Investigation of Pre-service Teachers' Knowledge of Sustainable Development Goals and Sustainable Consumption Behaviors

The knowledge, attitudes and behaviors of teachers and pre-service teachers about sustainable development will affect their implementation of sustainable development (SD) education in their classrooms. From this point of view, in this study, pre-service teachers' knowledge of sustainable development goals (SDGs), the sources of this knowledge and their sustainable consumption behaviors (SCBs) were determined as a product of the project supported by Tubitak 2209-A. Survey model was used and data were collected from a total of 1028 pre-service teachers studying in 8 different undergraduate programs at a Faculty of Education. Data collection tools; Sustainable Development Goals Knowledge questions and Sustainable Consumption Behaviors Scale. The data were analyzed using chi-square test of independence and ANOVA. Pre-service teachers' SDGs knowledge levels are low and differs according to gender at low effect size. The knowledge levels of pre-service primary teachers and psychological counseling and guidance teachers are statistically significantly higher than those of pre-service teachers in all other branches. The SDG knowledge scores of pre-service teachers statistically differed between the ones who complete the "Sustainable Development and Education" course and those who not completed, however their consumption behaviors did not differ between them. The SCBs of female pre-service teachers are significantly higher than males in the reuse sub-dimension. A differentiation in the sub-dimensions of pre-service teachers' SCBs is determined according to some of their departments. Based on the findings, it can be suggested that "SD and Education" course should be a must-course in all teacher training programs in order to increase pre-service teachers' knowledge of SDGs and to develop SCBs.