Social Studies and History Teacher Candidates' Attitudes and Evaluations towards the "Teaching Practice Course"

Abstract

The teaching practice course is an important opportunity for teacher candidates to gain skills and experience in the profession before their service. Teacher candidates' attitudes and evaluations regarding the teaching practice course can reveal whether the implementation process of teacher education is working correctly or not. This is important in terms of the quality and functionality of the process. The study, which was conducted to question the attitudes and evaluations of social studies and history teacher candidates regarding the teaching practice course, was conducted with 102 social studies and history teacher candidates studying at a university in the Central Anatolia Region during the 2021-2023 academic years. The study is a mixed method study in which quantitative and qualitative methods are used together. Descriptive scanning was used in the quantitative part of the research, and phenomenology pattern was used in the qualitative part. The SPSS program was used to analyze the quantitative data of the study; frequency, percentage, arithmetic mean, and t-test values were calculated. In the analysis of qualitative data, descriptive analysis was performed. According to the research results; The attitudes of social studies and history teacher candidates toward the teaching practice course were measured as above average and it was determined that the candidates developed positive attitudes towards the course. In the measurements made for the gender and department variables, no significant difference was observed between social studies and history teacher candidates in terms of gender and department. Pre-service teachers' evaluations of the course are given in detail in four categories.