Investigation of the relationship between academics' perceptions of teaching approaches and epistemological beliefs and self-efficacy of pre-service teachers of physical education and sports teaching department

In this research, it is aimed to determine the teaching approaches used by the academics in line with his views in the department of physical education and sports and to examine the relationship between the epistemological beliefs and self-efficacy of the pre-service teachers in the same department. In addition, it was attempted to determine whether the epistemological beliefs and self-efficacy beliefs of the pre-service teachers differ according to the arguments obtained from the personal information and the relationships between these characteristics. This research was carried out by mixed method (quantitative and qualitative). In the quantitative phase of the research, the relational cross-hatching model was used, while in the qualitative phase the phenomenon science (phenomenology) pattern was used. The group of participants in the quantitative phase of the research is determined by simple random sampling method. Accordingly, 1135 pre-service teachers of physical education and sport from seven different universities in seven geographical regions of Turkey have been reached. The group of participants in the qualitative phase of the research consists of 50 volunteer academics who were randomly selected from the same universities. To determine the views of the participating group in the quantitative phase; firstly the personal information form that is prepared by researcher was used, secondly epistemological belief scale towards learning form was used,thirdly teachers' self-efficacy scale form was used. To determine the views of the participating group in the qualitative phase, the personal information form and seven open-ended questions form that are prepared by researcher was used. Analysis of quantitative data obtained from scale forms was done using licensed SPSS 22.0 package program and analysis of qualitative data using licensed QSR NVIVO-8 program. In the epistemological belief towards learning scale of the study, significant differences were found in the overall scale scores of teacher candidates according to age and mother's educational status, and in the lower dimensions of the scale compared to the universities where they received sports education, gender, school type, class, father's educational status (p<0.05). However, there were no significant differences were determined according to their income status (p>0.05). In the second phase, on the teacher self-efficacy significant differences were found in the overall scale scores according to age, class, income status variables and in the lower dimensions compared to school types and universities where they received sports education (p<0.05). However, there were no significant differences between gender and parents ' educational status (p>0.05). In the third phase, from the views that academics have reported to questions about their approaches; they have prepared for the course the most way by scanning resources and literature (f=71), they provided the students' participation with attention-grabbing (f=22) and question-and-answer (f=18) activities, they expected the most from students to be active (f=41), they prefer the most teacher-centered methods in classes (f=71), they expected from students to do research and prepare homework during extracurricular times (f=51) and finally, it was stated that they mostly used traditional measurement and evaluation techniques (f=60). As a result, it was determined that the epistemological beliefs toward learning (=76.851) and teachers' self-efficacy beliefs (=92.048) of physical education and sports teacher candidates were moderate. The relationship between them was positively weak (r=0.240). It was also determined that academics mainly used teacher-centered approaches (f=71) but did not use the methods and techniques appropriate to only one approach during a course; they did the teaching activities according to the situation of the course, the time, the student and the class, sometimes with a teacher-centered approaches (f=71) and sometimes with a student-centered approaches (f=46). Since it is thought that the use of student-centered approaches in the teaching processes in physical education and sports teacher training programs will positively affect both the epistemological beliefs toward learning of pre-service teachers and their teacher self-efficacy beliefs, it should be supported that the pre-service teachers take responsibility for their own learning during the entire process in which they receive their vocational training. Key Words: Teaching Approach, Epistemology, Self-Efficacy, Physical Education, Pre-Service Teachers, Academics