Innovative STEAM Education Research for Child Development by MAKÜ Scientists

Burdur Mehmet Akif Ersoy University (MAKÜ) Faculty of Education faculty member Prof. Dr. Ekber Tomul and Doctoral Student Özlem Okatan, with the support they received from MAKÜ Scientific Research Projects (BAP) and the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK), implemented the project titled “The Effect of STEAM Education Activities Enriched with Augmented Reality on Scientific Process Skills in Preschool Period: Mixed Method” for preschool children.

In the project covering 5-year-old kindergarten students, it was observed that children using technological tools in the preschool period gained early scientific skills and process skills.

The project, carried out in kindergartens in the Gölhisar district, aims to evaluate the scientific process skills of students in 5-year-old classes through STEAM education. The project, implemented in three different groups: control group, normal STEAM education group, and augmented reality-supported STEAM education group, will analyze whether the scientific process skills of the group given augmented reality-supported STEAM education are more effective through comparisons made between these groups.

The project manager, Prof. Dr. Ekber Tomul, stated that the project is a first in Turkey and emphasized the importance of equipping citizens with qualities suitable for the age in a changing world. Expressing that one of the current educational approaches to develop 21st-century skills is STEAM education, Tomul stated that the origin of the project comes from the doctoral thesis titled "The Effect of STEAM Education Activities Enriched with Augmented Reality on Scientific Process Skills in Preschool Period: Mixed Method".

Tomul stated that the focus of the project is to impart scientific process skills to children at an early age and that they aim to evaluate the impact of technology in this process. He expressed that the results of the applications made on preschool children in Gölhisar within the scope of the project are still in the analysis phase and that their expectation is that the scientific process skills of the group given augmented reality-supported STEAM education will be higher.

In the project, where analysis studies are ongoing, a bachelor's, a master's, a doctoral, and a post-doctoral scholarship student selected from MAKÜ students living in the earthquake region are also involved.