A communicational approach to developing Turkish expression skills of international students: Design and implementation study

This study focuses on the role of the communicative approach in the development of basic language skills in teaching Turkish as a foreign language. The aim of the study is to design activities that can be applied in the classroom based on the communicative approach in teaching Turkish as a foreign language and to examine the effect of the related approach on the Turkish speaking skills of international students in a certain process in terms of various variables. The research was carried out in accordance with the single-group pre-test-post-test design, which is one of the weak experimental models. The application group of the research consists of 8 international students studying at Tokat Gaziosmanpaşa University Turkish Teaching Application and Research Center (TOMER). The study includes an 8-week process. The data of the research were obtained with personal information form, speaking anxiety scale, speaking attitude scale, writing anxiety scale and writing attitude scale. Pearson Product-Moment Correlation, One-Dimensional Analysis of Variance, T-test for Related Measures and Chi-square Test for Single Sample were used to analyze the data. As a result of the research, it was observed that the communicative approach had a positive effect on the anxiety and attitudes of foreign students, although it did not make a statistically significant difference. Key Words: Teaching Turkısh as a foreign language, communicative approach, writing, speaking, attitude, anxiety.