Pre-Service Teachers’ Perceptions of Instructors’ Teaching Skills

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the perceptions of pre-service teachers attending the pedagogical formation program offered by Balıkesir University Necatibey Faculty of Education pertaining to instructors’ teaching skills. A total of 220 pre-service teachers participated in the study. The data were collected by “Perceptions of Teaching Skills Scale” (PTSS), developed by the researcher. A three-way ANOVA was used to test whether pre-service teachers’ perceptions correlate significantly with their gender and major, and the subject-area of the instructors they evaluated. The results of the study showed that, according to the pre-service teachers’ perceptions, instructors “frequently” demonstrated behaviors indicative of teaching skills. Pedagogs and subject teachers showed similarity in the frequency of display of general teacher behaviors as well as behaviors belonging to the warm-up, development, and closure stages of a lesson. However, they displayed a higher rate of frequency than field instructors in the mentioned behaviors. The independent effect of gender was a determining factor in pre-service teachers’ perceptions regarding general teacher behaviors and behaviors in the warm-up, development, and closure stages of a lesson. On the other hand, the independent effect of major was a determining factor only in pre-service teachers’ perceptions of the behaviors in the warm-up stage. The research revealed that the gender*field common effect affects pre-service teachers’ perceptions of general teacher behaviors, while the field*major common effect affects both general teacher behaviors and behaviors in the warm-up stage. The results also indicated that gender*field common effect and field*major common effect mutually affect each other.