The aim of this study is to reveal the effects of using educational comics on students’ academic achievements, democratic attitudes, knowledge retention and students’ experiences about the teaching materials in the 6th grade social studies course “Participating in Administration” learning area. The research was carried out with mixed methods research and embedded design was used in the study. Mixed methods is a research approach whereby researchers collect both quantitative and qualitative data within the same study to understand research problems and integrate two data sets. Using the advantages of combining these two data sets, researchers draw conclusion on the strengths of these methods. Mixed methods research is used in the behavioural, health, and social sciences. The basic assumption of this approach is that it is more advantageous for the researcher to combine statistical trends (quantitative data) with personal experiences (qualitative data) than to use either of these methods alone to better understand the research problem. In an embedded design, both qualitative and quantitative data are collected at the same time, but one type of data, either qualitative or quantitative, is secondary to the other. Considering the findings obtained as a result of the analyses, it was found that there was a significant difference between the mean scores of experimental group students taught with educational comics and control group students in terms of academic achievement, democratic attitudes, and knowledge retention. According to the findings obtained from the interviews, it was revealed that students were pleased with the use of educational comics in online environments via distant learning and they evaluated these teaching materials as informative, entertaining, and attention grabbing. It was concluded that educational comics used in social studies course in distant education had positive effects on students’ academic achievements, democratic attitudes, and knowledge retention and the students found these teaching materials used in distant learning effective and positive.

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