Primary school teachers? views on global education within the context of social studies course

The aim of this study is to examine the primary school teachers? views on global education within the context of social studies course. In the study, phenomenological research design was employed and the data were gathered through semi-structured interviews and document analysis. Using three-interview model, the interviews were conducted with 12 primary school teachers working at six different primary schools in Eskisehir. The data based on documents were obtained from the assignments of the students? at the interviewed teachers? classes and a total of 105 assignments were examined. Content analysis was used to analyze the data gathered in the study. In light with the findings, the following results were revealed: It was found that the teachers perceived the terms globalization and global education as the same. Global education means to deliver the world history and culture, inform students about global issues, enhance the use of technology in teaching, exchange information and culture, consider individual differences, and train students to be aware of mutual interaction. With regard to having multiple perspectives, it was observed that issues such as ?subjectivity of individuals, adopting the dominant culture, showing respect for diversity? were covered in the social studies course. However, only one student assignment mentioned multiple perspectives within the scope of identifying identities and individuals. Apart from that, student assignments were not related to multiple perspectives. It was seen that the role of social studies course in delivering culture and the teachers? views on culture were positive. It was also revealed that the subjects taught related to recognizing and showing respect for different cultures were rather superficial in terms of content. Besides, the events organized within April 23 celebrations (Children?s Day) were considered to play an important role in terms of recognizing and interacting with different cultures. As for student assignments, they mostly touched upon the Anatolia culture which was related to Eskisehir in particular while cultural diversity in our country and different cultural elements in the world were not brought out. It was observed that global issues were not discussed in the social studies course, however, the teachers touched upon problems and developments in other countries as the occasion arose. On the other hand, with regard to global issues, environmental problems, and the NGOs such as Kızılay (the Red Crescent in Turkey) and AKUT (Search and Rescue Association) were covered. Besides, it was found that the students learned problems and developments in the world mostly from media, these were mentioned in the class only when the occasion arose, but the teachers thought the course program was enough in terms of global issues considering the level of the students. However, the assignments were rather superficial with regard to global issues and problems, and these were not taught holistically and with a global perspective, and were limited to natural disasters. As for global interconnectedness, the interconnections between countries and societies were not mentioned thoroughly. In this sense, it was found that the knowledge of interconnectedness in global education could not be taught to the students, and the export-import connections were not enough in terms of the knowledge of global interconnectedness. The assignments linked to global interconnectedness were mostly limited to the role of the NGOs at international level, and countries? membership to international organizations. It was concluded that the student assignments towards recognizing different countries could be beneficial only if the teachers provided proper guidance to the right resources. Otherwise, learning demographic information about countries would not be enough based on the scope of global education and from the perspective of the students. Keywords: Global education, Social Studies, Three-interview model