A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION PRACTICES IN TURKEY

Education plays a crucial role in the development of a country and teachers have a key role in shaping the future of the country. Education aims are both academic and social. Qualified teachers, equipped with the latest pedagogic techniques will encourage the economic development and future welfare of Turkey. By keeping pace with the challenges of globalisation in the competition-centred world, and at the same time, preserving Turkish cultural assets, this teaching force must develop by espousing not only Turkish national culture with its values, but also include other cultures. This can be possible only through a well-qualified education progress. The various functions of education have increased by constant advancements in technology and science. In the pursuit of quality education, studies have been conducted to investigate the problems in different fields such as Maths, Sciences, Social Sciences, Art, and Language, and so on. In this paper, foreign language education, particularly English language education is taken into consideration. The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyse English language teacher education practices in Turkish context. The paper includes some parts to present a meaningful order. It will initially discuss the general overview of the education system in Turkey including the foreign language policy. Next, foreign language teacher’s education in Turkey will be chronologically presented, and then a critical analysis of the current practices in terms of strengths and weaknesses will be analysed. Finally, some reformist recommendations for the current situation will be offered to describe how foreign language teacher education would be if teachers were given opportunities to do so