Approaches to study process and university classroom environment: The case of pre-service science teachers at the College of Education in Sana'a University

The purpose of this study is to investigate the extent of the diversity among Yemeni pre-service science teachers in their approach to study and their perception of the classroom learning environment.;The study sampled 393 (196 male and 197 female) science majors and 208 (101 male and 107 female) art majors who were enrolled at the four undergraduate academic levels in the College of Education at Sana'a University in 1995. Specifically, the groups were 50 male and 50 female science majors and 25 male and 25 female art majors from each undergraduate level of study.;Data were collected by using two questionnaires: Study Process Questionnaire (SPQ) which measured students' approaches to study developed by Biggs 1987. The second questionnaire was University Lecture Classroom Environment Scale (ULCES) which was constructed for this study from other scales that measure college and university classroom learning environments. For this study, both questionnaires were translated into Arabic. Data collected were analyzed by using SPSS statistical package.;The first result of this study indicated that educated Yemeni people were more likely to send their daughters to college. An important finding in this study was that in any significant gender differences females scored significantly higher than males. Female science majors scored significantly higher than male science majors in Surface Strategy, Deep Motivation, Surface Approach, and Deep Approach. Females scored higher in Deep Approach and Achieving Approach than in Surface Approach. Yemeni students were more likely to use Deep Approach and Achieving Approaches and less Surface Approach in their study, indicating that they were not rote learners. This conflicts with the general stereotype of Arab or Asian people as rote learners. In classroom environment, there were no significant differences by gender on most of the subscales of ULCES. It was found that students improved their Deep Approach and Achieving Approach as they reached higher levels in college. Most of the scales of the ULCES showed significant differences by level of education, notably a decline from freshmen gradually to seniors.;Several profiles were found in this study. Students with Deep Achieving had more favorable perceptions of classroom environment than students with Surface Approach. There were interrelations between motivation and strategy in most of the SPQ variables. Deep Approach and Achieving Approach were significantly related for most of the ULCES measures.