Özet:

The main purpose of the study is to reveal the views of preservice social studies teachers’ about the use of courthouses as an out-of-school learning and teaching environment in social studies lessons and to make an evaluation in this direction. The study used a qualitative phenomenological research design. The research group consists of 33 preservice social studies teachers who have previously experienced an exemplary process in the courthouse as a learning and teaching environment. The data were collected using a semi-structured interview form and analyzed using content analysis. According to the analysis results, the preservice social studies teachers held the view that courthouses can be used as a teaching and learning environment in social studies classes to teach topics such as the legislative, executive, and judiciary, legal literacy, and justice. They also stated that courthouses could help teach various concepts and/or values (e.g., judiciary, right, justice, witness, accused, case, and trial) in the context of social studies classes, and the use of courthouses facilitates the retention of knowledge; however, variety of problems may occur before (permission and transportation) and during the use of courthouses (process control). In this context, taking some precautions, it can be suggested that the courthouse should be used both as a learning and teaching environment in the social studies course.

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