I was born in Istanbul in 1983. I started to teach Turkish when I was studying the Turkish Language and Literature at the university. I worked in a language school and at the universities, and I suppose that I gained success. 😊 My achievements are directly proportional to my students’ success. My students are mostly teachers, consulate officers, international business people, and also travellers. I feel rewarded when I witness their progress in applying their Turkish language skills to their daily lives. Over the years, I have met hundreds of people from all over the world, taught Turkish, and told them about Istanbul and Turkey. Those people told me about their countries and learned to express themselves in Turkish. For example, I ask them: “Do you like Istanbul?” in Turkish it is “İstanbul’u surveyor museum?” or “ Traffic is very bad in Istanbul!”, “İstanbul’ da çok Trafik var!” A basic but correct conversation is really important for self-confidence in any language. If a learner can master basic sentence forms, the rest will come much easier. On the other hand, making mistakes is also very important. Especially, a learner can not speak without making a mistake the first and second time. My students are always varied and have diverse learning skills. My professionalism also allows me to tailor language education according to individual interests, needs, and capacities. In the classroom, I hold firm three main principles: first, providing a comfortable environment, second, creating an encouraging atmosphere, and third, establishing a collaborative instruction model. I consider that I developed an aptitude for making learning Turkish to become much easier, more enjoyable, and more practical for my students. I use a book prepared by a university in Turkey. I share the pdf version of the book for my lessons. I also adapt the materials according to the learner’s needs and support the book with my authentic materials. Even though I use a communicative approach, all my lessons are guided by a solid knowledge of grammar. I use Google Docs which includes a vocabulary list, sentences (corrected and uncorrected versions, you can compare both of them easily), grammar points and homework for revision. In this way, you can find everything in Google Docs well organized. How learning a new language opens a new window into a person, teaching Turkish is also the same for me! I was always interested in languages - I could speak a bit of Italian and learned Persian grammar except English. I always think about Istanbul -I was born and grew up here- it is a good place for self-improvement. First and foremost, Istanbul hosts international people coming from around the world. It is considering to me, I am lucky because I have one of the most pleasant professions. Promoting cross-cultural awareness is an important part of my lessons when teaching Turkish. Teaching the language involves the students and myself in a dynamic conversation about our cultural backgrounds. Teaching Turkish is in fact not only teaching a language but also teaching a culture. I am interested in cinema, and music and like visiting museums. I have published various movie and book review articles. If you want to speak Turkish well, please get in touch with me. It is fun, and we will smile during the lesson!