The Effect of Physics Courses Mathematical Modelling Used on Prospective Teachers' Interests and How They Associate Physics with Real Life and Other Courses

Learning through relating different disciplines provide positive contribution to individuals for establishing connection between science- technology- society. From this point, the aim of this study is to determine the association between relating Physics course in which mathematical modeling was used in one and two dimensional motion units and prospective teachers' interest. By this aim, semi- structured interviews were conducted with 8 volunteer prospective science teachers before the intervention and with 10 prospective science teachers selected through purposive sampling after the intervention, and also observations were carried out during the mathematical modeling intervention with the changing number of prospective teachers, 17 to 23 in different lessons. Data obtained from semi structured interviews were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis and observations were analyzed by employing deductive thematic analysis. Findings revealed that in parallel to increase in the participating prospective teachers' interest in lessons in which interdisciplinary relating was used, their skills to relate physics, mathematics and real life have been developed. In this context, it is recommended that the development of prospective teachers' interest could be further investigated through using different interdisciplinary relating methods.