مرکز منطقه ای اطلاع رساني علوم و فناوري - The Investigation of the Effects of the Use of Historical Novels on Historical Reasoning While Weaching Turkish Novel History: an Action Research

Abstract :

This research designed a history teaching activity which involves the use of historical novels in order to enhance the historical thinking skills of students. The purpose of the research is to design and implement a lesson plan which includes the use of historical novels, check the efficiency of such a lesson plan in history education and understand the viewpoint of the research group of high school students. Regarding this purpose, a lesson plan focusing on naval history has been prepared for high school sophomores and juniors. During the implementation process’ first lesson, worksheets prepared by the researcher were filled in an interactive class environment and various activities on naval history were completed. In the second lesson, focus groups were formed with students and the students’ responses were recorded with a sound recorder. At the end of the implementation process, some students were also invited in one-on-one viva voce interviews, which were also recorded. The research was conducted in a private school situated in the Tuzla province of Istanbul and included 23 students. The research is classified as a qualitative research and data were collected in the form of worksheets, interview recordings and focus group recordings, which were all processed in the form of constative and content analysis. The worksheets were distributed to the high school sophomores and juniors in a course of 4 teaching hours and while the author The Fisherman of Halicarnassus’ “Turgut Reis” novel was used for the sophomores, the author’s “Uluc Reis” novel was used for the juniors. The focus group meetings and interviews conducted with the research group of 23 people yielded the following results; the students found history education more enjoyable with the help of historical novels and indicated that they became able to express themselves, develop new points of view, hence acquired brand new information about the Turkish naval history. In a nutshell, it can be said that the purpose of the research is in line with the feedback of the research group.