Abstract:
The aim of the study was to analyze the use of blended learning via video streaming websites in teacher education. The research examined the classroom engagement levels in and the opinions of prospective teachers about blended learning via video streaming websites. Thus, the study was designed as a convergent parallel mixed-method research in which both quantitative and qualitative methods were used simultaneously. Blended learning was conducted at activity level during spring semester in 2019-2020 academic year, and the application lasted for 7 weeks, 14 hours. YouTube was preferred among other video streaming websites by the researcher/instructor because it is one of the most popular video streaming websites and contains numerous educational videos. 27 volunteer prospective teachers taking curriculum development in education course at a faculty of education at a state university in Turkey constituted the study group in quantitative part of the research while 10 volunteer prospective teachers participated in the qualitative part of the research. Classroom engagement level of prospective teachers was determined via “Classroom Engagement Inventory” developed by Wang, Bergin, and Bergin (2014) and adapted to Turkish by Sever (2014). The data about opinions of prospective teachers were collected via unstructured and conversational focus group interview. Descriptive analyses were used to determine the classroom engagement levels in quantitative part of the research, and content analysis was used to analyze the opinions of the prospective teachers in the qualitative part of the research. The findings of quantitative data revealed that prospective teachers were often engaged affectively, they were always engaged behaviorally and compliant, they were often engaged behaviorally and effortful, they were often engaged cognitively, and they were never disengaged in the classroom. The findings of qualitative data showed that the application had both positive and negative aspects. Positive aspects included being prepared for the classes beforehand, reinforcing the topics, active participation, studying regularly and systematically, and the opportunity to use the notes in the future. On the other hand, negative aspects included being time-consuming, being bored, inability to identify key points, and problems about the Internet. Based on the conclusions of the study, teacher educators are also recommended to create and use their own short videos each of which covers one single learning objective as a pre-lecture activity to enable prospective teachers have a firm understanding of the materials.
