The effect of station technique on students' attitude towards visual arts lesson and creative thinking skills in art education

The purpose of this research is to determine the impact of station technique applications at the 11th-grade level of secondary education on students' attitudes towards visual arts classes and their creative thinking skills in art education. The research was conducted with a total of 26 11th-grade students studying at Balıkesir High School in the central district of Balıkesir province during the second term of the 2021-2022 academic year. The research was modeled using the "embedded design," which is one of the mixed research methods, utilizing both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative section was modeled with a pretest-posttest control group quasi-experimental design, while the qualitative section was designed as a case study. The experimental group received lessons using the station technique, while the control group received lessons according to the existing curriculum. The experimental process was conducted for 9 weeks, with 2 hours per week, and to collect quantitative data, attitude and creativity scales were used. Qualitative data were collected through semi-structured interview forms. IBM SPSS 26 package program was used for the analysis of quantitative data, while descriptive analysis method was used for the qualitative section. Before analyzing the data, the assumptions of normality were examined primarily from the pretest-posttest data applied to the experimental and control groups. As the data obtained from the pretest-posttest applied to the experimental and control groups showed a normal distribution, parametric tests such as independent samples t-test, dependent samples t-test, and ANCOVA analyses were used for data analysis. Assumptions were tested before conducting ANCOVA analysis. For this purpose, equality of regression slopes of the groups, linearity of the relationship between pretest-posttest scores of the groups, Shapiro Wilk for normality assumptions, and checking the independence of the samples with skewness and kurtosis values were examined. Since all results satisfied the assumptions of normality, ANCOVA analysis was conducted. In the research results; it was found that there was a significant difference in favor of the posttest creativity scores between the pretest-posttest creativity scores applied to the experimental group, and there was a significant difference in favor of the experimental group in the comparison of posttest creativity scores of the experimental and control groups, and the level of this difference was found to be high. When the pretest-posttest attitude scores applied to the experimental group were examined, no difference was found, but a significant difference was found in the comparison of posttest attitude scores of the experimental and control groups. The level of difference was found to be high. According to the ANCOVA analysis conducted, a significant difference was observed between the creativity and attitude posttest scores when the pretest scores of the experimental-control groups were controlled. The level of difference was found to be high. It was observed that the station technique applications in the experimental group supported the development of students' artistic creativity and attitudes towards visual arts classes, and the students in the experimental group liked the activities conducted with the station technique. As a result of the findings, it is recommended that during the research period, where students were in an active position and the teacher acted as a guide, different methods and techniques should be used more in teaching.