The role of ıntercultural competence in foreign language teaching

Abstract

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the cultural dimension of foreign language education, and teachers today are expected to promote the acquisition of intercultural competence in their learners. Thus, the present study aims to investigate the opinions and attitudes of Turkish teachers of English on intercultural competence teaching and to see how and to what extent these opinions and attitudes are reflected in their classroom applications. Data were collected from 503 EFL teachers by means of a questionnaire. The findings have revealed that language teachers seem to be aware of the role of the culture in foreign language education though they do not often integrate culture into their teaching in order to develop intercultural competence in their learners.