Changes of the Chemistry Teacher Candidates’ Attitudes towards and Views about Information and Communication Technologies: ChemBioDraw Application

The aim of this study is to determine technology attitudes of chemistry teacher candidates by using ChemBioDraw software as computer assisted teaching material in Organic Structural Analysis class for planned four weeks. Furthermore, it was also intended students thoughts about using technology and visualization software in education. This study was carried out as applicable for the mixed method approach. In this regard, a pre- and post-test single group experimental design was administrated to examine the change of the participants’ attitudes. Their ideas on the usage of technology in the education system were determined by individual interviews. The sample of this study consists of 20 fourth grade chemistry teacher candidates who registered to organic structural analysis class in the department of chemistry of a university located in the southeast of the Anatolia for the 2014-2015 spring semester. Technology attitude scale and semi-structured interview form were used as the data collection tool to determine the ideas of chemistry teacher candidates for the usage of technology in the field of chemistry teaching. In the present study, paired samples t-test was used for the comparison of pre- and post-test scores of the chemistry teacher candidates. The participants’ ideas from interviews were subjected to content analysis. The frequency tables were composed based on similarities and differences in the responses. The technology attitudes of teacher candidates have changed significantly positive according to interview and statistical analysis results. Furthermore, the chemistry candidates have noticed that technology has an effective place in the chemistry lessons education. Teacher education should be integrated more according to these outcomes.