An Analysis of Young Children’s Preferences on STEM Activities in terms of Gender

Date

2020-09-01

Author

Çetin, Mustafa
Demircan, Hasibe Özlen
Şenyurt, Ezgi

Metadata

Show full item record

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Item Usage Stats

182
views

0
downloads

Presenting differences in the participation rates of genders in STEM activities may be a practical way to reveal that a solution to the gender gap should include addressing children at an early age,rather than at later periods in life. Thus, the purpose of the study was to investigate the STEM related activity preferences of 3 to 8-year-old children. The sample of the study consisted of 193 children, between 3- and 8-years old attended STEM activities presented at the eight-hours-longscience fair annually organized. Data was collected through a checklist. The results of the study revealed that the number of boys that attended the activities was greater than that of girls. More boys participated in the age group 5 than girls. On the other hand, girls’ participation was higher than boys in age group 6. The results of the study also revealed that the activity preference of girls and boys did not differ for five out of six activities, i.e., Catapult Design, Jumping Wooden Sticks, Design Own Ship, Rescue the Horse, and Constructing with Mirror. However, it was found that among the six activities, boys participated in the magnetic wall activity significantly more than girls. This study may indicate the basis from which the gender gap emerged in STEM-related fields.

Subject Keywords

STEM activities, Gender-related preferences, Gender gap, Early childhood

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/51809

Journal

Journal of Education and Future

DOI

https://doi.org/10.30786/jef.650246

Collections

Department of Elementary and Early Childhood Education, Article

Suggestions

OpenMETU
Core

An investigation of social competence and behavioral problems of 5-6 year-old children through peer preference, temperament and gender Öneren Şendil, Çağla; Erden, Feyza; Department of Early Childhood Education (2010) The aim of this study is to investigate differences in peer preference, gender and temperamental characteristics of 5 and 6 year old children on their social competence and behavioral problems. More specifically, the present study examined whether being boy or girl, being more preferred peer or less preferred and different temperamental characteristics differentiates children’s social competence, anger- aggression and anxiety withdrawal related behaviors. Peer preference was determined by the “Picture Socio...
An examination of social gender equality and social gender roles in fifth grade mathematics textbook and social sciences textbook Kandilli, Ece; Gökalp, Gökçe; Department of Educational Administration and Planning Education (2020) The purpose of this study is to examine social gender equality and social gender roles in 5th grade mathematics and social sciences textbooks. Specifically what extend gender equality is included in 5th grade mathematics and social sciences textbooks, how gender roles is addressed in textbooks, how gender equality indicated are in the education programs in 5th grade textbooks and how these textbooks are differed in terms of showing gender equality were examined. The study was designed as a multiple case stu...
Investigation of parents’ perceptions of male early childhood teachers Gülçiçek, Turan; Tantekin Erden, Feyza; Department of Early Childhood Education (2017) The purpose of this study was to investigate parents’ perceptions of male early childhood teachers. The participants of the study were 13 parents consisting of 11 females and 2 males living in Ankara, Turkey. For this study, a qualitative phenomenological study was conducted. The data of the study were collected through semi structured interviews. The interviews were completed in three months. Findings of the study indicated that parents had negative and positive perceptions related with their children’s ma...
A course on gender equity in education: Does it affect gender role attitudes of preservice teachers? Erden, Feyza (Elsevier BV, 2009-04-01) The aim of this study is to investigate if a semester-long course on gender equity in education has an impact on the attitudes of preservice teachers toward gender roles. To this end, a pretest-posttest analysis is carried Out in a state university in Ankara, Turkey, employing a sample of 133 preservice teachers: 33 of whom had taken the course and 100 of whom had not. The results reveal that the course has a substantial impact on the attitudes of the preservice teachers. Indeed, the attitudes of the teache...
Relative influence of cognitive and motivational variables on genetic concepts in traditional and learning cycle classroms Atay (Doğru), Pınar; Öztekin, Ceren; Department of Secondary Science and Mathematics Education (2006) The purpose of the study is to explore relationships among elementary school students’ gender, relevant prior knowledge, meaningful learning orientation, reasoning ability, self-efficacy, locus of control, attitudes toward science and achievement in genetics in learning cycle and traditional classrooms. The study was conducted on 213 8th grade students from eight classes of two public elementary schools in Ankara in 2005-2006 Spring-semester. Students in the experimental group (N=104) received learning cycl...

Citation Formats

M. Çetin, H. Ö. Demircan, and E. Şenyurt, “An Analysis of Young Children’s Preferences on STEM Activities in terms of Gender,” Journal of Education and Future, pp. 1–15, 2020, Accessed: 00, 2020. [Online]. Available: https://hdl.handle.net/11511/51809.