© Kamla-Raj 2014 Anthropologist, 18(3): 681-689 (2014) The Relationship between Prospective Teachers’ Love for Children and “Gender Roles and Some Demographic Qualities” Suna Arslan Cumhuriyet University, Faculty of Education, EBB, Sivas, Turkey E-mail: suna_karakucuk@yahoo.com KEYWORDS Love for Children. Prospective Teachers. Gender Roles. Idealism. Positive Image ABSTRACT The present research primly aims to analyze the concept of “love for children” within the context of education. It also aims to investigate the personal and academic conditions in favor of or against love for children among prospective teachers and propose solutions within the context of teacher training. The research has been designed as a descriptive study based on associational model. The sample comprised 248 prospective teachers selected with purposive sampling, studying at the Faculty of Education during 2010-2011 academic years. The results indicated a significant positive relationship between prospective teachers’ femininity gender roles and love for children scores. Besides, it was found that masculine participants’ love for children scores were significantly lower than those of participants classified as feminine and androgen. No significant relationship was observed between love for children and the participants’ gender, the department they study, their grade levels, the number of siblings, the place they live and educational level of their parents. INTRODUCTION Love is the best thing we learn and teach. It is part of our life instincts and it completes our lives. We as adults can choose or shape our needs to love and belong to; however, love ex- periences of children are determined by chance according to the conditions in which they are born. Modern societies have to ensure that the child gets to know about love first in the family and at home and then during their educational and school lives. The present research aims to discuss the concept of love for children in an educational context and reach findings and suggestions con- cerning love for children among prospective teachers and create awareness. For the child to love school and being a student, he/she needs to love the teacher. A child’s liking his/her school and being a student depends upon whether he/ she likes the teacher; if there is not such a bond in teacher-student communication, this is an educational issue that needs to be paid atten- tion and resolved. Several educational scientists have stated opinions about love for children and love for children integrated with the child’s education. Buscaglia (2010) states that love is not some- thing spontaneous but it is something taught firstly by parents and then teachers and, a teach- er cannot teach something he/she does not know. Pestalozzi defines love for children as di- rectly moving on when the child’s care and edu- cation are at stake, mentions of a love that com- bines the brain and heart (as cited in Tonguc 1960). In “Children of Barbiana”, a critical peda- gogy book, the lessons are defined as fear and lost time in the letters by “teacher students” who criticize their teachers because of lack of love. Besides, classic book of educational litera- ture, De Amicis’ Child Heart is also set upon teacher-student communication. Concerning this, Onur (2005) states that love for children is not only a natural/instinctual feeling and the scientific/developmental knowledge of this man- ner should also exist. Pointing out to the fragile distinction among these three concepts, he says “what needs to be discussed is not the exist- ence of childhood feeling but the content” (p. 529). In other words, he wants to imply that we have “a binary understanding of childhood”. However, we are adults who love children but do not take care of them, feed and educate them well. Ariés (1973), who is the pioneer of histori- cal researches of childhood, accepts that, the feeling of childhood is not love for children, but is a consciousness implying that the child is different. Then, loving a child on the part of the parents and the teacher is taking care of the child/ paying attention to him/her, protect/guide him/ her, having the insights of empathy and estab- lishing communication and educational and de- velopmental knowledge and turning these into attitudes. The period of childhood legally expresses the individuals who are not yet eighteen. National