The assessment of effectiveness of school- based approach on developing value education curriculum for the third and fourth grade students

The main goal of this research is to assess the effectiveness of school-based approach on developing value education curriculum by making educational, formative and summative evaluation of the developed curriculum. The research sample group is comprised of the third and fourth grade students, parents, teachers, administrators and staff of a private primary school which provides education in the 2014-2015 academic year and is located in Gaziantep. A value questionnaire, student evaluation forms, student self-evaluation forms and interview forms are used as data collection tools of the research. The values which are studied in the curriculum are determined by conducting the value questionnaire. Student evaluation forms and student self-evaluation forms are implemented to collect data for educational evaluation and interview forms are used to collect data for formative and summative evaluation of the curriculum. The data collected through interviews have been analyzed with the descriptive analysis technique and the data collected with pre- and post-tests of student evaluation and student self-evaluation forms have been analyzed by the Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test. The findings acquired at the needs analysis stage shows that the school does not have an effective value education curriculum and that there is a need for a value education curriculum based on the needs of the school and the students. The findings of the educational evaluation of school-based value education curriculum indicate that, according to teachers and parents, all the objectives of the value "to be determined" is achieved by the implemented curriculum. Moreover, according to the students, almost all the objectives of "being determined" is achieved. Then, the objectives of the value "to be sparing of" are partially achieved. According to the findings of formative and summative evaluation, it could be said that school-based approach on developing value education curriculum is effective for third and fourth grades. Key Words: School-Based Curriculum Development, To Be Determined, To Be Sparing, Primary School Value Education Curriculum, Curriculum Evaluation