Abstract

The aim of this study was to examine pre-service physical education teachers’ epistemological and pedagogical beliefs and to reveal the relationship between those beliefs. The participants in the study were 333 pre-service teachers studying in physical education and sports teaching departments. The epistemological beliefs questionnaire, and teaching and learning conceptions questionnaire were used as the data collection tools. In the analysis of the data, descriptive statistics, independent samples t-test, Pearson correlation analysis and path analysis were applied. It was determined that the pre-service physical education teachers’ mean scores for learning process-doubting authority/expert knowledge, learning effort and constructivist conception were high, while their scores for innate/fixed ability, certainty of knowledge and traditional conception were moderate. According to the path analysis results, it was revealed that their innate/fixed ability and certainty of knowledge beliefs positively predicted the traditional conception, while their learning process-doubting authority/expert knowledge and learning effort beliefs positively predicted the constructivist conception. As a result of the research, it was determined that generally, the pre-service physical education teachers believed in the importance of effort and process in learning, and that they adopted a constructivist conception. Furthermore, it was revealed that epistemological beliefs are an important variable in predicting pedagogical beliefs.

Keywords

References

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