The present study aims to test the theoretical model which assumes that academic motivation of high-school students is affected by need satisfaction and having life goals. The present study was conducted on 259 high-school students (136 male, 123 female) whose mean age was 15.84, and standard deviation was 0.75. The data of this study were collected by personal information form, the Scale of General Need Satisfaction, the Scale of Academic Motivation and also the Scale of Life Goals. In order to analyse the data, structural equation modelling method was used. Fit values indicated that the theoretical model was consistent with the data obtained. The results showed that high-school students combine their life goals with satisfaction of needs, a combination that appears to increase their academic motivation levels.

Keywords: Academic motivation, life goals, need satisfaction

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016018538 [HTML]

This study aims to reveal to what extent the mathematics oriented academic risk taking behaviors of the 8th grade students are predicted by such variables as the student’s self efficacy regarding math lessons, gender, TEOG, period of study, mother’s education level, father’s education level, taking or not taking private lessons and the parents' income level. Relational screening model is used in the study. The sample of the study includes 1031 8th grade students studying in the secondary schools affiliated with the Ministry of National Education- located in the province of Sivas during the academic year 2014-2015. In collecting the data, the following scales are used; “Mathematics Oriented Academic Risk Taking Scale (MOARAÖ)” and “Mathematics Self Efficacy Scale (MKÖAÖ)”. The method of linear multi hierarchical regression is adopted in the data analysis. It is found that MDF (Awareness in the Behaviors regarding Mathematics) variable is the most significant predictor in estimating MOARA (Mathematics Oriented Academic Risk Taking), GİTE (Tendency to Prefer Difficult Proccess) and BSOE (Tendency to Negativity after Failure), while it is MYBD (Converting Mathematics into Life Skills) variable in estimating BSTE (Tendency to Recover Following a Failure) variable.

Keywords: Mathematics Lesson, Mathematics-Oriented Academic Risk-Taking, Self-Efficacy

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016017559 [HTML]

When Turkey's mathematical literacy performance in PISA 2003 and 2012 is examined, it is seen that it has an increase of approximately 25 points between the two assessments. Despite this increase, the fact that the mathematics performance is below the OECD average leads to the need to determine what factors affect the mathematics performance of Turkish students. This study is aimed to investigate the factors affecting mathematics performance of Turkish students at school and school level. Initially Turkish sample consisted a total of 4848 students from 170 schools. As a result of examining the assumptions of the two-level hierarchical linear model; the data of 4236 students from 128 schools were included in the analysis. The results indicate that 64 % of the variability in mathematics achievement was found between schools. Variables associated with attitudes towards mathematics have significant effects on mathematics achievement. Mathematics self-efficacy has the most significant impacts on mathematics achievement after controlling remaining variables. For the school-level variables, proportion of mathematics teachers was found to be a strong predictor of a school’s average mathematics achievement. However, it’s been found that student-teacher ratio was the only negative predictor of mathematics achievement at school-level. School-level variables explained 44.1% of the variance in the between school difference in mean mathematics achievement.

Keywords: PISA 2012, mathematics achievement, hierarchical linear modeling

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2017026950 [HTML]

In this study, the effect of sexual health education program on the 9th grade high school students’ sexual health knowledge levels and attitude towards sexual health have been investigated. Pretest – posttest – follow up test control group quasi experimental design has been used in the research. Sexual health knowledge and attitude inventory was used for measuring high school students sexual health knowledge levels and attitudes toward sexual health. Sexual health education program for high school which is composed of 14 sessions were applied on experimental group 60 minutes in a week. On the other hand, control group has not been provided any treatment. Mixed Design (one between and one within factor) Repeated Measures ANOVA was employed to the pre-test, post-test and follow up test scores of experiment and control group subjects. Results indicated that, sexual health education program employed to the treatment group has positive effect on sexual health knowledge levels and attitude towards sexual health of 9th grade students.

