Özet:

This research was conducted to reveal the cognitive structures of secondary school students regarding the concept of the Silk Road through the Word Association Test (WAT). The research was carried out in the scanning model. The word association test prepared for the research was used as a data collection tool. The students were asked to write the first words that came to their minds about the key concept of the Silk Road in the word association test within the time given to them. The study group of the research consisted of 277 secondary school students studying in Ankara and Şanlıurfa provinces in the 2019-2020 academic year, that are selected by maximum diversity sampling. Of these students, 141 are from Ankara and 136 from Şanlıurfa, 96 of them are 6th grade, 86 7th grade and 95 8th grades. As a result of the research, the words obtained related to the concept of the Silk Road were examined in detail by tabulating, and conceptual networks were created in line with the cut points determined by considering the repeated words. In the research, 305 different words for the concept of Silk Road were produced by secondary school students. The most repeated word among these words was "China" (f=108). Other words that followed this word and were repeated many times were "road" (f=102) and "trade" (f=99). In addition, the most repeated word in 6th grades was "China" (f=47), while in 7th grades the most repeated word was "road" (f=38), while in 8th grade it was "trade" (f= 54). When the words produced by the students about the Silk Road and their frequencies were examined, it was seen that the words in which commercial relations and transportation came to the fore were derived. In addition, there was no difference in the comparison between the application class levels. It was observed that similar answers were given in terms of quality in all classes.

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