The teacher's opinions about acquiring the value of responsibility in social studies course

Making an individual a part of society can be achieved by the arrangement of educational environments in his school and surroundings. If an individual can feel a part of society, only then he can find the purpose of his life. The aim of this thought is to socialize the individual. The socialization of the individual can be realized by giving responsibility to the individual in educational environments.The purpose of this study is to determine the teacher?s opinions on the acquisition of responsibility value in the Social Studies Course. In this research was used descriptive method. This research was conducted with twenty Social Studies teachers at 13 primary schools in Ankara-Keçiören that are affiliated with the Ministry of National Education, in the educational year 2007-2008. The data of the research concerning the teacher?s opinion is collected by semi-instructed interviews. The data is analyzed descriptively. For this purpose, firstly, the data was transcripted, and then converted into codes, and themes and categories have been formed by bringing together related the code key.According to the studies findings, the majority of the teachers have mentioned that the value of responsibility initially must be given within the family. They also evaluate that a lot of problems which is confronted in society are results of his family?s deficiency in giving the sense of responsibility.In this study, it is determined that teachers think that the education of responsibility value is important. Furthermore, it is also ascertained that teachers use the homework as both an evaluation material and activity material in giving the value of responsibility during the Social Studies Course. In addition the majority of the teachers claim that they use their observation on students as the most important evaluation method. It also seems that teachers know alternative evaluation methods, but prefer using traditional evaluation methods since they take too much time and work.It is determined that teachers encounter some problems when giving responsibility value in Social Studies Courses. These problems include families not giving adequate responsibility education to their children, the behaviours being acquired in school but having not been used at home and in child?s surroundings and insufficient course time.According to the findings of the research, to solve these problems can offer several suggestions. Firstly, contacts with families should be improved since the views of families on education are important in teaching values. Secondly, the number of activities that can be used in teaching values in Social Studies Courses should be increased. Thirdly, the study times should be revised and increased.For students to acquire a sense of responsibility the student should be given the opportunity to live with the results of his behaviour in the real world not in an artificial habitat.Key Words: Social Studies Course, Education of Values, the Value of Responsibility