Student-centered factors of geography teaching: From the students' perspective

The aim of this paper is to present a critical view of geography teaching from the aspect of student-centered teaching, as well as the approaches and arguments for introducing significant changes in the internal organization of geography teaching. The teaching of geography has been evaluated according to three groups of factors: the share of methods and forms of teaching and learning, the use of knowledge sources and the media as a knowledge source and work resource for students and teachers, and the process and purpose of evaluating student achievement. The research has been conducted on a sample of 541 second-grade students of Montenegrin high schools, and the instrument used in the research has been constructed according to the five-point Likert scale of attitudes. The research has shown that the teaching of geography in high schools, observed cumulatively according to the above group of factors, does not yet present student-centered teaching. It has also been shown that the examined factors of geography teaching reflect the factors of student-centered teaching, from the perspective of students. The theoretical aspect of this work and the results obtained by studying the attitudes of students should point out to teachers the necessity and significance of changes in the essential segments of geography teaching, and be useful to the education reform organizers who need information about changes in the process itself, thus directly assisting the implementation of the reform.