AN INVESTIGATION OF RELIGIOUS CULTURE AND MORAL KNOWLEDGE TEACHER CANDIDATES' ACADEMIC SELF-EFFICACY AND METACOGNITIVE AWARENESS

The main purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between the academic self -efficacy and metacognitive awareness of pre -service Religious Culture and Moral Knowledge (RCMK) teachers. The sample of the study, which was conducted with the relational survey model, consisted of 744 students who were selected by simple random sampling among the students studying at the Faculties of Theology or Islamic Sciences of nine different universities in 20222023. The Academic Self -Efficacy Scale developed by Owen & Froman (1988) and adapted into Turkish by Ekici (2012) and the Metacognitive Awareness Scale developed by Durdukoca & Ariba & scedil; (2019) and a personal information form were used as data collection tools. As a result of the study, it was seen that the mean of the participants' Academic Self -Efficacy Scale was 2.82 and the mean of the Metacognitive Awareness Scale was 3.46. In the general score of the Academic Self -Efficacy Scale , the average of males was higher than the average of females, whereas there was no significant difference between the general averages of the Metacognitive Awareness Scale on the basis of gender. It was determined that there was a moderate positive relationship between the general scores of the Academic Self -Efficacy Scale and the Metacognitive Awareness Scale . Significant significant relationships were also found between the sub -dimensions of both scales. According to the results of the regression analysis conducted to determine the predictive power of metacognitive awareness on academic selfefficacy, metacognitive awareness predicts academic self -efficacy in a statistically significant way both at the general level and in the context of Personal awareness, Organizational awareness and Judgmental awareness factors.