Investigating the attitudes of the secondary education students towards the physical education lesson

The aim of this study was to define the attitudes of the secondary education students towards the physical education lesson, to examine the difference between the attitudes of the secondary education students towards physical education lesson and their personal characteristics and to examine the difference between the attitudes of the secondary education students towards physical education lesson and personal and professional features of the physical education teachers. Research group includes 1200 students being instructed in 10 General High Schools and 300 students being instructed in 4 Vocational and Technical High Schools, in all 1500 students, located in Malatya Province during the academic year of 2006-2007. Students were chosen from 9th, 10th and 11th classes at random. A questionnaire form including three parts was used as data collecting tool in the research. The first part of the questionnaire had 14 questions including personal information and features of the students; the second part including Physical Education Lesson Attitude Scale, and the third part had 10 questions including personal and professional features of the Physical Education teachers. The Physical Education Attitude Scale constituting the second part of the questionnaire was developed by applying to 600 students. The scale consists of 11 negative items and 24 positive items, in all 35 items. The scale has one dimension, one factor explaining the variance 36,19% and the first core value is 12,67. The reliability coefficient is 0,80 and between the front tests and the end tests applied to 50 secondary education students in each 45 day time and the consistency coefficient is 0,94 (Cronbach Alfa). Mann Whitney U Test in dual comparisons and Kruskal Wallis Variance Analyses in multi comparisons were used for analysis of the data. The significance level was defined 0,05. when the differences in significance occurred in the results of Kruskal Wallis Variance Analyses in multi comparisons, Mann Whitney U Test with Bonferroni?s correction was applied. Results of the study; 1) The attitudes of the secondary education students towards the physical education lesson have been defined as positively, 2) A difference in significance level has been obtained between the attitudes of the students towards the physical education lesson and their sexualities, classes, school types, education levels of their parents, attending the university preparation courses, doing the exercises in their spare time and frequency of doing sports and doing sports in a club. 3) A difference in significance level hasn?t been found between the attitudes of the students towards the physical education lesson and their ages, number of their sibling, existence of their parents and their parents? jobs and their parents? monthly incomes. 4) Differences in significance level have been obtained between the attitudes of the students towards the physical education lesson and the personal and professional features of the physical education teachers.