Decisions related to foreign language teaching in the National Education Councils and their reflections on practice

The general purpose of this research is to determine the decisions taken about foreign language teaching in the National Education Councils held between 1939 and 2014 and their reflections on Turkish National Education System. In this study, National Education Councils, which have gathered since 1939 and can be seen as the memory of Turkish National Education System, are the main source for examining the policies and strategies related to foreign language teaching pursued by the Ministry of National Education. This study was conducted in order to evaluate the importance given to foreign language teaching in the National Education Councils which is the highest advisory body of the Ministry of National Education. Also, this study was carried out in order to determine the decisions taken on behalf of foreign language teaching in National EducationCouncils and to examine the reflections of these decisions on practice. This study is a qualitative study and qualitative research methods are used in this study. Case study, which is one of the qualitative research designs, was preferred as the model. The universe of the research consists of nineteen National Education Councils held between 1939 and 2014. In this study, primary sources related to the whole universe could be reached and document analysis was conducted for data collection. The printed and digital documents of the National Education Councils made between 1939 and 2014 were scanned and examined.Nineteen National Education Council decisions were analyzed one by one throughout this study. As a result of these analyzes, some findings related to each council were obtained. In the light of the findings, it is concluded that foreign language teaching is not given enough importance in National Education Councils and only a few National Education Councils deal with foreign language teaching. Foreign language teaching, which has been at the center of discussions for many years, has not been sufficiently placed on the agenda of the Councils.