Use of oral history as learning and teaching method in social studies courses

Oral history makes people the subject of history by recording people's life stories. Oral history has been used as a data collection tool in particularly history and in many other fields; it has been used as a teaching method in many countries such the UK and the USA for a long time. In addition, oral history studies, which are used intensively in the field of education, were conducted after the curriculum changes had been made according to constructivist approach in 2005. As a matter of fact, oral history was proposed as a method in 2005 Social Studies Curriculum and its benefits were examined in detail. However, there are no examples, guidelines or instructions on how to conduct oral history studies. Similarly, in related studies conducted in the literature, it has been found that no guidelines, instruction or sample implementation forms are recommended to guide teachers, although its benefits, significance, and characteristics have been addressed. In this respect, the aim of this dissertation is to carry out the implementation of oral history method, which is regarded as a teaching and learning method, determine the principles of the oral history implementation, unearth the students and teachers' opinions about the use of oral history practices, and prepare an Oral History Implementation Instruction for social studies and history teachers to apply oral history method. Within the scope of the dissertation, which includes Pilot and Main Implementation, students made oral history studies on "There is No End to Progression" (İlerlemenin Sonu Yok) which is a topic of Social Studies Curriculum. The study was conducted according to the exploratory research model which is a qualitative research method. The working group which was chosen according to the opportunistic sampling technique were consisted of 20 (13 girls, 7 boys) 6th-grade students who were studying in Central District of Karaağaç Middle School in Uşak province in 2014-2015 Spring term. In this study, as data collection tools Evaluation Form for Student's Oral History Studies, Parent Informing Form, Focus Group Interview Form, Teacher Interview Form, Student's Oral History Reports and Researcher's (Observation) Notes were used in order to generate and gather data, and these forms are developed by the researcher. Both descriptive and content analyses were used for data analysis. After data analysis, several themes which are beneficial both for students and social studies teacher were emerged after the implementation of oral history method with secondary schools students. Data analysis shows that oral history is a useful learning and teaching method that can be used in social studies courses. Students, who participate in the study, state that they enjoy being in the oral history study, but they expect shorter period of study. In addition, they express significant contributions of oral history study such as improving communication skills, becoming an entrepreneur, writing an oral history report, defeating fears and gaining and improving self-confidence and learning local history of the city in which they live. Similarly, the social studies teacher says that oral history is an effective method and students acquired variety of skills such as communication skills, scientific research, taking responsibility, collaborative learning and projecting. In addition, it is concluded that it is necessary for teachers to constantly guide students and communicate well with families during an oral history study. Consequently, an "Oral History Implementation Instruction" was developed for social studies and history teachers and it is presented in the Appendix.