Impact of coding training on metacognitive awareness and creative problem-solving skills of secondary school students

Technological developments are coming up with new fields at a rapid pace. In addition, the necessity and importance of increasing the qualitiy of education shows itself in every field. The need for individuals who can solve complicated problems in every field and have engineering skills at a certain level has increased. Individuals who can use different skills together is possible with STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathhematics). "Coding training", which takes place in the scope of STEM, is the basis of this process. Coding is one of the many concepts that entered our lives with innovations in the field of instructional technologies. Coding training is carrying out under the name of "Kodlama Dersi" in Aydın, as well as in many cities in Turkey. Whether this lesson has a positive effect on creative problem solving and metacognitive awareness of students was tried to be understood with this research. For this purpose, in the research, "Creative Problem Solving Inventory" and "Metacognitive Awareness Inventory" were applied to 730 fifth and sixth grade students who are studying in secondary schools which are in Aydın and with and without coding training in the scope of Ministry of National Education Curriculum. In the research, the secondary schools which have coding training and have not coding training was identified by criterion sampling technique. When the incorrect results came up, 488 students who received coding training and 242 students who did not receive coding training were included into the sample. In this research, whether there is a difference between the participants was tried to be understood by using quantitative descriptive method. Because acquired data did not indicate normal distribution, Kruskal Wallis and Man Whitney U nonparametric test analysis were used in the analysis of the data. As a result of the data that is acquired in the research, it is understood that the students who are studying in schools where coding training is applied have higher creative problem solving skills and metacognitive awareness scores in terms of both general and sub-dimensions, comparing to the students who are studying in schools without coding traning. In consequence of the research, it is understood that coding training improves students' metacognitive awareness and creative problem solving skills. Canonical correlation analysis was conducted in order to understand to what extent metacognitive awareness, which is dependent variable, explains creative problem solving behaviour. As a result of this analysis, it is understood that metacognitive awareness predicts creative problem solving skill. In the research, it has been observed that coding training improves metacognitive awareness and creative problem solving skills of students. Because of the advancing technology and practising many actions virtually, it is expected that coding training will take part in curriculum in the world. KEY WORDS: Coding Training, Metacognitive Awareness, Creative Problem Solving, Quantitive Method, Secondary School