Abstract:

The beliefs of pre-school teachers candidates in mathematical development form the basic ground for shaping the perceptions and attitudes of pre-school children to mathematics. Therefore, it is necessary to determine as early as possible the beliefs of mathematical development of pre-school teachers candidates to prevent negative perceptions and attitudes that will develop in pre-school students about mathematics. This study was done with the aim of determining the beliefs of pre-school teacher candidates in mathematical development. The examples of the study are made by 248 teachers candidates who study in the Pre-School Teaching Department of the University of Inönü and Dicle University. In the research, one of the quantial methods was used by scanning method. As a data collection tool, the "General Information Form" was used to collect information about the teachers' candidates and the "Matematical Development Faith Scale" to determine the mathematical beliefs of the teachers' candidates. In the analysis of the data, visual statistics were used, Mann Whitney U and Kruskal Wallis H test. The research finds that pre-school teachers are believed that mathematical education is important/suitable/need for the pre-school semester/program. Pre-school teacher candidates express that they can help their pre-school children learn mathematics and that they will not be disturbed by teaching mathematics; they believe that they do not have to be sure that children remember the counting numbers before mathematics education and that it is unnecessary that children help them remember the numerical processes. There is no significant difference between the gender of pre-school teachers candidates, the fields of secondary education they graduate and the universities in which they continue and the mathematical beliefs, while there is a significant difference between the class levels of pre-school teachers candidates in their undergraduate studies, the conditions of receiving mathematical education lessons and the (pre-school) undergraduate studies they previously graduate and the mathematical beliefs.

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