Reflection on Out-of-School Education Activities from the Textbooks to the Social Studies Curriculum

Abstract

The Social Studies course covers many opportunities for students to actively learn-by-doing and learn-by-living outside of the school and classroom environments. In this context, the present study aims to identify how the Social Studies Curriculum in Turkey (Ministry of National Education [MoNE], 2018) supports learning in environments outside of the school; the study also aims to determine the extent to which such learning opportunities are actualized in the activities found in the Social Studies textbooks published during 2019. The current study adopts a qualitative document analysis method. The textbooks to be examined for this study are the Social Studies 4th Grade to 7th Grade textbooks which are printed in 2019 and prepared by different authors and publishing houses. Such textbooks are also listed on Education Information Network (EBA), an official website affiliated with the Ministry of National Education, and the current Social Studies Curriculum (MoNE, 2018). It was determined as a result of the study that most of the activities related to out[1]of-school teaching and learning in the Social Studies Curriculum (MoNE, 2018) occur at 4th Grade and 5th Grade; also the number of such activities gradually decrease across higher year or grade levels. The greatest amount of activities related to out-of-school education in the Social Studies textbooks are found in the 5th Grade. Homework activities, and other activities such as trip-observations, project assignments, oral history, local history, research assignments supported by family participation, and out-of-school activities including interviews were found in these textbooks. Homework is used the most among the out-of-school learning focused activities. Results from the study concludes that many out-of-school activities covered in the Social Science textbooks are carried out as classroom activities because of the uncertainty about how learning can be achieved in out-of-school learning environments. In contrast, numerous gains are specified by out-of-school education, therefore such gains have been transformed into out-of-school activities in the textbooks for the Social Studies curriculum.