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Renewed primary and elementary schools science curriculum has been implemented in Turkey for three years. In this curriculum students are required to learn school science subjects by various inquiry-based learning activities or experiments. However, whether pre-service elementary science teachers (PSTs) are completely ready to implement this curriculum by considering some levels of inquiry is still not known. This study aims to explore PSTs’ difficulties in performing guided inquiry-based physic experiments and their perceptions about physics laboratory. A total of 80 PSTs participated in the study and they performed guided inquiry-based electricity experiments. Data were collected through an open-ended questionnaire, the interview and field note. Qualitative content analysis was performed to analyze the data obtained. The results of this study showed that some PSTs faced difficulty in performing the experiments due to their teacher-centered previous learning experiences, insufficient content knowledge about physics, insufficient inquiry skills, poor adaptation to inquiry activities and low-level collaboration. In addition, the majority of PSTs perceived physics laboratory as a place where the physics knowledge was confirmed. As a conclusion, this study showed that most PSTs had some difficulties in performing the guided inquiry-based electricity experiments. How researchers and instructors can decrease the number of the difficulties that PSTs face in the inquiry activities or experiments by taking some precautions is also discussed in this study., Yenilenen İlköğretim Kurumları Fen Bilimleri Dersi Öğretim Programı üç yıldır Türkiye’de uygulanmaktadır. Bu programda öğrencilerin feni çeşitli sorgulayıcı öğrenme etkinlikleri ya da deneyleri ile öğrenmeleri istenmektedir. Fakat fen bilimleri dersi öğretmen adaylarının, bu öğretim programını sorgulayıcı öğrenmenin bazı düzeylerini düşünerek uygulamaya tam olarak hazır olup olmadıkları bilinmemektedir. Bu çalışmanın amacı fen bilimleri dersi öğretmen adaylarının elektrik konusuna yönelik rehberli-araştırma sorgulama deneylerini yaparken karşılaşmış oldukları zorlukları ve fizik laboratuvarı hakkındaki algılarını tespit etmektir. Çalışmaya 80 fen bilimleri dersi öğretmen adayı katılmıştır ve elektrik konusuna yönelik rehberli-araştırma sorgulama deneylerini yapmışlardır. Açık uçlu anket, mülakat ve gözlem bu çalışmada kullanılan veri toplama araçlarıdır. Elde edilen verileri analiz etmek için nitel içerik analizi uygulanmıştır. Bu çalışmanın sonuçlarına göre bazı öğretmen adayları deneyleri yaparken geçmiş öğretmen merkezli öğrenme deneyimlerinden, yetersiz fizik alan bilgilerinden, yetersiz sorgulama becerilerinden, problemlerinden ve düşük seviyedeki işbirliklerinden dolayı sıkıntılar yaşamışlardır. Ayrıca öğretmen adaylarının çoğu fizik laboratuvarını bilginin onaylandığı bir yer olarak düşünmüşlerdir. Sonuçta bu çalışma çoğu fen bilimleri dersi öğretmen adayının elektrik konusuna yönelik rehberli-araştırma sorgulama deneylerinde zorlandığını göstermiştir. Bu çalışmada araştırmacıların ve öğretmenlerin, öğretmen adaylarının rehberli-araştırma sorgulama deneylerinde karşılaştıkları zorlukların sayısını bazı önlemler alarak nasıl azaltabileceği de tartışılmıştır

In this study, the physics subjects that student teachers liked or disliked and the reasons of why they liked or disliked these subjects were determined. A total of 322 student teachers from different departments participated in the study. As a main data collection tool, an open-ended questionnaire was delivered to the student teachers. Then interviews were conducted with some student teachers to confirm the results obtained from an open-ended questionnaire. The results revealed that student teachers who liked the physics subjects indicated the subjects such as ‘vectors’, ‘torque’ and ‘optics I’ more. On the other hand, student teachers who disliked the physics subjects indicated the subjects such as ‘projectile motion’, and ‘magnetism II’ more. It was found that some of the reasons of why student teachers liked or disliked the physics subjects were closely related to their successfulness in solving some physics problems about the physics subjects, their past learning experiences, and difficulty level of some physics subjects., Bu çalışmada öğretmen adaylarının sevdiği ya da sevmediği fizik konuları ve onların bu konuları neden sevip ya da sevmediğinin sebepleri belirlenmiştir. Çalışmaya farklı bölümlerden toplamda 322 öğretmen adayı katılmıştır. Veriler kesitsel tarama araştırması ile toplanmıştır. Ana veri toplama aracı olarak açık uçlu anket öğretmen adaylarına dağıtılmıştır. Sonrasında açık uçlu anketten elde edilen verilerin doğrulanması amacı ile bazı öğretmen adayları ile mülakatlar yapılmıştır. Elde edilen sonuçlar fizik konularını seven öğretmen adaylarının ‘vektörler’, ‘moment’ ve ‘optik I’ gibi konuları daha çok belirttiklerini göstermiştir. Diğer taraftan fizik konularını sevmeyen öğretmen adayları ‘atışlar’ ve ‘manyetizma II’ gibi konuları daha fazla belirtmişlerdir. Öğretmen adaylarının fizik konularını neden sevip ya da sevmediğinin bazı sebepleri, onların fizik konuları hakkındaki problemleri çözerken ki başarıları, onların geçmiş öğrenme deneyimleri ve bazı fizik konuların zorluk seviyesi ile yakından ilişkili olduğu bulunmuştur

In Turkey, a new Turkish High School Physics Curriculum (THSPC) was put into practice, starting initially with the Grade 9 in the2008-2009 education-year. When compared with the previous ones, this curriculum emphasized the importance of students’ active involvement in learning, use of real-life contexts and development of new skills. Even though what is intended with the new curriculum reflects the global trends in science/physics education, its success (or failure thereof) depends a great deal on teachers since they are the main actors to put the curriculum into practice. Whether teachers can implement the curriculum as intended by the curriculum developers remains an important question. A teacher’s belief is an important factor, among others, that affects his/her implementation of the THSPC. In this regard, the aim of this study was to investigate physics teachers’ beliefs relatedto the teaching of physics according to the THSPC. Four physics teachers from different schools participated in this study. Data were collected through interviews, classroom observations and an open-ended questionnaire. According to our findings, physics teachers believed that teaching physics based on the THSPC helped studentsuse their skills, become more interested in physics lessons, relate physics to their daily life and understand physics better. However, teachers believed that factors such as students’ interest in physics, the university entrance exam, inadequate laboratory facilities, limited lesson hours per week, and lack of information and communication technologies affected the implementation of the THSPC. For more effective implementation of the THSPC, making some changes in the curriculum should be necessary.

This study explores finding the areas of polygons with a smartphone light sensor. A square and an irregular pentagon were chosen as our polygons. During the activity, the LED light was placed at the vertices of our polygons, and the illuminance values of this LED light were detected by the smartphone light sensor. The smartphone was placed on a rotating time-lapse device, and this device was placed at the intersection point of the line segments in the polygons. These line segments were also connected to the vertices of these polygons; therefore, the square was composed of four triangles and the pentagon of five triangles. While the rotating time-lapse device was rotating around itself, it captured the maximum illuminance values of the LED light. Using these maximum illuminance values, we calculated the lengths of the line segments. In addition, we knew the period of the rotating time-lapse device and the duration elapsed between two consecutive maximum illuminance values. Thus, we could calculate the angle between two consecutive line segments. With these values, we could also calculate the areas of the triangles in the polygons. Then, the areas of these triangles were summed to obtain the areas of the square and pentagon.