The development of multicultural education and attitudes of class teacher candidates

The purpose of this study is to determine the change in primary education teacher candidates 'multicultural education attitudes and competencies within one academic year and whether the prospective teachers' multicultural attitudes, competencies and experiences differ according to gender, grade level and geographic region factors. In the study, descriptive screening model was used to determine whether class teacher candidates' differences in educational attitudes, competence beliefs and experiences over time and class, region and gender variables. The research was carried out in the 2018-2019 academic year at the beginning of the fall semester and at the end of the spring semester. The study group of the research consists of 340 first grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, and 4th grade prospective teachers who study in the education faculty of a university in the Western Black Sea Region. In the study, "Multicultural Proficiency Scale" developed by Guyton and Wesche (2005) and adapted to Turkish by Akcakolu and Arsal (2017) was used. According to the results of the research, the pre-test and post-test results of the class teacher candidates' multicultural attitude, self-efficacy and scores showed a significant difference and an increase in post-test scores was observed. It was concluded that the gender of the pre-service teacher candidates did not affect the multicultural attitude, self-efficacy and experience scores. When the grade level variable is examined, the attitude scores of the elementary teacher candidates who are trained in the 2nd grade are higher than the pre-service teachers who are trained at the other grade levels, whereas, when the self-efficacy and experience scores are examined, the pre-service teachers who are trained in the 4th grade are higher than the pre-service teachers in other classes. . Class teacher candidates were found to have no impact on the multicultural attitude and experience scores of their region, whereas in the self-efficacy dimension, the pre-service teacher candidates residing in big cities were higher than the pre-service teacher candidates in other regions. Finally, when the variable of the region where teacher candidates are registered to the population is examined, the attitudes and self-efficacy scores of the class teacher candidates who are registered to the population in the Mediterranean, South East Anatolia, Aegean and Eastern Anatolia regions were found high, while the scores of the class teacher candidates registered in the population in the Marmara region were found high. Suggestions for updating the classroom teacher training program were presented to the research results. Keywords: Multicultural education, Multicultural attitude, multicultural competence, multicultural experience, teacher candidate, classroom teacher.