Hatice Cemre Dağgül and Eastern Mediterranean University (EMU) academic staff member Prof. Dr. Ayşe Işık Gürşimşek received the 3rd Kemal Yücel Research Honorary Award for their work titled “Examining the Self-Regulation Skills of Pre-School Period Children in Terms of Different Variables”.
In a statement, EMU Education Faculty, Department of Elementary Education academic staff member Prof. Dr. Ayşe Işık Gürşimşek stated that self-regulation, a topic that has garnered a great deal of academic attention over the last few years affects children’s skills such as cognitive, emotional and behavioural planning in addition to control, prevention, direction and regulation as well as being prepared for primary school, mathematical skill, friendship relationships, academic and social competence. Prof. Dr. Gürşimşek noted that the award winning study examined variables and the self-regulation skill levels of state pre-school level education institutions located in Nicosia and Kyrenia, TRNC. Prof. Dr. Gürşimşek also indicated that raising awareness about learning strategies starting from an early age can lead to development in planning their own education. With the development of monitoring and evaluation skills academic success, commitment to school, peer acceptance, avoiding negative behaviour and healthy nutrition can also be positively affected.
The study carried out with parents and 122 children born in 2010 receiving pre-school education (63 girls / 59 boys) used the Pre-School Self-Regulation Scale to evaluate the self- regulation skill levels of the children and their performances in a range of tasks. The study firstly determined the attention / impulse control and positive emotion points of the children. After analysis of sociodemographic variables findings suggest that the self-regulation skills of children show differentiation according to gender but no differentiation according to educational background of parents, family income and number of children in the family.
Highlighting that their work is the first research in North Cyprus concerned with the self-regulation of children Prof. Dr. Gürşimşek indicated that its findings will light the way for other research in Cyprus concerning children’s self-regulation skills, parental education organized by pre-school education institutions and on the job training courses aimed towards teachers.
