AN ANALYSIS OF TURKISH AND RUSSIAN TEACHERS’ OF ENGLISH APPROACHES TO EFFECTIVE INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGIES

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine teachers’ approaches to Marzano’s effective instructional strategies (MEISs), as defined by Marzano, Pickering and Pollack (2001) in the secondary schools in Turkey and Russia and tell whether they differ or not. In this study survey research – one of the quantitative approaches – was carried out. The participants for the study were 54 teachers of English in Turkey and 40 teachers of English in Russia. “The Effective Instructional Strategies Questionnaire” and an open-ended questionnaire were used to gather data. Data was generated utilizing content analysis and non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test. The results related to the first and second research questions revealed that there were partial differences between Turkish and Russian teachers’ approaches to Marzano’s nine effective instructional strategies and to usage of these strategies. Turkish teachers place less importance than Russian teachers on such strategies as summarizing and note taking, homework and practice, generating and testing hypothesis. As to Russian teachers, they do not espouse strategies in the category of non-linguistic representations as much as Turkish teachers do. The results of the study showed that Turkish and Russian teachers’ approaches and the usage of the strategies differ.