Teachers’ Views on Citizenship Subjects within the Context of Social Studies Literacy Regarding Identity Formation and Acquisition of Citizenship Awareness of Immigrant Students

Abstract

While immigrant students, who live in Turkey, have their own values at home, they encounter Turkish culture and values at school and in their social life. This situation brings along certain tensions in identity formation processes. Citizenship education aims to prepare students for social life by providing them with the necessary knowledge and skills to grow up as democratic citizens. Therefore, citizenship education has an important function in the identity formation of children. Therefore, citizenship education has an important function in the identity formation of children. The aim of this research is to determine teachers’ views about citizenship subjects regarding identity formation and citizenship awareness in the context of social studies literacy. Case study, which is one of the qualitative research methods, was used in this study. Data was gathered via a semi-structured teacher interview form. The data of the research was obtained via Social Studies teachers that work in Secondary Schools in Hatay, Turkey, during 2019-2020 academic year. For this purpose, semi-structured interviews were performed with 15 Social Studies teachers. Descriptive analysis technique was used to analyze the data obtained as a result of semi-structured interviews. The data obtained from the research was evaluated; the findings were defined and interpreted. Accordingly, it was concluded that citizenship issues have a unifying and integrating structure, both individually and socially, in identity formation and realizing citizenship awareness, and also influence the adoption of social rules and transforming them into behavior.