Examination of pre-service primary school teachers' metacognitive awareness with anxiety towards mathematics teaching

In this study, pre-service primary school teachers' metacognitive awareness and anxiety towards mathematics teaching were investigated. In this contect, it has been examined whether the levels of mathematics teaching anxiety and metacognitive awareness of primary school teachers' differ according to gender and class level. Finally the relationship between these two variables was examined. The study is designed according to the relational screening model of quantitative research approaches. The study group consisted of 315 pre-service teachers receiving education in Kastamonu University, Faculty of Education, Department of Primary Education in the academic year of 2018-2019. Anxiety scale for teaching mathematics that was developed by Peker (2006) and Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (MAI) scale was used as a method in this study. In the analysis of data, t-test and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and correlation analysis techniques were used. As a result of the study, it was determined that there was a negative correlation between the metacognitive awareness of the class teacher candidates and their mathematics teaching anxiety. Besides, significant differences have been determined in favor of female teacher candidates in the dimensions of procedural information and situational knowledge which are sub-dimensions of metacognitive awareness scale. No significant difference was found in the metacognitive awareness of pre-service teachers according to the grade levels. Mathematics teaching anxiety was only a significant difference in favor of male teacher candidates in the field education knowledge sub-dimension. There was no significant difference in mathematics teaching anxiety according to grade level.