The social studies course enables students to gain content, comprehend learning processes, and become effective citizens by integrating various types of information relevant to social sciences. One of the basic materials used by teachers and secondary school students in the social studies course is textbooks. In this research, pre-service social studies teachers were enabled to create a textbook module within the scope of the social studies textbook review course and to gain experience regarding the textbooks they will use as basic materials in social studies courses in their future professional lives. The main purpose of the study is to reveal the experiences of pre-service social studies teachers in the process of creating a social studies textbook module. In the research, phenomenology, which is one of the qualitative research designs, was adopted. Criterion sampling technique was used to determine the participants. The participants of the study consisted of 10 pre-service social studies teachers. The data of the study were collected through semi-structured interviews and were analyzed through inductive analysis. As a result of the research, it was revealed that the pre-service teachers included various activities and visuals in the social studies textbook modules and aimed to create the formal, visual, content, linguistic, and expressive characteristics of the modules in accordance with the students’ level. Pre-service teachers emphasized that creating a social studies textbook module had various benefits for them. In the study, some of the pre-service teachers stated that creating a social studies textbook module brought them closer to the teaching profession. It was revealed that the pre-service teachers who participated in the study had difficulties due to experiencing technical problems and creating content suitable for the level of the students while creating a social studies textbook module. As a conclusion, pre-service teachers suggested that the elective social studies textbook review course should be a compulsory course. Based on this research, it may be recommended to conduct studies on the application of social studies textbook modules prepared by pre-service teachers and to examine the effects of textbook modules in practice.

Social studies, textbook, pre-service teachers.