Keywords: sexual health education, high school students, prevention, repeated measures ANOVA

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2017026755 [HTML]

Although widely conducted, there has been an ongoing debate on the reliability of oral exams resulting scores due to the existence of human raters and the factors for the differences in their scorings. This quasi-experimental study investigated the possible effect(s) of the raters' prior knowledge of students' proficiency levels on rater scorings in oral interview assessments. The study was carried out in a pre- and post-test design with 15 EFL instructors who also performed as raters in oral assessments at a Turkish state university. In both pre- and post-tests, the raters assigned scores to the same video-recorded oral interview performances of 12 students from three different proficiency levels. While rating the performances, the raters also provided verbal reports about their thought processes. The raters were not informed about the students' proficiency levels in the pre-test, while this information was provided in the post-test. According to the findings, majority of the Total Scores ranked lower or higher in the post-test. The thematic analysis of the raters' video recorded verbal reports revealed that most of the raters referred to the proficiency levels of the students while assigning scores in the post-test. The findings of the study suggest that besides factors such as accent, nationality, and gender of the test-takers and the assessors, raters’ prior knowledge of students' proficiency levels could be a variable that needs to be controlled for more reliable test results.

Keywords: Rater effects, intra-rater reliability, fairness, paired oral exams, think-aloud protocols

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2017027583 [HTML]

The aim of this research was to reveal out the mental images of teachers regarding the concept of student. The study group was composed of 290 primary school teachers that were chosen via convenience sampling method and had been working in Ankara during 2013-2014. In the analysis of data, content analysis techniques were used. According to the findings, nine categories were determined such as student as a developing entity, student as a valuable entity, student as a stuff, student as the representative of knowledge, student as an empty mental, student as a social participant, student as an original entity, student as a passive knowledge receiver, student as a negative connotation. The views of teachers did not indicate significant difference according to gender, whereas the views indicated significant difference according to the branches. When the affective qualities’ importance is taken into consideration, effective professional training and in-service teacher training that will make branch teachers’ metaphors positive towards students are seen important.

Keywords: Teacher, student, metaphor, student metaphor

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016018864 [HTML]

Developing creative thinking, language and academic skills which are related to cognitive skills during pre-school period with qualified programs is crucially important for children’s further lives. Based on above view, in this study it is aimed to examine the effect of support program for cognitive skills on 61-72 month children’s creative thinking, academic and language skills. The sample of the study is composed of 58 normally developing children; 29 of them are in the control group and 29 of them are in experimental group. As data collection instruments “Personal Information Form” was used to collect general information about children, “Test for Creative Thinking-Drawing Production (TCT-DP)” developed by Urban and Jellen (1996) and adapted into Turkish and its validity and reliability study was conducted by Can Yaşar and Aral (2011) and “Kaufman Survey of Early Academic and Language Skills (K-SEALS)” developed by Kaufman and Kaufman (1993) and adapted into Turkish and its validity and reliability study was conducted by Uyanık ve Kandır (2014) was used to measure children’s creative thinking skills. Support Program for Cognitive Skills, which aimed to develop preschool children’s cognitive, academic, language and creative thinking skills, was implemented in two days for 12 weeks. While analyzing the difference between the groups for paired groups Mann Whitney U Test and for within the groups comparison Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test was utilized. At the end of the study it was found that Support Program for Cognitive Skills was effective in developing children’s creative thinking academic and language skills.

Keywords: Cognitive skills, creative thinking, academic skills, language skills, preschool education

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016018726 [HTML]

The purpose of the research is to develop a learning-teaching model for the violin detached bow stroke and to test the utility of this model. Cognitive task analysis is used in the research. The learning-teaching model for detached bow stroke has been developed on the light of literature, video observations and expert opinions. The model contains pre-conditions to learn detached stroke, preparation, critical tasks, process steps and practice suggestions. The model was implemented individually to seven beginner students who had correct violin holding, whole bow practice and had basic sounding skills from bow. Experts evaluated videos the angle of following the steps, control behaviours and playing the correct detached stroke. It is observed that the students can follow the process steps widely and play correct detached stroke. Adult students followed the steps much more restrained according to the adolescent students. After application of the model a semi-structured interview was made about design of the model, convenience of the following steps and practice. Students said that they can follow the steps but they need to take feedbacks between the steps to make sure its correction.

