Examination of Primary School Students' Cognitive Structures Regarding Rules

Rules are often created based on the needs and values of society. Social rules, on the other hand, are guidelines that state whether we should or should not do certain behaviors. In addition to educational activities, schools also include activities aimed at teaching social rules. The concept of rule, its formation, implementation, classification and diversity, its changing borders, its importance for human education, order, and life has a structure that is highly questioned among people. It is important to know the perspectives of primary school children regarding the rules, one of the ages where this questioning is made deeply, in order to plan educational activities. The aim of this research is to reveal the cognitive structures of primary school students regarding the rules through the Word Association Test (WAT). In this study, descriptive survey model, one of the quantitative research methods, was used. The study group of the research consists of 185 primary school second, third and fourth grade students studying in a Turkish province in the 2022-2023 academic year. The study group was selected according to easily accessible case sampling, one of the purposive sampling strategies. While primary school 2nd grade students associated the concept of rule with 52 different words, third grade students associated 56 different words and fourth grade students associated 75 different words. When the words with a cut-off point of 25 and above were examined, it was seen that school and traffic answers were given at every grade level. When the words at each grade level were examined, it was seen that the students generally did not write the concepts with close meaning and similar meanings related to the concept in which they explained the rules with examples. However, it has been determined that the written words are mostly associated with social and school rules. [This paper was published in: "EJER Congress 2023 International Eurasian Educational Research Congress Conference Proceedings," Ani Publishing, 2023, pp. 225-240.]