The Opinions of Instructors Teaching Turkish to Foreigners about the Writing Skills of Syrian Students

Abstract

This study focuses on the difficulties experienced by the instructors while teaching writing skill to Arabians from Syria, and how these difficulties could be overcome. The study group of the research includes 11 instructors working in Turkish Teaching Centers (TTCs) of Cukurova University and Adana Science and Technology University. The data collected through the use of interview forms prepared by the researcher. After the interviews, content analysis was performed on the data collected. Following the content analysis, the data were analyzed by the researchers and grouped under certain titles and codes. Based on the content analysis, it is found that there is a lack of experts in teaching Turkish as a foreign language and materials particularly designed and developed for teaching Turkish writing are needed. Moreover, the teaching of suffixes, umlaut letters and conjunctions are problematic areas while teaching writing skills to Arabians from Syria. Suggestions have been put forward to overcome the difficulties reported by the instructors based on the findings of the study.

İlgili Çalışmalardan Hareketle Suriyelilere Türkçe Öğretiminde Karşılaşılan Sorunlar

“…Especially if students use a different alphabet or some vowels do not exist in their language, these problems are experienced. When the studies dealing with this subject are analyzed, the problems arising from the language characteristics of Turkish such as alphabetical and structural differences of Turkish (Biçer, 2017;Demirci, 2015;Erdem, 2017;Erdem, Kaya & Yılmaz, 2017;Gözübüyük Tamer, 2020;Şengül, 2015;Taşkaya & Ersoy, 2016); confusion of letters, misuse of vowels, and misuse of consonants (Beyhan & Epçaçan, 2018;; misuse of capital letters and not using punctuation marks (Kara, 2010) and having too many rules (Akkaya, 2013) were found. The characteristics of the target language may cause some problems for foreign students learning that language.…”

“…Araştırmanın bu bölümünde ise elde edilen bulguların, sonuçları verilmiş ve araştırma problemleri doğrultusunda tartışması yapılmıştır. (Biçer, 2017;Demirci, 2015;Erdem, 2017;Erdem, Kaya ve Yılmaz, 2017;Gözübüyük Tamer, 2020;Şengül, 2015;Taşkaya ve Ersoy, 2016); harflerin karıştırılması, ünlü harflerin yanlış kullanılması ve ünsüz harflerin yanlış kullanılması (Beyhan ve Epçaçan, 2018;; büyük harflerin yanlış kullanılması ve noktalama işaretlerinin kullanılmaması (Kara, 2010) ve çok fazla kural olması (Akkaya, 2013)…”

Direct Writing Activity: A Strategy in Expanding Narrative Writing Skills for Elementary Schools

“…This expertise proves that writing skills are the most difficult skills to master compared to speaking skills [3]. Those opinions were not without reason, writing skills are the most complicated skills that require mastery of various linguistic elements such as grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, and spelling [4]- [6].…”