Examining pre-service teachers' inquiry skills in terms of their science teaching efficacy beliefs and challenges

Countries wanting to be at the forefront in science and technology need individuals who inquire and discover scientific knowledge. Therefore science teaching and learning are of great importance. This study aims to examine pre-service science and classroom teachers' inquiry skills, science teaching efficacy beliefs, and the challenges they believe that they may encounter in inquiry-based science teaching. Also, it is aimed to determine the sources of these challenges. This quantitative research was carried out using a cross-sectional scanning model. The study group was determined by the simple random sampling method. In this context, a total of 244 pre-service science and classroom teachers studying at the Science and Primary Education Departments of Central Anatolian were included in the study. To collect the data, "The Personal Information Form", "Science Teaching Efficacy Belief" (STEBI) scale, "Inquiry Skills Scale" and "Challenge Experienced In Inquiry-Based Teaching Scale" were used. The data were obtained from the online form created on Google Forms. The data were analyzed via SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) program. As a result of this research, a moderate positive correlation was found between pre-service teachers' self-efficacy beliefs and their beliefs about inquiry skills. A negative significant relationship has emerged between pre-service teachers' inquiry skills and their beliefs about the challenges experienced in inquiry-based science teaching. Also, the results of the analysis showed that pre-service teachers had confidence in their pedagogical knowledge. Still, they believed that there might be obstacles in inquiry-based science teaching due to this method's characteristic structure. It is also seen that they have concerns such as too many subjects in inquiry-based science teaching, lack of material support, and the method requiring a lot of effort.