Abstract:

People may move away from their countries where their mother tongues are spoken and lead a life in different countries for a variety of different reasons. In such a situation they have to use the language of the new country in order to adapt and live on their lives in the new land. This obligation causes people to drift away from their mother tongues, to forget their native language and causes them difficulties when speaking their mother tongue. The divergence from the mother tongue also leads to cultural alienation. Proverbs and idioms are the two main linguistic structures that combine a mother tongue and culture. The alienation of Turkish speakers to these linguistic structures result in inadequacies for them to comprehend and express themselves in the mother tongue. Hence teaching proverbs and idioms is one of the important tools of instruction in teaching Turkish to native Turkish speakers. It is the proverbs and idioms that make up the presence of oral culture in Turkish language to a large extent and these are well known instruments which facilitate communication in certain situations as it is passed on in collective memory of the society. Teaching materials to be used when teaching proverbs and idioms should be selected from among literary works in pure language attractive for students’ interest. Yunus Emre’s Divan has a particularly important place among these materials since Yunus Emre’s Divan is a unique piece of literary work that we can offer to students to teach when to use proverbs and idioms and in what kind of environments all in the context of the text itself. In this study firstly the proverbs and idioms mentioned in Yunus Emre’s Divan are located, and then subsequently specific activities in which they are used are generated at levels B1, B2 and C1, C2. With the activities prepared in this study, as well as teaching of proverbs and idioms, improving students’ four basic language skills and transmission of culture are also targeted

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