The opinions and experiences of new primary school teachers about social studies and science lessons

Science and social studies teaching are educational disciplines that aim to provide students with the skills to understand, analyse and think critically about scientific and social issues. This study aims to determine the effect of pedagogical content knowledge and teacher competencies of novice classroom teachers on science and social studies teaching. Category analysis, one of the content analysis techniques, was used to analyse the data written in the research. The research was conducted with 14 classroom teachers who were new to the profession in the 2021-2022 academic year. In order to ensure homogeneity of the sample types, diversity was ensured by taking into account the gender of the teachers, the settlement where they work, while selecting the classroom teachers. Fifty per cent of the selected teachers were female and 50 per cent were male. Considering the locations where they work, the majority of them, 57%, work in village. In this study, data were collected through a semi-structured interview technique, the questions of which were prepared by the researchers. Then, the majority of the participants evaluated themselves as adequate in the questions of ‶professional knowledge″ in the scale of professional competence in teaching science course in the dimension of the research. Classroom teachers who were new to the profession stated that they were more competent in the questions forming the field of "attitudes and values". Looking at the feelings and thoughts of the classroom teachers when they first started teaching, it was concluded that the majority of the teachers were excited they were happy with being appointed as a result of their efforts, they had the uneasiness caused by uncertainty and they did not know what to do because they did not know what they would encounter in where they went, and they saw themselves as idealistic teachers. Regarding the opinions of new primary school teachers on planning the results of the professional skills dimension, it was stated that the majority of them considered themselves sufficient in terms of taking into account the individual differences and sociocultural characteristics of the students, creating / organising learning-teaching environments, making measurement and evaluation in accordance with the achievements of science and social studies courses and the developmental characteristics of the students, and applying appropriate strategies, methods and techniques in the learning-teaching process. In the learning-teaching process, among the methods used appropriately in the science course, the invention method is used most, then the experiment method is used, demonstration, direct-answer, demonstration and lecture techniques are used, and the least fishbone method is used by the participants. In the social studies course, it is seen that direct expression and question-answer techniques are mostly used. In the general evaluation of the content of the education given in the faculties of education, it is seen that the participants generally think that the education is given by ignoring socio-cultural differences, the internship period is insufficient, variables such as school administration and student profiles are ignored. The answers they gave in terms of their suggestions on the applicability of science and social sciences courses in terms of science and social studies courses; the application should be diversified, the content of education should be regional, the duration of practice and internship should be extended, education should be designed to teach at the primary school level, and permanent education that appeals to all sensory organs should be made. Keywords:Teacherqualifications, science,social studies,classroom teaching