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Open Access Thesis

Keywords

Home economics students--Attitudes; Home economics--Study and teaching;

Abstract

The main purpose was to determine if vocational home economics students' attitudes toward inductive versus didactic learning affect their perception on selected variables concerning the pre-student teaching field experiences. To complete this main purpose it was necessary to determine vocational home economics students' attitudes toward inductive versus didactic learning. The main subjects were 58 vocational home economics majors, as of Fall, 1979, at the University of Northern Iowa. They included sophomores, juniors, and seniors. All students were females. The majors must have been taking, or had taken, one or both of the field experiences in the Common Professional Sequence, a series of courses that must be taken to acquire a State of Iowa Teaching Certificate. Other participants included supervising teachers in the field experiences, who teach home economics. The study involved 12 teachers from the area community schools. Only one teacher teaches home economics at the Price Lab School, the location of the second experience. A questionnaire was developed to determine the subjects' attitudes toward inductive and didactic learning and their perceptions on the selected variables concerning the pre-student teaching field experiences. The students indicated their level of agreement/disagreement with the statements by using a Likert-type scale. Background information was collected for hypotheses testing. Interview guides were developed for student interviews to crosscheck attitude responses, and for teacher interviews to crosscheck field experience responses on the questionnaire. The questionnaire data indicated that 53 of the 58 students preferred inductive learning and five preferred didactic learning. An analysis to determine significant relationships among the perceptions on the selected variables concerning the pre-student teaching field experiences held by students preferring either inductive or didactic learning was made. Only the Pearson r for Variable 4, Factors affecting the desire to learn, was significant at the .01 level. Total scores were used to accept the hypotheses that there were no significant differences among the perceptions on the selected variables concerning the field experiences held by majors favoring one learning style, completing various amounts of the experience, or completing various education courses. The analysis indicated that only one student did not perceive Variable 3, Self-motivation. Similarity in the breakdown of the analyses, using total scores and an item for determining preference of learning style, were used as a basis for accepting one hypothesis. The analysis indicated that there was no significant difference in the type of activities participated in during the field experiences and preference for learning style. No significant difference between GPA and preference for learning styles was found, using total scores to determine preference for learning style, t(56) = .38, p < .05. A significant difference was found, using an item to determine preference for learning style, t(55) = 2.12, p < .05. Interview results supported most of the attitude and the field experience responses on the questionnaire. The teacher interviews indicated that students' comments were reliable.

Year of Submission

1980

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Department

Department of Home Economics

First Advisor

Janice Morgan

Second Advisor

Barbara Pershing

Third Advisor

Jack Kimball

Comments

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Date Original

1980

Object Description

1 PDF file (256 leaves)

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

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