21st century skills of CEIT teacher candidates and the prominence of these skills in the CEIT undergraduate curriculum

In the age of globalization and information and technology, changes as in all the fields of human life are being actualized in the education systems, too. It is of great importance for the teachers who are the most notable agents to transfer the changes to the next generations to be equipped with skills and knowledge so called 21 century skills in their pre-service education and start their profession. In this respect, the prominence of these skills in pre-service teacher education curriculum is a subject to be considered. With the constant emphasis on technology age, Computer and Instructional Technologies (CEIT) teacher candidates should have 21 century skills in terms of their contribution to their students as well as the schools they will work in. In this study, the “Multidimensional 21 Century Skills Scale” developed by Çevik and Şentürk (2019) was applied to 123 teacher candidates studying in CEIT Department of Gazi University, Gazi Faculty of Education in 2018-2019 Spring Semester. The CEIT curricula were also examined in terms of their inclusiveness about the 21 century skills. The analyses of the scale indicated that CEIT teacher candidates’ scores are generally high for the scale overall but highest in Career consciousness and lowest in Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills sub-dimensions. It is also seen that 21 century skills are generally reflected in the CEIT curricula with the courses and their contents especially in the updated curriculum which shows that curriculum development processes were performed according to the changes and needs in the world. Further studies could be conducted for the efficiency of the updated curriculum in the following years.

Introduction 21 st century, in which globalization and information and communication age is being lived, has various effects on the humankind. Challenges in social, economic and individual fields, climate change, the changing nature of business life with the effect of globalization and innovation, the difficulty of individuals' finding jobs in changing workplace environments, the rapid development of technology and individuals and educational processes' lagging behind this speed effect everybody's life in some way (Bialik & Fadel, 2015). All these changes being lived in the 21 st century is a matter of fact that should be deeply considered all humanity and especially the educational systems. How could the educational systems educate the individuals who will keep up with all these changes and what is more important, how will the teachers who will educate these individuals be trained in their preservice education?
New paradigms bring together new concepts. In fact, individuals are faced with a concept the content of which is not such a new one: the 21 st century skills. Even in the literature it is stated that 21 st century skills are the ones that students should be, do and have in order to be successful but these are the skills that should have been acquired also in the 20 th century but could not have been achieved (Craig, 2012). Kaufman (2013) states that these skills are not any newly skills, however the skills the value and importance of which have just been understood. It is a fact that why we still talk about these skills is lagging behind the technological advances and not being able to integrate it to all aspects of our lives. 21 st century skills have been defined by many institutions such as the national organization "Partnership for 21 st Century Skills" which collaborates with many industries (Domine, 2011).
However, when a common classification is taken into account, it is seen that these skills are divided into three basic skills field and basic skills, the basic skills composing of learning and innovation, media and technology and career skills (Yalçın, 2018). Also known as the "survival skills" (Wagner, 2018), these skills focus on transferring the skills and knowledge instead of just having information on specific subjects. When taken into account in terms of education, we see that these are the skills that will continue the learning processes inside and also outside the school (Bal, 2018;Çevik & Şentürk, 2019;Pellegrino, 2017).
The 21 st century skills that could be approached as "critical thinking, problem solving, information and communication literacy, financial literacy, global competences, adaptability and flexibility" (Bialik & Fadel, 2015;Cansoy, 2018;Geisinger, 2016;Kaufman, 2013;Larson & Miller, 2011;Partnership for 21st Century Skills, 2015) are the skills that could be seen as the tools that would help the students solve the problems they encounter in the global economy as save their lives through collaboration (Domine, 2011).
In a such rapid changing world, the questions of how the needed skills will be taught to the individuals as well as which competences the teachers who will teach them has to have are a matter of fact for a long time (Schleicher, 2012). Teachers are no more the transmitter of the knowledge but should be the models for their students in many aspects especially in producing solutions to problems and needs by using information and communication technologies. It is also an important mission for the teachers to integrate information and communication technologies into the curricula (Adeosun, 2014;Domine, 2011;Jan, 2017;Temelli, 2018;Uşun, 2009).
In an age that the Z generation should be educated, teacher candidates should be able to start their profession equipped with ICT as well as the pedagogical and professional training served to them (Boholano, 2017). Therefore, teacher training programs should reflect 21 st century skills and attain them to teacher candidates and should be continuously updated in direction with the changes in the world as a prerequisite of curriculum development processes. Turkish Council of Higher Education has made revisions and updates in teacher training curricula in the light of the changes in the world (Tekerek, Karakaya & Tekerek, 2018;YÖK, 2018a). 21 st century skills that all teacher candidates should attain have particular importance for CEIT teacher candidates who have to be role models for their students as well as colleagues in the schools they work in. It is known that CEIT teachers are experts who use the technology in their professional lives the best (Dursun, 2015;Toplu & Göktaş, 2012). The responsibilities of the teacher candidates who will graduate from this department in attaining students, teachers and the society with the ICT skills is undeniable (Karataş, 2010). Certainly 21 st century skills are not only about ICT however it is a fact that as the technology leaders the CEIT teacher candidates should be graduated with also the other skills in order for educating the students of the technology age and respond to their needs. In this research the 21 st century skills of CEIT teacher candidates as well as the prominence of these skills in CEIT undergraduate curricula were examined.

