Identifying drivers of curriculum model of economic education based on entrepreneurship for the first year of high school

Purpose: Today, entrepreneurship education has become the focal point of educational systems worldwide. It is seen as a tool for achieving a knowledge-based economy and addressing various economic and social issues, including the rising number of unemployed graduates, particularly in developing countries such as Iran. In many countries, it has become an integral part of industrial and educational policies. The importance of lower secondary education lies in its role as a bridge between primary education and upper secondary education, as well as the entry point for students into adolescence. Therefore, educational programs at different levels must be appropriately designed and developed to ensure they have a significant impact on students' future academic and professional lives. Neglecting economic education in the curriculum model for students cannot adequately prepare them for understanding economic issues and achieving success in the future job market. Therefore, economic education in schools and teaching entrepreneurial skills at the lower secondary level are of great importance for students. Materials and Methods: The aim of this research is to identify the driving factors of an entrepreneurship-based economic education curriculum model for lower secondary education. The research is applied in terms of its objective and uses a mixed-methods approach. To identify the initial driving factors, a systematic review and inductive content analysis techniques were employed. For identifying the final driving factors, the Delphi technique was utilized. The statistical population for identifying the initial driving factors included academic articles and research studies, research projects of organizations and institutions, expert and researcher studies, related authored books, and master's and doctoral theses from higher education institutions, as well as existing circulars from the Ministry of Education and its subsidiaries. For the final driving factors, curriculum specialists, textbook authors, and experts in the field from Mazandaran province were selected, resulting in 37 texts and 15 experts through snowball sampling for the initial factors, and 20 experts through purposive sampling for the final factors. For identifying the initial driving factors, Silva's (2015) systematic review method and inductive content analysis with initial, axial, and selective coding were used, and for identifying the final factors, the Delphi method in three stages and SPSS software were utilized. The data collection tools included reviewed texts and semi-structured interviews for identifying the initial factors and semi-structured and structured expert checklists for the final factors. Validity and reliability for the semi-structured interviews were ensured through necessary reviews, including acceptability (expert review), confirmability (expert reassessment), and intra-topic agreement. For the final factors, the content of the expert checklists was confirmed for comprehensibility and clarity by five academic and organizational experts, and its reliability was calculated and confirmed with a test-retest method score of 0.88. Discussion and Conclusion: According to the results, the final model includes 9 elements, 14 dimensions, 23 components, and 92 indicators. In the Klein-based research model, the "Objective" element includes five driving factors: practicality and operationality, development of individual and technical skills, development of psychological skills, creation of financial and economic knowledge, and fostering creativity and ideation. The "Content" element includes seven driving factors: financial and economic literacy, skill enhancement, knowledge augmentation, executability, real needs-based, creativity and entrepreneurship, and management-oriented. The "Teaching Methods" element includes six driving factors: project and workshop-oriented, collaborative teaching, modern teaching techniques, knowledge and skill-oriented, scaffolding, and flexible teaching. The "Evaluation" element includes five driving factors: qualitative evaluation, operational evaluation, evaluation of theoretical knowledge and attitude, during-teaching evaluation, and participatory evaluation. Among the final driving factors, creating financial and economic knowledge holds the most importance in the "Objective" element, skill enhancement in the "Content" element, project and workshop-oriented teaching in the "Teaching Methods" element, and operational evaluation in the "Evaluation" element