Investigation of the relationship between the ecological identities and the environmental literacy of prospective primary school teachers

The importance of education in protecting the environment and the environment is increasing day by day due to the problems such as the rapid depletion of natural resources, global climate changes, depletion of the ozone layer, unplanned urbanization, environmental pollution, extinction of living things. One of the most important aims of environmental education is to enable individuals to develop their knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors regarding the environment. Students, future elders, should be educated as individuals with high knowledge, consciousness, and awareness, having multiple knowledge about their environment in order to live in harmony with their environment. In this context, it is especially important to determine the literacy and identity characteristics of pre-service teachers, who will be teachers in the future and will give environmental education to individuals, in terms of planning the quality of education. Based on the identified characteristics, the aim of this study is to examine the relationship between pre-service teachers' ecological identities and their environmental literacy. The research is quantitative research in correlational survey model. In a correlational research design, it is aimed to investigate relationships between variables without the researcher controlling or manipulating any of them. In this study, correlational research, a type of non-experimental research method, was used to determine the ecological identities and environmental literacy levels of pre-service teachers and describe the relationships between them. The study group consists of 135 pre-service teachers studying in the third and fourth class of a state university located in the middle Black Sea, Faculty of Education, Department of Classroom Teaching in the 2020-2021 academic year. The sample was selected by the easily accessible sampling method. "Ecological Identity Scale" and "Environmental Literacy Scale" were used as data collection tools in the study. Ecological identity scale was developed by Walton and Jones (2017) and adapted into Turkish by Gezer and İlhan (2018). In the adaptation process, the scale was applied to a study group of 460 university students and the Cronbach alpha internal consistency coefficient was found to be .78. The scale consists of 18 items with a five-point Likert-type. 13 of the items in the scale were positive, five items negative and scored in reverse. As environmental literacy scale "Environmental literacy scale for adults (ELSA)" developed by Atabek- Yiğit et al., (2014) was used. All items in the scale were responded to on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from strongly agree (5), agree (4), undecided (3), disagree (2), and strongly disagree (1). The scale consisted of 20 items and the Cronbach alpha value for the entire scale was calculated as .88. As a result of the study, a moderate positive correlation was found between of the pre-service teachers' ecological identities and environmental literacy, environmental awareness, environmental concern, and environmental awareness. It was observed that pre-service teachers' environmental literacy, environmental awareness and environmental concerns were exceedingly high and environmental awareness was high. A positive relationship was found between pre-service teachers' environmental literacy and environmental awareness, environmental concern, and environmental awareness. A strong relationship was found between pre-service teachers' environmental literacy and environmental awareness, environmental concern, and environmental awareness sub-dimensions. while a moderate relationship was found between environmental awareness and environmental concern sub-dimensions. In the light of the findings, suggestions were made for program makers, practitioners, and students in the process of practices and studies related to ecological identity and environmental literacy in the teacher training process.