Use of comics in social studies teaching

This study was designed to investigate the effect of comics use in Social Studies lesson on students' academic achievement, attitudes towards lesson, perceptions of history and their views on comics. It was aimed to reach a comprehensive perspective by using both qualitative and quantitative methods. It involves an experimental implementation of comics use in Social Studies lesson in a secondary school in Istanbul, Turkey in 2014-2015 academic year. With this implementation of 7th grade students, "The Conquer of Istanbul", which is in the 3rd unit "A Journey of Turkish History, was studied. As a mixed-method study, both pretest - post test – retention test and interviews, observation and document analysis were conducted. Under the light of both qualitative and quantitative data, it was concluded that comics use in Social Studies lesson had a positive effect on students' academic achievement, attitudes towards lesson, perception of history and their views on comics. The results of the study were interpreted and recommendations for further research and practices were made. Keywords: Comics, social studies teaching, material use, academic achievement and attitudes.