Attitude scale development study on democracy education

The main purpose of this study is to develop a valid and reliable scale to determine primary school teachers' attitudes towards democracy education. In addition, it was examined whether the classroom teachers' attitudes towards democracy education differed significantly according to the variables of gender, age, seniority. Study; It is a quantitative research in terms of expediency and is a scale development study conducted in the screening model. The universe of the research consists of classroom teachers working in primary schools in Diyarbakır in the 2021-2022 academic year. In the study, the sample for the pilot and final application of the "Classroom Teachers' Attitude Scale towards Democracy Education" was determined as 627 primary school teachers from the universe by simple random sampling method. In order to create the "Classroom Teachers' Attitude Scale towards Democracy Education", a 25-item draft form was created by scanning the literature. This draft form was reduced to 20 items as a result of expert opinions. The remaining items were converted into scale format, and a draft scale was obtained by using a five-point Likert-type rating scale in the form of 5 (Totally agree), 4 (Agree), 3 (Undecided), 2 (Disagree), 1 (I strongly disagree). Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted with the data obtained from 255 classroom teachers as a result of the pilot application. As a result, 9 items that were found to have very close factor loading values under the factors found were removed from the scale. A two-dimensional ('Attitudes Towards Classroom Management' and 'Attitudes Towards Classroom Communication') 11-item scale was obtained. With the developed scale, the final application was provided by collecting data from 372 teachers. The validity of the scale was ensured by making confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) with the data obtained as a result of the final application. The Cronbach Alpha Coefficient calculated for the overall reliability of the scale was found to be ,882. When the Cronbach Alpha criterion value ranges are examined, it is seen that the scale in hand has a coefficient indicating a very high level of reliability and that measurement results with high reliability levels of the scale can be obtained. When the level of attitudes of classroom teachers towards democracy education shows a significant difference in terms of variables; It was determined that there was no significant difference according to the gender variable, in favor of the teachers who worked at the age of 46 and above, according to the age variable, and in favor of the teachers who were 21 years and above according to the seniority variable. Suggestions were made in line with the findings obtained. Key Words: Democracy, Democracy Education, Democratic Behavior, Democratic Class