Aim of the study
The aim of this study is to investigate the 21 st century skills of the CEIT teacher candidates and examine the undergraduate CEIT curricula (before 2018 and the updated 2018) that would provide the attainment of these skills in terms of their prominence of 21 st century skills.
In accordance with this basic aim, answers to these research questions were searched:


Is there a meaningful difference between the scores of CEIT teacher candidates they got from the "Multidimensional 21th Century

Method
The Model of the Study Survey model was used in this descriptive study. Survey model is among the research approaches which aims to present a situation, event or the individuals as they are (Karasar, 2015). In this study document analysis method was used in order to determine the prominence of 21 st century skills in the CEIT curricula before and after 2018.

Study Group
The study group of the research consisted of 123 CEIT teacher candidates attending Gazi University Gazi Faculty of Education in 2018-2019 Semester. As the whole study group was reached no sample was taken in the study. For the other research problem of the study CEIT curricula documents were examined.
The demographic data of the CEIT teacher candidates according to the demographic information of the scale is presented in Table 1: teacher candidates, respectively followed by 3 rd grade (sophister), 1 st grade (freshman) and the least contribution from 2 nd grade (sophomore) teacher candidates.

Data Collection Tool
In this study, the multi-dimensional 21 st century skills scale developed by Çevik  post hoc tests were applied in order to determine in which groups the between-groups differences were.

Findings
In this section of the study, the findings obtained are given below:

The Findings About the 21 st Century Skill Scores of CEIT Teacher Candidates in the Scale Sub-Dimensions and the Scale Overall
In this part of the findings, the scores the CEIT teachers got from the scale were presented in Graphic 1 normalized according to 100 points in terms of the scale overall and the sub-dimensions: When Graphic 1 is examined it is seen that CEIT teacher candidates' scores are generally high for the scale overall. In terms of sub-dimensions, respectively Career Consciousness, Information and Technology Literacy Skills and Entrepreneurship and Innovation Skills scores are high. Compared to aforementioned skills Social Responsibility and Leadership Skills are high but relatively lower than the other sub-dimensions. However, it is seen that CEIT teachers' scores are the lowest in Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills sub-dimension.

The Findings Related with the Gender Variable According to the Scores Obtained from the Multidimensional 21 st Century Skills Scale
Independent samples t-test was applied to determine whether there is a meaningful difference between the scale scores of teacher candidates according to gender. The results are given in Table 2. There was found no meaningful difference between the scores of teacher candidates and their gender in the sub-dimension of "Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills" (t= .043; p>.05).
While male teacher candidates' mean scores towards "Information and Technology Literacy Skills" were (X= 12.54), this score was (X= 12.50) in female teacher candidates. According to these findings, it could be summarized that there was no meaningful difference between the scores the teacher candidates obtained from the scale and their gender in the subdimensions "Information and Technology Literacy Skills", "Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills" and "Social Responsibility and Leadership Skills". However, there was found a meaningful difference as a result of the analyses done between the scores of teacher candidates and their gender in terms of "Entrepreneurship and Innovation Skills" and "Career Consciousness" sub-dimensions as well as the overall scale in favor of male teacher candidates.

The Findings Related with the Grade Variable According to the Scores Obtained from the Multidimensional 21 st century skills Scale
In order for determining whether there was a meaningful difference between the scores of teacher candidates obtained from the Multidimensional 21st century skills Scale and the grade they attended, one-way ANOVA analysis was conducted. The findings are presented in Table 3.

