Examining Science Pre-teachers' Perceptions of General Chemistry Laboratory Environment

The purpose of this research was to examine science pre-teachers' perceptions of general chemistry laboratory environment on dimensions of student-cohesiveness, open-endedness, integration, rule-clarity, and material-environment. The sample group of this research which was conducted according to the cross-sectional model as one of the survey-research models, consists of 557 science pre-teachers who were studying their 1st year in 10 different universities around Turkey. General Chemistry Laboratory Class Environment Perception Scale was used to designate the pre-teachers' perceptions of laboratory. In addition to the distribution of pre-teachers' perceptions in each dimension, it was also examined whether the distribution differs based on the universities in which those pre-teachers study, and the lecturing instructors' areas of expertise. The distribution in their perceptions was indicated by frequency and percentage values, and the difference in the distribution was analyzed by Kruskal-Wallis, Independent Samples T Test and Mann-Whitney U test. While in perceptions of laboratory there was a significant difference in each dimension based on the universities the pre-teachers are studying in, there was a difference in only dimensions of open-endedness and integration based on the lecturing instructors' areas of expertise. The acquired findings were related to the Literature, discussed and some suggestions were made