Raising Awareness of Prospective Preschool Teachers about Specific Learning Difficulties

Abstract

In Turkey, the recognition, evaluation and diagnosis of the symptoms of specific learning disabilities (SLD) are carried out during primary school. Academic difficulties of a child with SLD may cause self-confidence problems and adaptation problems at school. One of the important reasons for the late recognition and diagnosis of SLD is that teachers do not have sufficient knowledge about the symptoms of SLD in children. The study was designed to determine the awareness levels of prospective preschool teachers about specific learning disabilities, to draw attention to what the characteristics of these children are, which practices should be included, whether teachers have sufficient knowledge and practices when evaluating the developmental characteristics of children diagnosed in preschool, and to increase the awareness of prospective preschool teachers about specific learning disabilities. In the study, one-group pretest-posttest experimental design model, one of the quantitative research methods, was used. The study group of this research consists of 37 prospective teachers studying at a foundation university in Gaziantep. Since the research was designed to determine and increase the awareness of these prospective teachers towards children with SLD, ‘Learning Difficulties Awareness Scale’ was applied to the prospective teachers. The data collected in the study were analysed by t-test. As a result of the study, it was revealed that the training provided raised pre-service teachers' awareness of specific learning disabilities.