Abstract:

When it is considered that the basis of the science course is taken in elementary school, the primary school teachers who are also the practitioners of the science curriculum in this level have great responsibilities in the acquisition of science consciousness. It is thought that updating the science curriculum will cause some changes in practice. Therefore, the opinions of the primary school teachers about the implementation of the new program are important. This study was carried out in order to investigate the opinions of the 4th class primary school teachers about the objectives, content, educational status and evaluation items of the 4th class science curriculum in primary school which was updated in 2018 and implemented as of the 2018-2019 academic year. The study group consisted of 5 primary school teachers in the central district of a province in the Western Black Sea Region, selected from the same primary school according to the criteria sampling. The data were collected through the semi-structured interview form. There were 10 open-ended questions in the interview form. The data were analyzed by using a descriptive analysis method. The primary school teachers who participated in the research indicated that the science curriculum should be suitable for the level of the students, their simplicity, attractiveness of the subjects, interest and attention, the content in terms of being appropriate for the characteristics of the students and the beginning of this course from the third grade of primary school; on the other hand, they stated that the coursebook was not prepared in self-sufficient way, there were too many concepts in the program and too many details were included, the number of experiments were low, there was difficulty in providing material for some subjects and there was no laboratory environment. Meeting the equipment needs in schools can increase the effectiveness of the program in practice. Another variable that increases the effectiveness of the program in practice is the inclusion of out-of school activities by primary school teachers in science classes. 

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