Teacher opinions on the first reading and writing education in the multigrade classes

The aim of the study is to reveal the opinions of the primary school teachers working in the multigrade classes about the first reading and writing education process. For this reason, the search was carried out in a region where there were many villages and in these villages educational activities were carried out in the primary schools with multigrade classes. This research was prepared with phenomenology pattern which is one of the qualitative research approaches. A semi-structured interview form was prepared for the interview technique in the process of the search. Within the scope of this form, 20 primary school teachers working at primary schools with multigrade classes in the villages and towns of Yıldızeli district in Sivas in the 2017-2018 Academic Year were interviewed. The classes in which these 20 teachers worked were selected as the multigrade classes including (1-2, 1-2-3, 1- 2-3-4 etc.) the first grade. The data collected by the semi-structured interview form were textualized by the researcher. The written data were analyzed by content analysis method and the codes were determined. These codes were combined under various themes. The codes, participants and frequencies belonging to the themes were turned into the tables and they were interpreted. The results obtained from the questions prepared for the purpose of the research were given in the order of the questions in the interview form. According to the results, it was seen that the primary school teachers mostly used peer teaching in the multigrade classes and that the individual study skills of the first grades were insufficient. At the same time, it was determined that the first grade Turkish language teaching program was not suitable according to the majority and that all of the teachers preferred the vertical basic writing.In addition, it was found out that the majority of the teachers found insufficient the books distributed by the Ministry of National Education, but they were satisfied with the notebook implementation. According to the final result for subproblems, it was seen that classroom equipment and stationery materials were insufficient in the multigrade classes. According to the results of these questions, it was determined that the most of the teachers had never worked in a single class before, and that the ones who worked in these classes generally considered multigrade classes as a disadvantage. In addition, it was understood through that the first writing and reading education has both weakness and strength in comparison with the other classses. Keywords: Multigrade Classes, First Reading and Writing Education