The Project of Air Pollution Awareness: Interdisciplinary Community Service Practices

Abstract

The aim of this research is to introduce an interdisciplinary project about air pollution that is organized and applied for Community Service Practice Course. In order to organize this project 32 pre-service primary school teachers and 120 students' awareness toward air pollution (4th grade) have been determined through The Air Pollution Awareness Questionnaire. The results obtained from the needs analysis indicate that learning environments need to be designed that focus on fundamental concepts, causes-effects, future situation and precautions in order to increase air pollution awareness. To achieve an interdisciplinary approach, a two stage learning environment has been designed by relating these focus points with Turkish, Social Studies, Science, Mathematics and Public Administration disciplines respectively. These two stages are preparing the discipline-based course plans and materials; and carrying out the interdisciplinary plans with students by pre-service teachers. In this article, the design, development and implementation process of this learning environment are presented in detail. As a result of this research, a roadmap for how to deal with the Community Service Practices Course in an interdisciplinary manner has been established. Keywords:Interdisciplinary approach, Air pollution awareness, Community service practices course. Hava Kirliliği Farkındalığı Geliştirme IntroductionTeachers are the most important element of the education system that affects the society. Due to their roles and responsibilities such as integrating with the society, being a leader in the society; teachers should receive necessary training that empowers these qualities before they begin their profession. It is also essential that they acquire enough experience during these trainings (Çetin & Sönmez, 2009). Community Service Practices Course (CSPC), which is a mandatory course taught in the departments of education throughout the universities in Turkey, is a medium in which teachers can acquire these experiences (Gökçe, 2012). Similar practices also exist in various other countries and these courses are not only conducted within the scope of teacher education (Beldağ, Yaylacı, Gök & İpek, 2015). For example, there is a program named Service-Learning in the United States that include all students from K-12 to university (Barton, 2000). Service Learning is based on the importance of "experience" as given by John Dewey (Giles & Eyler, 1994;You & Rud, 2010). Within the scope of teacher education, Service Learning is regarded as acquiring experience on complex social problems, developing social skills, and familiarizing with social culture and values by pre-service and in-service teachers (Barton, 2000).CSPC includes participation as speakers or organizers in scientific events such as seminars, panels etc. about the importance of community service, determining the social problems, designing projects for the purpose of solving these problems, and social issues (Council of Higher Education [CoHH], 2006). This course aims not only to...

The Issue of Air Quality in Socio-Scientific Teaching: Does it Impact 11--13-years-old Students' Informal Reasoning Skills?

“…These conditions should be stopped by giving an understanding through scientific education in science classroom. Therefore, teaching cases related to air quality issues must be taught to school students aged 11-13 years to foster sustainable awareness related to environmental topic [7,8].…”