Evaluation of Teaching Strategies Applied by the Teachers at Vocational High Schools that Provide Tourism Education: The Case of Kayseri

Abstract

This study contributes to the body of knowledge by determining the teaching strategies in their courses applied by teachers at vocational and technical Anatolian high schools that provide tourism education, as being the subjects in the implementation of these strategies, and their strengths and weaknesses. For this purpose, in November 2019, primary data were collected through the individual and focus group structured interviews with vocational tourism, foreign language, and general culture courses’ teachers working in Erciyes Vocational and Technical Anatolian High School, which provides tourism education in Kayseri. As a result of evaluating the interviews, it was concluded that teachers mostly adopted expository teaching strategies in their courses. The results are that the most frequently used method is the question-and-answer technique in expository teaching, role playing in guided discovery teaching, and project assignment in inquiry teaching. It is among the main results obtained that expository teaching provides a better understanding of the course subject, guided discovery teaching enables students' active participation in the course, and inquiry teaching improves students’ foreign language knowledge. Besides, it is stated by teachers that these strategies have weaknesses such as the inability to ensure students’ active participation and the difficulty in attracting the students’ attention in the expository teaching, the ineffectiveness of the guided discovery teaching in large groups, and the difficulty of the students’ motivation in the inquiry teaching.