An Investigation of the Views on the Integration of Science Technology and Mathematics in a Mathematics Teacher Education Program
Abstract
STEM is a new concept for Turkey. Interest is increasing in the academic community of the related fields and
especially in the field of education of science and mathematics. At the practical level there are sparse
individual efforts of practice in high schools by teachers of science and mathematics. Therefore our primary
aim is to understand how this idea is reflected in the minds of teacher candidates of the related fields in a nonintegrated
mathematics-science program. We also analyzed the curricula followed in the above programs.
Our sample consisted of 349 teacher candidates from the departments of mathematics, science and computer
education and instructional technologies education who were in their final years. For this inquiry we use a
mixed methods strategy. We use both quantitative and qualitative data. Quantitative data comes from the
scale developed by the researchers “The integration of STEM” and also from a questionnaire for the
demographics of the sample. Qualitative data comes from the programs used in the departments. Document
analysis method and descriptive & inferential statistics techniques, are used to analyze data from the scale
and from the questionnaire. Findings of the study suggest positive attitudes towards STEM integration.
Findings also indicate similar and different attitudes with respect to the department. Reasons for these were
discussed with regard to the current literature and to the curricula of the departments under study.
Keywords
References
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