Evaluation of grade 9 physics curriculum based on teacher's views

Abstract

The principle of this research was to examine new grade 9 physics curriculum, which was put in the academic term of 2007-2008, considering the views of teachers who where using the curriculum ın their classes. In addition, teachers views were also evaluated by taking into account the teaching experience and whether they attend an in-service course about the application of new curriculum. Survey model was used in this descriptive study. A scale involving general characteristics, units and subjects, acquisitions, learnng-teaching process and assessment and evaluation dimensions of grade 9 physics curriculum was develop to collect data. Experts news were investigated to ensure the construct validity of the scale. In order to find reliability coefficient, the scale was piloted to 81 physics teachers apar from the teachers in the sample and calculated reliability coefficient was found to be 0.86.There are 54 items in the scale. The final form of the scale was administered to 44 physics teachers who were working in the cities or districts that might be reached easily to apply the scale. SPSS package programme was used to analyse data. According to the findings of the study, teachers thought that activities in the curriculum were not suitable to apply in classroom environment. It is also found that activities were not adopted to the environmental conditions, environmental facilities did not support activities and time required to teach a unit was not sufficient or it was not equally balanced in terms of teachers’ views. The role o teachers should not be disregarded in achieving a success for the application of curriculum. Thus, studies focusing on the curriulum evaluation and examination of teachers’ views should be carried out.