The first introductory meeting of the Language Tree project, which will be carried out under the coordination of Kastamonu University, supported by the European Union and the Turkish National Agency within the scope of Erasmus+ KA220-YOU (Partnerships for Cooperation in the Youth Field), was held.
The introductory meeting was moderated by Prof. Dr. Yavuz Kartallıoğlu, Head of Yunus Emre Institute Education Department. The opening speeches of the meeting were made by Kastamonu University Vice Rector Prof. Dr. Kasım Yenigün, Kastamonu University Vice Rector Prof. Dr. Ömer Küçük, Sakarya University Vice Rector Prof. Dr. Hatem Akbulut and Düsseldorf Education Attaché Gamze Bozgöz.
In the first part of the meeting consisting of two parts, the project coordinator Harun İlçioğlu (Kastamonu University) gave a general information about the project. Veli Gök (Kastamonu University), Assoc. Prof. Dr. N. Feyza Altınkamış (Institute for Turkish Studies, Integration and Research), Assoc. Prof. Dr. Isabella Chiari (Sapienza University), Assoc. Prof. Dr. Muhammed Hüküm (Sakarya University) and Atanur Memiş (Association for Turkish Education as a Foreign Language) introduced how the institutions will contribute to the project in the strategic partnership structure of the Language Tree project and the researchers participating in the project from the relevant institutions.
In the second part of the meeting, participants were informed about the planned outputs of the project. Assoc. Prof. Dr. N. Feyza Altınkamış provided information about the Needs Analysis output; Dr. Himmet Sarıtaş (Association of Turkish Teaching as a Foreign Language) explained the Guide output; Lecturer Harun İlçioğlu briefed the participants about the Diagrams and Videos output. Additionally, Lecturer Damla Okyay (Association of Turkish Teaching as a Foreign Language) gave information about the two international symposiums to be organized within the scope of the project, and Lecturer Zehra Kum (Association of Turkish Teaching as a Foreign Language) informed about the Learning/Teaching/Training activity.
It was observed that experts conducting research in the field of teaching Turkish as a foreign language and teaching Turkish to bilingual Turkish youth participated in the meeting. The meeting concluded with a Q&A session, during which the project team stated that new information meetings about the project outputs would also be held and that current announcements would be made on the website https://dilagaci.com.