Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
YUKSEKOGRETIM DERGISI, cilt.7, sa.1, ss.10-27, 2017 (ESCI)
In this research, it was aimed to determine the reasons of boredom experienced by prospective teachers during their courses at a public university, what they do and feel at the time of boredom, the influence of boredom on their absenteeism and academic performance, the characteristics of the courses that they intensely experience boredom and the strategies that they use to manage their boredom. The study was designed as qualitative since the boredom phenomenon that prospective teachers experience together with some emotions, behaviors and attitudes that accompany this experience during the courses can be best understood through the the heuristic nature of this design. As the data gathering instrument, a questionnaire was developed by the researcher that consisted of seven open-ended questions and one multiple-choice question. Data was analyzed by using content analysis. 270 prospective teachers among the undergraduate students from education and literature faculties were included to the study in a public university in Ankara. Results revealed that one-third of the participants found the "half of their courses" boring while more than half of the students found "some of their courses" boring. It was found that prospective teachers mostly experienced boredom because of the faculty-related factors and then came the student-related factors. According to the subjective evaluations of prospective teachers, the reasons caused by the faculty resulted a decrease in their academic performance in varying degrees by triggering their absenteeism. Two most frequently used strategies adopted by the students were; using the mobiles for the purposes of entertainment such as playing games, listening to music and chatting with their near friends. Although one-third of the participants tried to focus on the course to overcome their boredom, most of them were interested in irrelevant activities actively or passively.