Analyzing pre-service elementary teachers pedagogical beliefs

The major aim of the study was to reveal prospective elementary teachers' pedagogical beliefs. The following research questions were addressed in the study: "What are prospective elementary teachers' teaching beliefs?" and "Do their teaching beliefs differ based on their gender?. Data were gathered by using the adopted version of Teacher Beliefs Survey developed by Benjamin (2003). The instrument assessed traditional and constructivist view of teaching with a number of 18 items. It was distributed to 234 fourth-grade Prospective Elementary Classroom Teachers. The participants were categorized by using cluster analyze based on their pedagogical beliefs. The analysis results showed that majority of the participants hold constructivist teaching belief whereas remaining presented traditional and pragmatic views. Non parametric statistic test was conducted whether the participants' teaching beliefs differed based on gender. Chi square analysis showed significant difference between gender and teaching beliefs of the participants.

Pedagogical Beliefs ,

Cluster Analysis ,

Gender ,

Pre-Service Teachers ,