Agrıcultural awareness for prospectıe teachers

Abstract

Personal decision making, participation in civic and cultural affairs, and economic productivity are the end goals of education in different disciplines at the individual level. If knowledge and understanding of agriculturally-related scientific and technologically-based concepts are included in the processes required for personal decision-making, participation in civic and cultural affairs, and economic productivity, it is called agricultural literacy. Agricultural awareness which requires understanding of basic concepts related to agriculture, and their impacts on social and economic life of the society, is the first step of agricultural literacy. This research study examined 310 prospective elementary teachers' understandings of basic concepts related to agriculture, including its definition. Therefore; participants' agricultural awareness as a prerequisite for literacy was examined. Research participants were chosen among three programs, mathematics, science and social studies, at the elementary education department. A questionnaire, prepared by the researchers, and interviews with selected participants was the two ways to collect data. Data from questionnaires were analyzed statistically, whereas data gathered through interviews were analyzed qualitatively. Therefore; it is a mixed method research where two techniques were used to analyze data. Quantitative data analysis corresponds mean values of participants with regard to programs they attend. The mean difference among prospective elementary teachers' from different programs was significant at the 0.05 level. Therefore, the sequence of means display that prospective mathematics teachers are more knowledgeable than social studies teachers and lastly, prospective science teachers have the least amount of agricultural knowledge among the others. Participants' agricultural knowledge which might be counted as the basic of agricultural awareness and literacy was at the moderate level. Qualitative data analysis of interviews displays participants' reasoning and resources of what they know about the issue. Details about qualitative analysis were given in the paper. © 2011 Academic Journals.