Abstract:

Astronomy is as old as human history. Its popularity has increased even more with space exploration of today. Countries have seen that it is necessary to emphasize teaching astronomy in their educational programs. In this sense, in our country, it has been observed that units containing Astronomy and Space Sciences have been highlighted compared to the previous curriculum since 2018. The aim of this study is to investigate the situations faced by teachers as a result of the changes made in the science education curriculum and the teaching difficulties that arise. Research is a qualitative case study. Research data was gathered through face-to-face interviews with teachers who attended Science classes in 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th grades in secondary schools in Antalya province. Semi-structured open-ended questions prepared by the researcher were used as data collection tool in the interviews. The data obtained classified as themes and codes. Content analysis method was used in the analysis of the data. According to the findings of the research, the challenges of Science teachers in teaching astronomy subjects classified as the difficulties that has been experienced with the students, the reason of physical and technical equipment of school, the school administration, parents, other branch teachers or Science teachers, and the execution of the curriculum phases. It may be possible to reduce the difficulties experienced through training on the content development studies and new methods for teachers.

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