The Effect of constructivist learning and authentic assessment approach on social studies teaching students? academic achievement retention and attitudes towards social studies

iiiABSTRACTTHE EFFECT OF CONSTRUCTIVIST LEARNING AND AUTHENTICASSESSMENT APPROACH ON SOCIAL STUDIES TEACHING STUDENTS?ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT RETENTION AND ATTITUDES TOWARDS SOCIALSTUDIESFazilet KARAKUŞPhD. Dissertation, Department of Educational SciencesSupervisior: Asst. Prof. Dr. Ahmet DOĞANAYDecember 2006, 278 pagesIn the present experimental study, the effect of constructivist learning and authenticassessment approach on elemantary school fourth grade students? academic achievement,retention and attitudes toward social studies was investigated.The study, which lasted 12 consecutive weeks, was conducted at two publicelemantary schools in the Seyhan district of Adana in 2004-2005 academic year. The subjectof the study consisted of total 90 students that they were divided in one experimantal and twocontrol groups. All groups were formed randomly. The groups were equialized according totheir social studies academic achievement pretest scores, social studies attitude scale pretestscores, picture and narrative.The measurement instruments for the study were ? Tarih, İlk Yurdumuz TarihteAnadolu Authentic Paper Pencil Test? and ?Social Studies Attitude Scale? both of which wereadministered as pre test, post test and retention test to measure academic achievement andattitudes toward social studies. Process of Constructivist Learning Conceive EvaluationForm, Process of Authentic Assessment Conceive Evaluation Form were used to assessprocess of constructivist learning and authentic assessment conceive of students.Findings from the academic achievement post mean score revealed that there wasstatistically significant difference between experimental and control groups. This resultindicated that constructivist learning and authentic assessment based teaching approach ismore effective than traditional teaching method on academic achievement. Although, therewas a difference in favor of experimental group between academic achievement retentionscore means of experimental and control groups which was not statistically significant.Therefore it is assumed that the effect of constructivist learning and authentic assessmentbased teaching approach on retention of achievement is not meaningful.ivFindings from the social studies attitude scale revealed that there were statisticallysignificant difference between experimental and control groups in terms of positive attitudeimprovement in the favor of experimental groups. This result indicated that constructivistlearning and authentic assessment based teaching approach is more effective than traditionalteaching method on attitudes. Statistically significant difference was also found betweenexperimental and control groups on the retention scores of attitudes test. This result indicatedthat constructivist learning and authentic assessment based teaching approach is moreeffective than traditional teaching method on the retention of the attitudes.Constructivist learning and authentic assessment approach were effect on conceive ofelemantary scholl fourth grade studentsKey Words: Constructivist learning, authentic assessment, attitudes toward socialstudies, social studies cirriculum, learning and teaching.