Drama in Education Lesson According to Pre-service Teachers in Terms of Individual and Professional Development

This study aims to examine how pre-service teachers who took the "Drama for Education" course evaluated the course in terms of individual and professional development.The research was carried out with a case study, which is one of the qualitative research designs.Within the scope of the study, 58 pre-service teachers from different departments who took the "Drama in Education" course as an elective were studied.During the data collection process, an open-ended form was used with 58 preservice teachers and interviews were conducted with 10 pre-service teachers at the end of the semester.The obtained data were analyzed by content analysis method.According to the results of the research, at the beginning of the semester, pre-service teachers associated the "Drama in Education" course with a theoretical process and children's games.At the end of the term, pre-service teachers expressed a number of positive views, both individually and professionally (for example, gaining empathy, increasing self-confidence, gaining teaching experience).These findings support that the creative drama course is an effective tool that can contribute positively to both the individual development of pre-service teachers and their future teaching careers.This study emphasizes the potential of creative drama education to increase the pedagogical competencies of pre-service teachers and the importance of integrating such courses into the education process of pre-service teachers.