An analysis of graduate theses on construetire approach in science education published between 2005 and 2023 in Turkey

The purpose of this study is to examine science education master's and doctoral theses written on the constructivist approach in Türkiye between 2005 and 2023. It was aimed to emphasize the developments, pedagogical approaches, and teaching methods related to this subject in the field of science education. It aimed to reveal the developments, pedagogical approaches and teaching methods in science education. Contribute to the generation of ideas about further studies regarding the constructivist approach that should be done in the field of science education in Turkey. In the current research, "Document Analysis", one of the qualitative methods, was used. The population of the research was determined by criterion sampling, one of the purposeful sampling methods. Between 2005 and 2023 determined fifty seven among science education master's and doctoral theses prepared according to the constructivist approach at universities in Türkiye were analyzed. The analysis of these data was carried out using the content analysis technique. In the results of working; It is seen that the most theses on the subject were written in 2008. İt can be seen that the constructivist approach has become a type of approach that is especially prevalent in today's education methods and guides students' success, perceptions and attitudes. When we look at the distribution of the topics among the independent variables used in the theses, it is seen that the studies on students' academic achievement, attitudes and perceptions (35.8%) were examined the most, followed by learning environments (17.9%), teaching dimensions (12%) and learning theories (7.16%) have been examined. In this sense, it is seen that the necessary importance is not given to the approach and there is not enough diversity in the studies, that is, the emphasis is on learning and success-oriented variables. In this context, issues such as learning environments related to the constructivist approach, the relationship of different methods and techniques, teacher competencies, as well as their relationships with other courses need to be revealed. During their undergraduate education, they should be provided with lesson planning and teaching practices based on the achievements of the constructivist approach.