Description:
This study aims at describing teaching practices in science lessons by using large scale international studies namely PISA 2006, TIMSS 2007 and TALIS 2008. This study specifically tries to answer the following questions: Which teaching practices are used? What are the most frequently preferred teaching practices? Data used in the study were obtained from the international data source of PISA, TIMSS and TALIS. According to findings the most frequently preferred teaching methods are asking questions to check whether topic is understood, making conection between the topic and daily life, summarising previous lesson, demanding explanation on the topic from student, observing teacher when he demonstrates an experiment, listening to the teacher when gives lecture-style presentation, reviewing homework and studying on textbook. The study concluded that teaching practices in science and technology lessons are tend to render students passive and there is a significant difference between written curriculum and implemented curriculum. Teachers put importance on getting students comprehends the subjet instead of developing their research, questioning skills. It is suggested that during the pre-service and in-service training courses mentoring system should more effectively be used.