Investigation of attitudes of prospective physical education teachers towards the profession of teaching

One of the significant factors which determine professional success of the teachers is their attitudes towards their profession. It has been thought that this is also true for physical education teachers. Starting from this point of view, the aim of this study is determining professional attitudes of prospective physical education teachers as well as observing these attitudes by considering their sex, grade level , sports branch, accommodation unit, reason for choosing education department and educational background of their parents; all of which are to affect their level of professional attitudes. The research is conducted via survey model which analyzes the attitude levels of prospective physical education teachers towards the profession of teaching. Research group is composed of 161 prospective teachers studying at Aksaray University, School of Physical Education and Sports, Department of Physical Education and Sport Teaching; 58 of which are female and 103 of which are male (Mage=21.223, Sd= 2.339). Questionnaire for personal data and Attitude Scale towards Profession of Physical Education Teaching are used as data collection tools. In comparing two parameters according to status of the variables; t test has been used for differences between arithmetic means in independent groups, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) test has been used for more than two parameters, and Tukey test has been used for heterogeneous distributions having significance level. In the analysis, as descriptive statistics, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, frequency and percentage distribution, reliability analysis are used. As a result, insufficient levels of attitudes towards the profession as well as professional affinity of the prospective physical education teachers are observed. Besides, their levels of professional concern are observed more than expected. The fact that sex, grade level, accommodation unit where they have spent most of their lives and the reasons for choosing the teaching department are the factors on prospective physical education teachers' attitude levels towards the profession of teaching has also been determined. Keywords 1. Attitudes 2. Professional Attitude 3. Physical Education 4. Prospective Physical Education Teacher