Examination of secondary school children's metaphorical perceptions toward Syrian peers and their parents' attitudes to Syrians

The aim of this study to examine secondary school schildren's metaphorical perception toward Syrian peers and their parents' attitudes toward Syrians. In addition to this, metaphors are examined considering gender, class level, number of siblings, number of Syrian classmates, years of Syrian classmates and type pf school. Plus, parents' attitude scores are examined based on education level, income, number of having child and whether having a Syrian friend or not. At last, metaphor types and parents' attitude mean scores were analyzed. Sample of this study is comprised of 211 children (134 girlsi 67 boys), 211 mother and 211 father. In this mixed study, Local People's Attitude Towards Syrians Scale and Attitude Towards Refugee Children Scale were used for parents in qualitative study part and a metaphor sentence about Syrian classmates is collected from students in quantitative study part (My Syrian friend is like……… Because…….). As a results of analysis, it is found that girl students tendency to use positive metaphor than boys and students in Imam-Hatip schools use more positive metaphor than other type of schools. Besides, having or knowing a Syrian friend, higher education level and higher income are related to higher attitude scores for both mothers and fathers. Moreover, parents of children who used positive metaphors have higher attitude scores than parents of children who used neutral and negative metaphor types and children used the most positive metaphor themes among others.