A pilot study was conducted with two teacher candidates to evaluate understandability and relevance of the questions. At the end of this process the forms were re-examined and re-arranged and made ready for implementation. The data obtained from interviews were coded by researchers and another science educator and inter-coder reliability percentage is calculated as 82.76%. The privacy of personal information of the interviewed teachers regarded by coding them as T1, T2, T3 ...T16. T1 points to first teacher candidates while T6 represents 6th teacher candidates and T16 stands for 16th teacher candidates. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION The teacher candidates state that they are going to employ the Six Thinking Hats technique and the Creative Drama method. The use of these methods of teaching, which are among the active teachinglearning methods, is seen as a positive feature. One of the most critical factors in the teaching-learning process is teacher’s deciding appropriate method and technique at the appropriate time according to the purpose and subject to be taught. In addition to what a science teacher is going to teach, how he/she is going to teach and if he/she has the required knowledge and skills is also very important. While depending on the educational attainments, the content and features of the students there are many active teaching methods like case study, problem solving, and the station methods and none of the students’ mentioning about these methods may indicate that teacher candidates are not informed fully about active teaching methods. Thus it may be concluded that teacher candidates seem to prefer a teacher oriented teaching environment rather than a student centered one which may create problems regarding the acquisition of the educational attainments. The teacher candidates also stated that they are going to take personal differences of the students into consideration with regard to arrangement of the learning environment and they will prefer a U shaped classroom setting and will conduct experiments. Learning of the content by the students depends on efficiently arrangement of teaching and learning process by the teacher. A rich learning environment depends on not only physical arrangement of the classroom but also features of the students as well. The teacher candidates have not mentioned about arranging a rich learning environment. Thus it is logical to conclude that the learning and teaching processes designed by them will not be effective with regard to acquisition of the attainments. As for out-of-class activities, they stated that they are going to take their future students to science and technology centers, to the nature and zoos. This is a positive aspect with regard to creating informal leaning environments and realizing the educational attainments. In a teaching and learning process it is important to reveal individual differences and taking these differences into account while designing a teaching and learning process. It is important to select methods that enable students to learn at their own pace rather than employing whole group learning methods. In this context, the teacher candidates have not revealed any opinion regarding methods that pay attention to these individual differences. Thus it may be claimed that the teacher candidates may experience difficulties with regard to revealing individual differences of the students and creating learning environments that consider them, which may prevent full and lasting learning. Most of the teacher candidates specified that they will begin the lesson with an inviting and engaging topic. None of the teacher candidates mentioned about determining readiness level of the students, specification of the educational attainments, and selection of the instructional materials. As a result it is possible to suggest that teacher candidates are not proficient in terms of planning the instruction and paths to be followed during the teaching process. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS In order to create a democratic classroom environment it is important to arrange teaching and learning process in a certain way that allows an effective communication between teachers and students, and students and students. Planning and implementing teaching activities with students and creating classroom rules with student participation is important to establish a democratic classroom atmosphere. During the pre-service education of the teacher candidates practical activities regarding teaching and learning process must be given place specifically. The process of recruiting teachers to teacher training institutions should be a gradual process that requires a special selection. Throughout the teacher training terms the science teacher candidates should be provided with practical opportunities regarding student centered teaching methods, student individual differences, planning activities and time management