The effect of the self-regulation education program on children's self-regulation and learning skills

The research was designed as a quasi-experimental model with the pretest-posttest control group, one of the quantitative research methods, and was aimed to investigate the effect of the self-regulation education program which is applied to preschool children on children's self-regulation and learning skills. The study was conducted with the participation of a total of 34 children who were 60-72 months old, 16 children in the experimental group and 18 children in the control group, and their teachers in two classes in an independent kindergarten in Kastamonu province. Data collection tools were "Self-Regulation Skills Scale for 4-6 Years Old Children (Teacher Form)" to measure the self-regulation skills of children, "Preschool Learning Behaviors Scale" to determine children's learning behaviors, developed by the researcher to determine the family characteristics of the study group. "Demographic Information Form" and "Teacher Form of Self-Regulation Instruction Program Activities Application Observation Record" were used to learn the opinions of the teachers of the children in the experimental group about activities improving self-regulation skills. A total of 24 self-regulation education activities developed by the researcher was applied to the children in the experimental group for 10 weeks. Children in the control group did not receive any activity to improve their self-regulation skills until the research data were collected, and the children continued their normal education activities. As a result of the research, it was determined that the experimental and control group children's posttest scores increased in all sub-dimensions of self-regulation skills, including inhibitory control, attention and working memory, compared to their pretest scores. While there was an increase in the posttest scores of the competence/motivation and attitude towards learning sub-dimensions, among the learning behaviors of the experimental group children compared to the pretest scores, there was no difference in the attention continuity sub-dimension between scores of the pretest and posttest. Similarly, there was no difference between the posttest scores and the pretest scores in any sub-dimension of the learning behaviors of the control group children. At the end of the processes, it was determined that the experimental group children showed higher skills in all sub-dimensions of self-regulation skills and learning behaviors compared to the children in the control group.