Scores Obtained from the Multidimensional 21 st Century Skills Scale
Whether there was a meaningful difference between the scores of teacher candidates obtained from the Multidimensional 21 st century skills Scale and the high school they graduated from, Kruskal Wallis H analysis was applied. The findings are presented in Table 4:  Table 3 is examined it is seen that there is no meaningful difference between the scores of teacher candidates and the high-school they graduated from in terms of the sub-dimension of "Information and Technology Literacy Skills" (X2 = 3.08; p>.05). No meaningful difference was found in "Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills" sub-dimension (X2 = 1.97; p>.05) as well as in the "Entrepreneurship and Innovation Skills" sub-dimension (X2 = 3.01; p>.05) and in "Social Responsibility and Leadership Skills" sub-dimension (X 2 = 6.52; p<.05).
In order for determining the meaningful difference between the school types, the results of the paired comparison of Mann Whitney U test, teacher candidates who graduated from Vocational High School have been using "Social Responsibility and Leadership Skills" more actively and are more developed in these skills than those who graduated from Anatolian High School.
There was no difference found also in the "Career Consciousness" sub-dimension of the scale according to the graduated high school (X 2 = .99; p>.05). When the scores of the Multidimensional 21st century skills scale overall is examined it is seen that there was meaningful difference between the scores of teacher candidates and the high school they graduated from.
It could be stated that there is no difference among the teacher candidates in 21 st century skills according to the high school they graduated from. So, the study shows that there is no significant separation in terms of the high school the teacher candidates graduated from.

5.
The Findings Related with the Academic Achievement Variable According to the

Scores Obtained from the Multidimensional 21 st Century Skills Scale
For determining whether there was a meaningful difference between the scores of teacher candidates obtained from the Multidimensional 21st century skills Scale and their academic achievement Kruskal Wallis H analysis was applied. The findings are presented in Table 5: Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills" (X 2 = 5.84; p>.05).
No meaningful difference was found between the scale scores of teacher candidates and their academic achievement average on the sub-dimensions; Entrepreneurship and Innovation Skills (X 2 = 1.71; p>.05); Social Responsibility and Leadership Skills (X 2 = 5.38; p>.05) and Career Consciousness (X 2 = 6.24; p>.05). also no meaningful difference was found between the scores of the teacher candidates from Multidimensional 21st century skills scale overall and their academic achievement average (X 2 = 4.38; p>.05).
These findings indicate that the academic achievement average of the teacher candidates does not show any meaningful difference with their 21 st century skills. So, it could be said that even though the academic achievement levels of the teacher candidates are different, there is no significant divergence in their 21 st century skills.

Undergraduate Curricula
The sub-dimensions of 21 st century scale used in the study were taken as the themes of study's this part. The curricula were analyzed with descriptive analysis. The course names and content were examined and the ones which contained 21 st century skills teaching were presented in Table 6:

Discussion, Conclusion and Implications
The rapidly changing and developing world requires no more the sole information but the skills and information that could be transferred to all fields of life. To attain these skills to the students is the mission of education systems and training the teachers who will educate the students in this new way is one of the most important duties of Faculties of Education. It is of great importance for all teacher candidates to have these so called 21 st century skills and also their teacher training including to educate them towards gaining these skills.
In this study the 21 st century skills of CEIT teacher candidates were examined in an age when the technology is rapidly developing and the importance of integrating technology into the curriculum is very high. The "Multidimensional 21th Century Skills Scale" developed by Çevik and Şentürk (2019) Kozikoğlu and Altınova (2018). Also, this finding differed from that of Özdemir-Özden et. al.
(2018)'s study in which Career Consciousness Skills of female teachers were high.
A meaningful difference was found between the grades of the teacher candidates between their scores form the scale in which final year teacher candidates had higher scores of 21 st century skills than the sophister (third grade) teacher candidates. A similar result was seen in the study of Özdemir-Özden et. al. (2018) in which sophister teacher candidates had higher scores than the sophomore teacher candidates.
When the high schools the teacher candidates graduated from were taken into account no meaningful difference was seen which implied the importance of undergraduate programs for attaining the students with the 21 st skills that in addition showed the importance of this study implying the effects of undergraduate curricula on teacher training. However, in the study by Dilekli and Karagöz (2018) a meaningful difference was found in the high schools of the teacher candidates they graduated from. In this study no meaningful difference was found according to the teacher candidates' academic achievement.
The analysis of the CEIT curricula before 2018 and 2018 indicated that 21 st century skills are taken into account in the courses. However, the new curriculum is updated and changed according to the recent necessities and developments which is indicating that curriculum development principles are taken into account. Nevertheless, the role of the faculty staff in delivering the courses/curriculum should not be forgotten. The faculty staff, with the necessity of lifelong learning are also believed to have the requirement of updating themselves and their teaching in order not to fall behind the developments. Further studies could be conducted in the following years as the teacher candidates would graduate from the 2018 curriculum. Then some comparative research could be made whether the new curriculum has positive effects on the 21 st century skills attainments of the teacher candidates which would also guide the curriculum development process in future.