An investigation into secondary mathematics teachers' views on values education in mathematics lesson

The aim of this research is to examine the views of secondary school mathematics teachers on values education in mathematics lessons. In this respect, it is aimed to examine their thoughts on the Mathematics Lesson Curriculum (MLC), the secondary school mathematics course book and the teaching carried out in the context of values education by secondary school mathematics teachers. Case study which is one of the qualitative research methods was used in this study. The universe of the research consists of mathematics teachers working in public secondary schools in the central district of Batman province in 2020-2021 academic year. The sample was formed from twenty mathematic teachers selected from this universe by simple random sampling. Semi-structured interview method was used as data collection tool in this study. Content analysis method was used in the analysis of the data obtained in the research. As a result of the research, it was identified that the fact that insufficient inclusion of values education in MLC adversely affected the level of teachers to include values education in mathematics lessons. It has also been concluded that the teachers expect the issue of values education to be given a broader coverage in MLC and to be guided in a way that will ensure the formation of general educational values in the students as well as the academic achievement of the students. It has been found that while problems related to mathematical objectives are included in mathematics course books, activities and problems possessing value are not adequately included. It has been concluded that there needs to be activities and problems having value content and the number of activities and problems related to daily life need to be increased in mathematics course books. The necessity of associating the mathematics course with values in raising individuals who have adopted general educational values was also specified. It was also found that the teachers mostly used root values related to values education in the content related to daily life problems in the mathematics lesson. The inadequacy of MLC and mathematics course books in terms of values education, the parents and school administration's focus on the academic achievement of students, the fact that MLC is extensive to include values education, and the fact that they have not received pre-service and in-service training on values education have been found out as the difficulties in associating mathematics with values experienced by teachers.