INVESTIGATION OF MATHEMATICS TEACHERS' HOMEWORK APPROACHES BEFORE AND DURING THE PANDEMIC

Abstract

The aim of this research is to examine the mathematics teachers' approaches to homework before and during the pandemic. The method of the study is case study, one of the qualitative research methods. The participants of the study consist of 12 mathematics teachers who work in Sivas state schools affiliated to the Ministry of National Education or give private lessons in Sivas in the 2021-2022 academic year and volunteer to participate in the study. The data were collected with the data collection tool developed by the researchers, first in written form, and then through semi-structured interviews with two volunteers. Content analysis was used in the analysis of the data. According to the findings, teachers' homework objectives are reinforcement, repetition, self-control, and individual learning. They also described homework as work done in out-of-school learning environments. Reasons for assigning homework; they expressed it as determining whether the students understood or not, encouraging them to study, dealing with problems alone for individual learning, working regularly and associating the acquired knowledge with other subjects. They stated that before the pandemic, they prepared the content of the homework assignments for the exam, suitable for the achievements, test and worksheets, from easy to difficult, simple and in accordance with the achievement, while they prepared easier test and worksheets from the content of EBA during the pandemic period. On the other hand, while expressing the methods of giving homework as test books, supplementary resources, worksheets, and textbooks before the pandemic, they stated that they gave homework from EBA, Whatsapp and digital (Z) books in addition to what they did before the pandemic, and they did online exams and digital activities. It is also among the findings that homework follow-up is more difficult during the pandemic process and there are difficulties in reaching students and parents in providing feedback.