Keywords: Violin, detached bow stroke, cognitive processes.

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016024235 [HTML]

The purpose of this longitudinal survey study was to investigate how pre-service teachers perceive their career choice reasons and the prestige of teaching career along with if they would (re)prefer teaching as a career. The study was conducted at Pamukkale University, School of Education, the Primary School Teaching Program (1–4) in Elementary Education Department. Participants’ were pre-service teachers registered to the program in 2010-2011 academic year, and their perceptions were followed for the next four years. Data were collected through a questionnaire including close- and open-ended questions and were analyzed by employing a descriptive analysis technique. Emerging (and other) findings were presented by using frequencies and percentages. Findings could be expressed in three dimensions: (1) Effective career choice factors could be ordered as intrinsic, extrinsic, altruistic and mercenary. Intrinsic perceptions increased as the extrinsic perceptions were declining in teacher education process. Changes in altruistic and mercenary perceptions were relatively small. (2) Perceptions regarding the prestige of teaching profession declined through the teacher education process. (3) Those who would (re)prefer teaching declined as they approached graduation. Despite some positive effects, efforts are needed to restore pre-service teachers’ image regarding the prestige of teaching profession.

Keywords: Teaching profession, career choice, primary school teachers, teacher education

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016018402 [HTML]

The purpose of this research study is to determine the relationship between leadership behaviors and learner autonomy support behaviors of primary and secondary education teachers. The study was designed in the survey model. The sample of the study was comprised of 338 teachers working in the province of Afyonkarahisar, Turkey, who were selected by using disproportionate cluster sampling technique. Data were collected through Teacher Leadership Scale’ and ‘Learner Autonomy Support Behaviors’ Scale. The Teacher Leadership Scale consists of three subscales, which are collaboration among colleagues, institutional improvement, and professional improvement. The Learner Autonomy Support Scale consists of three sub-dimensions, which are feeling and thinking support, learning process support and evaluation support. Both scales reveal the views of teachers concerning the necessity and exhibition of their behaviors. Descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient were used to analyze the data. Based on the findings, teachers’ level of exhibiting leadership behaviors and learner autonomy support behaviors were higher than they considered such behaviors to be necessary. Teachers considered that, out of teacher leadership sub-dimensions, professional improvement was believed to be the highest for both necessity and exhibition parts. This sub-dimension was followed by the collaboration among colleagues, and institutional improvement. The feeling and thinking support sub-dimension of autonomy support was the one deemed to be the most necessary and the most exhibited. This was followed by learning process support and evaluation support. There were also significant relationships between teacher leadership and learner autonomy support behaviors of teachers. In the study, such recommendations as creating a democratic school atmosphere for increasing the teacher leadership and learner autonomy support behaviors of teachers, supporting personal growth efforts, encouraging the collaboration among colleagues, and enabling them to involve in decision-making processes have been presented.

Keywords: teacher leadership, leadership, learner autonomy, autonomy support

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016016394 [HTML]

The aim of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of the self-monitoring technique in increasing mathematics multiplication fluency of students with visual impairments. Participants of the study were three students with visual impairments aged between 11 and 14 and attended 5th grade classrooms at a second stage of a primary school for students with visual impairments located in Ankara. All students with visual impairments who used sight as a primary sense could read and write using large printed texts. The study has been conducted using a changing criteria design. The results of the study indicated that self-monitoring technique was highly effective in increasing the number of correct answers, accuracy rates of multiplication fluency and in reducing the number of incorrect answers in all students participated in the study. Overall, study results showed that the self-monitoring technique was effective in increasing multiplication fluency in students with visual impairments. The findings of the study also indicated that the accuracy rates and the correct answer rates of all students were maintained two weeks after the completion of the study. All participants expressed that the technique was easy to use and effective. Research findings were discussed and recommendations for future research and practice were provided.

