Foreign language

Integrating culture into teaching. Changes that occurred in the way teachers thought about integrating culture in their teaching were identified and presented under the code “integrating culture into teaching”.
P # 9 shared her teaching experience she gained in a public university in the eastern part of Turkey. During those years, she had difficulties with her students, as

the students were opposed to learning English. They believed that learning a new language would assimilate them. In order to overcome that difficulty, P # 9, with her colleagues and students, translated Kurdish stories that were taken from students‟ own culture to first into Turkish first, and then into English. They compiled the stories and created a storybook for their students and they could finally interact with the students to teach English. A majority of the participants (P # 2, # 4, # 5, # 6, # 7 and # 8) found P # 9‟s way of overcoming cultural barriers profoundly effective.

Therefore, in the interview sessions, the researcher asked them a question about implementing P # 9‟s activity in their future teaching. The replies of the participants revealed that they found P # 9‟s experience inspiring and they would like to implement such an activity. For instance P # 8 reported;
I really liked P # 9‟s project, and I really would like to do such thing, to translate the stories from other cultures. But my context is different from P # 5‟s context because I work in Istanbul. So, okay, it is possible to do such a thing, but reading P # 5‟s, I thought of other ideas. For example, I have students from all over Turkey, from different cities of Turkey. May be, I may ask them to translate a story which belongs to their hometown, to translate that story into English, and I may tell them that I will compile those stories and I will have a book. I‟m sure they will enjoy such a project as well. So, actually P # 5‟s idea, project or activity, how you call it, inspired me.
Participant P # 7, like her classmates, wanted to implement such an activity in her classroom:
I think that was the best reflection I have ever had and that was, this is something that I will ever forget. On the other reflections, I continued talking about P # 9‟s case. I remember. We can create wonders here with even beginner students by asking them share their fairy tales with us, just I mean it

would be may be a limited English with more drawings etc. but it would be their world. It would be really motivating and valuable for them. I think I might give it a try, I mean, I should talk to her more about it, I mean how she managed that and how she chose the topics and what procedures she followed. But I would definitely love to do such a thing in my future teaching.

Considering P # 8‟s and P # 7‟s replies, it can be concluded that P # 9‟s experience broadened participants‟ perspectives about integrating culture in their teaching via similar activities.