PEDAGOGICAL APPROACHES OF ELEMENTARY TEACHERS FOR PRIMARY REFUGEE CHILDREN

Throughout history, people have had to leave their homelands because of wars, firefights, violence and oppression. The fact that people are made to leave their countries makes the refugee issue a serious problem worldwide. Refugees experience many problems in social, economic and cultural spheres. Children, however, are the most affected ones. Inadequacy of the education they get or a total deprivation of that will make them confront some more significant and serious problems in coming years. The aim of this study is to specify the pedagogical approaches of elementary teachers for primary refugee students. General scanning model in quantitative research design was used in this research. This research was conducted to 182 elementary teachers working in İzmir city center in 2015-2016 education periods. The data was collected by one dimensional survey developed by researchers. Internal validity index of the survey consisting 25 items was calculated as 0,95. For the data analysis, t test, frequency and percentage were used. According to the findings of this study, one third of the elementary teachers have stated that they have refugee children in their classes and the majority of the elementary teachers, (%74,7) have declared that they don't have any knowledge regarding the education of refugee children. Also it is stated that the majority of the elementary teachers that participate in this study (%83,0) believe that refugee children cannot carry out their education without any problem. This reveals that teachers of refugee children in İzmir are ineligible. Thereby, it is suggested that in-service training activities regarding the education of refugee children be arranged for elementary teachers.