I nvestigati on of Preschool Teacher Candidates’ Attitudes Towards Learning and Their Entrepreneurship Levels

Abstract

Since learning to learn and entrepreneurship as lifelong learning competencies get importance, it is expected from teacher candidates to have positive attitudes towards learning and to be entrepreneur. Owing to this, it was aimed to investigate preschool teacher candidates' attitudes towards learning and their entrepreneurship levels in terms of various variables in addition to determine the effect of their attitudes towards learning on their entrepreneurship levels. The research was carried out via participation of 170 teacher candidates having been educated at department of preschool education at Mersin University. "Atitude Scale towards Learning" developed by Kara (2010) to determine teacher candidates' attitudes towards learning and "Entrepreneurship Scale for Undergraduate Students" developed by Yilmaz and Sünbül (2009) to determine their entrepreneurship levels were used. Descriptive statistics was done to determine preschool teacher candidates' attitudes towards learning and their entrepreneurship levels. Tests of differentiation among means was carried out to define whether differentiation occurs in preschool teacher candidates' attitudes and perceptions on entrepreneurship levels according to such variables as gender, grade and the frequency of use of ICT for learning. Path analysis was carried out to state the effect of preschool teacher candidates' attitudes towards learning on their perception about entrepreneurship levels by using Lisrel Program. The findings of the study indicated preschool teacher candidates' positive attitudes towards learning and high perceptions on entrepreneurship. Moreover, it was concluded that attitude towards learning wasn't a variable affecting entrepreneurship level. (English) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]