The curriculum of Social and Environmental Studies predicts learning goals for the second and fifth grade of primary school, where students learn that people are different and get acquainted with the concept of diversity.
In the theoretical part of master’s thesis, I have defined concepts connected to diversity, researched the theme of diversity as part of the curriculum and looked for teaching guidelines on diversity in Slovenia and also in European Union. I wrote about what can influence the development of students' perspectives, defined stereotypes, and prejudices. I described the creative movement as a learning approach. I wrote about its use when teaching the subject of Social and Environmental studies.
I made a pedagogic experiment (quasi-experimental causal research). In the empirical part, I made quantitative research in which I researched:
1. How students of second and fifth grade understand the diversity of people.
2. If students, taught with creative movement approach (experimental group), are more accepting of different people than students, who were not taught with creative movement approach (control group).
The study included two groups of students in second grade and two groups of students in fifth grade. I took one group from each grade and used the creative movement. I taught the other two groups without the creative movement. Before and after the experiment I researched students' perspectives with a questionnaire on the diversity of people.
After the experiment, I analyzed the answers to the questionnaire. As expected, I have come to the conclusion that fifth-grade students understand diversity better than students in second grade.
Fifth-grade students already understand the differences that are invisible (e.g. cultural and personal differences, abilities). Second-grade students mostly recognize the physical differences (e.g. gender, height ...). I discovered that teaching with creative movement significantly influences perspectives on the diversity of people. Students, who were taught with creative movement, presented more positive and less stereotypical perspectives on the diversity of people in the community.
With this research, I wanted to encourage primary school teachers to teach the chapter on diversity in the community as effectively as possible and inspire them to use a kinesthetic approach.
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