The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages Literacy of Teachers Working in Turkish Teaching Centers

Abstract

The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, which will be briefly referred to as CEFR in this article, is accepted as a reference by academics working for the Council of Europe Committee on Languages. It sets the criteria for the teaching of any language as a foreign language. It aims to assess and evaluate foreign language acquisition, foreign language teaching, and foreign language levels in the world within certain criteria. In an attempt to determine the prevalence of the literacy of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages among 88 randomly selected teachers teaching Turkish to foreigners, this study aims to explore, based on the concepts of information literacy and academic literacy, how well the framework is known and received by the teachers. The data revealing the perceptions of the teachers towards the concept of “CEFR” were analyzed and interpreted with the content analysis method. As it can be concluded from the results of the current study, more research is needed on CEFR literacy. In addition, teachers of Turkish as a foreign language should be encouraged to develop professionally and improve their CEFR literacy. This is indeed a key step for the future of teaching Turkish as a foreign language.