The effect of redising the First World War in respect of the constructivist approach in 11th grade history books on the students academic success

Textbook, as a written material, is the most frequently used learning and teachingtool that can be accessed by the students and teachers in our country. Textbooks aim atbringing in the targets in the education program to the students according to thecurriculum. It is well known that it is very important for the textbooks, which areperhaps the only resource for some students at some schools to be sufficient in content.According to the principles stated in the Basic Code of National Education, the qualityof the textbooks are also significant in order to educate constructive, creative andproductive people who have the power of free and scientific thought and who bear theresponsibility for the society they live in. As per the new education approach, tolerant,sharing, productive, contributing, investigating and examining students are able tointerpret phenomena in their own way and who have free thought are basis but not thepassive, memorizing ones who are unable to interpret.The common opinion on history courses in our country is that it is a course ofmemorizing. In general, students believe that the only way of being successful is tomemorize the information written in the books or which their teacher made them writein their notebooks. Therefore, they define this lesson as a difficult one during whichthey have to memorize a mass of information, names and dates.The constructivist system applied in the primary education textbooks has activatedstudents. Students now have the chance of interpreting the primary and secondaryresources and various visual materials in the books and have the opportunity of betterixapprehending the subjects by practicing them identically with the activities in the books.The curriculum is also prepared in the same way for the secondary education textbooks.This study in the nature of a field survey consists of conceptual framework,findings and suggestions. In the research, opinions of high school students on the courseand the textbook of History of Revolutions and Principles of Ataturk are received andaccordingly a new subject design is built to be applicable for students. In the textbookof History of Revolutions and Principles of Ataturk for High School 3rd Grade, thesubject of the First World War is edited according to the constructivist system. Thisscheme is applied to the students in the experimental group chosen among Mimar SinanHigh School 11th Grade students and the subject is lectured to the students in the controlgroup chosen by traditional methods and the existing textbooks. As the result of theperformance test made at the end of the practice, a significant difference in performancewas found between the students in the experimental and the control group in favor ofthe students in the experimental group. The students in the experimental group to whomthe designed subject of First World War was applied had the chance of making research,interpreting documents and associating history with other sciences and disciplines. Theyalso had the opportunity of demonstrate their creativity during the in-class activitiesperformed in the design.Keywords: History of Revolutions and Principles of Ataturk, Textbook,Constructivist Approach, First World War, Achievement.