Determination of STEM Semantic Perceptions and Thoughts for the Approach of STEM of the Pre-School Teachers

Abstract

The STEM approach is expected to bring innovations that add value to life by blending technology and engineering with the theoretical knowledge presented by basic sciences such as science and mathematics. At this point, it is important that the STEM approach is perceived correctly by preschool teachers and applied to preschool children with correct practices. The aim of this research is to determine the thoughts of pre-school teachers about STEM approach and the semantic perceptions of STEM.The study group of the research using mixed research method consists of 30 preschool teachers in independent kindergartens. The thoughts of pre-school teachers about STEM approach were determined by the interview form developed by the researchers. STEM semantic perceptions of preschool teachers were determined by using STEM Semantic Differential Scale which was developed by Knezek and Christensen (2008) and adapted to Turkish by Kızılay (2017). According to the results, the semantic perceptions of pre-school teachers about STEM areas in general have positive attitudes towards STEM areas, they have very little idea for STEM approach and the reason for application of STEM approach in preschool period is that children are introduced to science in the early period and they support the development of creativity. It is seen that they have the idea to provide the development of problem-solving skills.

Keywords

• STEM yaklaşımı, STEM alanları, okul öncesi öğretmenleri, semantik algı,STEM approach, STEM fields, pre-school teachers, seman-tic perception