Evaluation of scientific literacy levels of science teachers in terms of various variables: Sample of Sakarya

The primary purpose of this descriptive survey study is to examine the scientific literacy levels of science teachers in terms of various variables such as gender, age, seniority, type of program graduated, education level, the region of the school where he/she works, science site/journal tracking status and daily internet usage time to improve themselves. The study group consisted of 166 science teachers working in Sakarya and the universe of the research consists of 437 science teachers working in Sakarya Province. In the study, Scientific Literacy Skills Test (BOBT) developed by Gormally, Brickman, and Lutz (2012) was used. The original language of the test was translated from English to Turkish and piloted. KR20 value of the test was found to be 0.79. Then, this test was applied to science teachers working in Sakarya Province to determine their scientific literacy levels. In the analysis of the obtained data, t-test, ANOVA and mean values were calculated by using SPSS20.0 program. According to the results of the study, scientific literacy levels of science teachers were found to be above medium level. Another result of the research is that there was a significant difference in favor of science teachers between the teachers who graduated from science teaching department and teachers who graduated from other departments such as physics, chemistry and biology teachers. Additionally, it is concluded that the average score of the 4th (understanding elements of research desing and how they impact scientific findings/conclusions) and 5th (creating graphical respresentations of data) skills of the scientific literacy skills measured by the test were well below the total score value that can be obtained from those skills. On the other hand, it was found that the 7th skill (problem solving using quantitative skills including probability and statistics) score average of the scientific process skills measured by the test was quite high. According to the results of the study, to improve the scientific literacy levels of science teachers, it is proposed to organize in-service science education programs on this issue, and encourage science teachers to do a postgraduate education in this field. Key Words:Scientific literacy skills, Science teacher, Science education