Keywords: : Low vision, students with visually impairments,. self-monitoring technique, mathematics, multiplication

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016018530 [HTML]

In this meta-analytical study, the effect of the variables, gender and marital status, on teachers’ exhaustion was tested. Within this study, a sample group of 11,651 individuals was obtained by bringing together 31 separate studies on gender-exhaustion, and a sample group of 5,486 individuals by bringing together 18 separate studies on marital status-exhaustion. The results of the analysis, obtained by applying the Russell model of effect, demonstrated that the gender variable affects teachers’ emotional exhaustion, and the marital status their desensitization. The findings demonstrated that female teachers experience more emotional exhaustion than male teachers and that single teachers are exposed to desensitization more than the married ones are.

Keywords: Gender, marital status, meta-analysis, the standardized mean difference in independent groups

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2016018517 [HTML]

Exploring teachers’ reflective experiences is important to shed light on understanding how different reflective practices work in classroom settings. The aim of the study was to engage EFL university instructors in reflectivity through various tools and to investigate their related perceptions. To that end, eight EFL university instructors in a Turkish context participated in the study. For systematic implementation of reflective practices, different reflective tools; namely, reflective diaries, reflective video analysis, and reflective peer sessions were used following a training procedure. The participants reflected on their reflective practices by writing reflections, answering a perception questionnaire and participating in semi-structured interviews. Qualitative analysis using the Constant Comparison Method put forward that all participants benefited much from the study in terms of gaining awareness about their teaching practices and promoting self-evaluation albeit some negative perceptions related to time and effort required. The participants also realized that reflective practice is an effective method for teacher development, and it can be applied through different ways or tools. Findings assert that reflective teaching practices could contribute to professional empowerment when implemented in a systematic fashion. This study yields promising results for designing effective reflective practices for teachers in various contexts.

Keywords: reflective teaching practices, reflective tools, teacher education

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2017025118 [HTML]

The purpose of this study is to investigate the origins of secondary school students’ perceptions of gender of scientist. For this purpose, phenomenology, one of the qualitative research techniques, was used in this study. Totally 592 students from five secondary schools in the central of Duzce participated in this study in 2014-2015 academic years. To determine students' perceptions of gender of scientist, a questionnaire consisting of open-ended questions and a semi-structured interview were developed. Although the questionnaire was administered to all students, the interviews were conducted with 120 students selected randomly. The data obtained through data collection techniques was combined and encoded by two researchers participating in the research process. The results of the study indicated that students' cultural background, scientist figures presented in printed and visual media and the use of the terms “Man of Science” or “Scientist” to identify people specialized in science affected students’ perceptions of gender of scientists. According to cultural background, while some students adopting traditional/ patriarchal culture identified scientist as a male based on male gender linked stereotypes or as a female based on female gender linked stereotypes, others adopting modern/western culture and protesting gender linked stereotypes thought scientist as a male and female.

Keywords: Scientist Image, Male Scientist, Career Choice

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2017027508 [HTML]

As an important method of education in the 21st century, distance education has been quite popular in Turkey in recent years. As of 2016, there are 114 state universities and 35 distance education units delivering at least one degree program in Turkey. In addition to formal education, open education has reached a significant number of students since early 1980’s. Formal education, open and distance education currently compete with each other. In distance education, the level of competition is particularly high because degrees in similar areas of study and the increasing number of universities delivering distance education programs. Branding seems like a crucial requirement because of these reasons. This qualitative study analyzes the demand problem from the perspective of distance education managers and proposes solutions accordingly.

Keywords: distance education, demand, branding, demand management

DOI : 10.16986/HUJE.2017025182 [HTML]