Public Health Knowledge Levels of Different Types of Jordanian Teachers

Abstract

This study examines the level of health knowledge of specific categories of Jordanian teachers to see which category is competent enough to teach health as a separate school subject. The Health Awareness Test (HAT) was administered to 670 teachers of whom there were seventy-four science teachers at the compulsory stage, 139 Arabic language teachers at the upper elementary stage, 342 elementary grades teachers, thirty-four high school physics teachers, thirty-three high school chemistry teachers, and forty-eight high school biology teachers. The data analysis revealed that of the target groups, only female teachers of biology, chemistry, and physics and male teachers of biology, reached the acceptable level in knowledge about health as measured by HAT. Sex as well as specialization (the subject the teacher teaches) differences were found to be significant favoring female over male and biology teachers followed by chemistry teachers over the rest of the groups. The interaction between sex and specialization was not significant The implications of the above results for curriculum planning are discussed.