The impact of engineering design-based activities on 8th grade students environmental awareness, entrepreneurship perception and entrepreneurship skills

The main purpose of this research is to examine the effects of engineering design based activities carried out in the 8th grade "Energy Conversions and Environmental Science" unit of the curriculum on the environmental awareness, entrepreneurship perceptions and skills of students. In this line, the single group pre-test and post-test –one of the quantitative experimental methods– was implemented to 37 students (21 girls and 16 boys) studying the 8th grade during the 2019-2020 academic year in a public middle school at which mainly students belonging to socio-economically middle class families are enrolled. The engineering design based activities which were structured in line with the targeted achievements of the Energy Conversions and Environmental Science unit of the curriculum were carried out with students for five weeks. The research data was gathered via "Environmental Awareness Scale (EAS)", "Entrepreneurship Perception Scale (EPS)" and "Entrepreneurship Skills Checklist (ESC)". The obtained data were analysed with the SPSS program. Descriptive Statistics and Paired Sample T-Test were used to analyse the data. As a result of the research, it was observed that there was a significant difference between the pre-test and post-test data obtained from the EAS and EPS. The findings revealed that engineering design based science activities conducted in the context of real life contribute to the increase in the environmental awareness and entrepreneurship interest of students. In addition, positive developments were identified in the entrepreneurship skills of students considering self-confidence, perception of innovation and creativity, leadership competency, tendency to stand out, social skills and group work ability and risk taking tendency as the sub-dimensions. It was observed that engineering design based activities had a high level of impact on the environmental awareness of 8th grade students and a medium size effect on entrepreneurial perceptions.