Difficulties facing the science teacher before serving during the period of practical education in the Republic of Yemen

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to find out the difficulties encountered by pre-service science teachers (PSTs) enrolled in practicum program at faculty of education-Amran University in Yemen. In addition, the study has aimed to find out the statistical signification differences of the main scores of PSTs' estimating of difficulties faced PSTs. To this end, a questionnaire which consists of 64 items all about the practicum difficulties encountered by PSTs was developed by the researcher. Content validity as well as reliabilit of the questionnaire was calculated. Cronbach alpha coefficient of the instrument was found to be (0.78). The questionnaire was conducted during the 2ndsemester of the academic year 2015/2016 to 150 PSTs who randomly selected from a population consists of 417 PSTs. Data of this study was analyzed by different statistical procedures through using SPSS program. Results of the study revealed that 39 (61%) of the questionnaire items ranked as the highest difficulties faced the participants during the practicum program; 7 items (11%) ranked as a medium difficulties; and 18 items (28%) as the lowest difficulties faced PSTs. In addition, it was founded that there are statistical significant differences at α=0.05 in the mean scores of PSTs' estimating of difficulties faced PSTs in all groups ‘comparisons for all subscales except for three comparisons. Based on the results of these studies, some recommendations and similar studies were stated to be studied.