Competency of secondary school science teachers in laboratory practices and the problems they face with applications

IIABSTRACTIt?s a reality that Science education in our country has some important problems. Theprograms are rather presented with a perspective of memorizing than theory. The classesare too crowded, the lessons are generally carried out with the teacher as centre; these aresome of the difficulties for a teacher. There are also crucial problems with the laboratoryequipments which are very important for teaching Science and the peculiarities of thesphere. These problems increase in schools which are in rural districts.The main purpose of this research is to determine their own opinion about their level ofcompetency, and the problems which are faced by the Science teachers of secondaryschools, while carrying out Science practices in laboratory. These competencies are studiedin three groups. These are in laboratory practices; (a) the competencies of teachers, (b) thematerials, and (c) the state of competency of the physical atmosphere of the laboratories.The competencies of the teachers have been compared according to their sex, experienceand branches. Their opinions have been asked about the peculiarities of the materials andthe atmosphere of the laboratory.During the education year 2004-2005, 181 teachers who gave Science lessons in thesecondary school section of 80 Primary schools in the city of Elazig were subject to thisresearch. All the subjects had taken part of this research, so no illustration was determined.However, only 127 of the poll were delivered. This means that we?ve reached 70,16 % of thesubjects, and that was sufficient.The data was collected by polls in the research which had a descriptive scanning model. Thepoll was formed by the researcher in a five- styled likert type format. Together with thedistribution measurements of the data analytics, was the ?t? test carried out by independentgroups where the measures of the parametric test were revealed in the comparison betweenthe two groups, where the measures of the parametric test weren?t revealed was the MannWhitney U test carried out. In comparisons of more than two groups was the single routedvariation analyze carried out when the parametric test measures were revealed, when theparametric test measures weren?t revealed was the Kruskall- Wallis test carried out. Thelevel of confidence was determined as 0,05.The results of the research can be summarized as:► During the laboratory applications the teachers haven?t found any big differences betweentheir competency levels according to their sex, it has been understood that they foundthemselves sufficiently competent.► It has been found out that the teachers thought that their competency increased inpreparing the test and observing plans, the control of materials and choosing the suitablematerials for the lesson while working through the years.►It has also been observed that their competency in finding the useful materials forlaboratory practices isn?t on the ideal level.Some general suggestions are given in order to increase the related competenciesconcerning the laboratory practices according to the results obtained.► The number of Science lessons in a week have to be increased or separate lessons haveto be determined for the laboratory practices of Science lessons.► Less experienced teachers like Biology and Chemic teachers have to be more educated indetails to be more competent in laboratory practices.► The required preventions have to be settled in order to suit the atmosphere, theequipments of the laboratories of the Science lesson to the purposes of the lessons inprimary schools.Keywords: Science education, educating teachers, education methods, laboratory methods.