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Teaching English Language - Volume:3 Issue: 11, Summer and Autumn 2009

Teaching English Language
Volume:3 Issue: 11, Summer and Autumn 2009

  • تاریخ انتشار: 1390/10/11
  • تعداد عناوین: 7
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  • Parviz Birjandi, Ghazal Lotfi Page 1
    This study presents an investigation into Iranian EFL learners‟ beliefs about listening comprehension difficulties they experience while listening to English aural texts in a non-collaborative setting like that of a classroom lecture. The data were elicited from learners‟ self report through the procedures of semi-structured interviews (N=86). The collected data were qualitatively content analyzed. The learners‟ beliefs about their listening comprehension problems were categorized under the four major characteristics of input, listener, task, and learning context. Multiple factors within these categories were identified by learners to influence their listening comprehension. Many of the factors identified were related to input and listener characteristic. To find out whether learners‟ beliefs about listening comprehension difficulties were related to levels of language proficiency, learners were divided into two language proficiency groups of pre-intermediate and intermediate. The two groups were found to share similar beliefs regarding the listening problems they had and their underlying contributing factors. The findings of the study indicate that learners are aware of range of factors influencing their listening comprehension even though they are not equipped with the necessary strategies to tackle their listening problems. Possible implications for EFL listening instruction are discussed.
  • A. Mehdi Riazi, Akram Bahrami Page 33
    This study reports the results of an investigation which sought Iranian scholars’ attitudes, problems, and strategies publishing research articles in English. To this end, interviews were conducted with 72 academics across different disciplines (Sciences, Social Sciences, and Art and Humanities); then, a coding scheme was developed based on the relevant literature and the information provided by interviewees to codify the interviews. Findings revealed a detailed categorization of the participants’ attitudes, problems, and strategies. It was found that Iranian scholars had a positive attitude towards publishing papers in English as a means of knowledge production. The results also supported the findings of previous research that the most important problems during writing research articles for non-native scholars and scientists were the introduction and discussion sections. Also, the major strategies reported were revising and editing, disciplinespecific reading, and practicing writing. Implications are discussed for EAP courses, university authorities, and the editorial boards and reviewers of the journals.
  • Reza Khany, Khatereh Kamali Page 61
    This study is a corpus analysis of thematic organization and progression in local and international articles written in sub-disciplines of applied linguistics. Having read and analyzed the «introduction» sections of 120 articles in four local and four international journals, the researchers investigated the results within the Hallidyian Categorization of theme as well as Dane''s revised models of thematic progression chains. Results show that the majority of topical themes were unmarked, although the number of unmarked themes in international journals was less than those in local papers. There was no significant difference in total number of textual themes of both groups in the study. In both groups of articles, coordinated conjunctions were used less frequent than conjunctive adjuncts. The most frequent types of interpersonal themes in both groups of articles were of finite operators although they were used more by international writers. The frequency of using marked themes in international articles was more than double compared with local articles although they were used in a similar way in both groups of articles. The intra-comparisons showed no significant difference among themes written in both local and international journal. However, some differences were found in inter or cross-comparisons. Finally, cross-comparisons showed significant differences among the thematic progression chains in articles written in two groups.
  • Abbas Ali Zarei, Kobra Ghahremani Page 81
    The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between MA students‟ autonomy and their reading comprehension ability. To this end, a 32-item questionnaire and a 20-item multiple-choice reading comprehension test were given to a sample of 68 participants. The collected data were analyzed using the Correlation procedure, one way ANOVA and Regression analysis. Results of the correlation procedure indicated that there was a positive relationship between learners‟ autonomy and the reading comprehension ability but the one-way ANOVA showed that the differences among the scores of low, mid and high autonomy-level students on the reading comprehension test were not statistically significant. Regression analysis showed that, of the factors considered in the questionnaire, only the Nature of Language Learning was a reliable predictor of reading comprehension ability of the participants.
  • Mansoor Tavakoli, Mohammad Javad Ahmadian Page 101
    The study reported in this article aimed to investigate the effect of simultaneous use of online planning and task repetition on accurate and fluent oral production of morphosyntactic features (e.g. plural –s, possessive –‗s, –ing forms, past tense –ed) by EFL learners. The effect of four planning and task repetition conditions (i.e. online planning without task repetition, task repetition under time pressure, task repetition with online planning, and no planning/task repetition) on learners‘ accuracy and fluency in producing morphosyntactic features was investigated. 60 Iranian beginning-level EFL learners were randomly assigned to the four experimental conditions. Participants in all four groups (n=15) were required to engage in an oral narrative task in which they watched a short episode of a classical silent film and, then, were asked to narrate the story under the conditions specified for each group. Results revealed that the opportunity to engage simultaneously in online planning and task repetition enhanced both fluency and accuracy significantly as compared to the mere engagement in online planning or task repetition or lack thereof. The results also have some implications for teachers and practitioners in EFL contexts.
  • Ghasem Modarresi Page 135
    Collocation as one of the most difficult aspects in second language learning has been neglected by contrastive analysts in ELT. In this comparative study of collocational errors, a pool of 124 males and females students majoring in English at Azad University of Ghuchan has participated. Having collected the collocational errors out of the students'' writings, the researcher decided to analyze the data from a syntagmatic perspective to determine, first, the amount of collocational errors emerging from students'' lack of collocational knowledge, and then, the strategy types that learners resort to in order to overcome their collocational deficiency. The amount of errors resulting from lack of or inadequate familiarity of students with collocations was 74%. Since the data are written compositions and the object of analysis is the texts, the researcher prefers to conduct a qualitative research and the kind of methodology employed in this research is that of interpretive approach. The results of the study showed that most of the students'' errors in writing come not from their insufficient knowledge of grammar but from their inability with regard to the combination of language units, emphasizing that no piece of written English is totally free of collocation. It also became apparent that the types of strategy learners employ most to overcome their collocational problems were transfer, emerging from their negative transfer of Persian collocations, and synonym. The implication of the study would be for educators, test developers, syllabus designers, and practitioners to fully recognize that familiarity with the way words combine helps the learners to encode language precisely and clearly.
  • Shima Babapour Page 155
    While strong evidence has been provided for the effectiveness of cross age peer tutoring, there is less empirical evidence to support the efficacy of same age peer tutoring. Hence, the purpose of this study was to determine the short-term and long-term academic effects of same age peer tutoring on elementary students'' achievement in listening, reading and writing. The treatment consisted of about 16 sessions containing 15 to 30 minutes peer tutoring for each of the 3 skills in the study. The participants of the study were 60 grade one elementary students. The experimental group students were taught under peer mediated system while the students in the control group were taught under teacher mediated system. The data were analyzed using several independent and paired t-tests which were administered across pre-test, post-test and delayed post-test scores. The results indicated that same age peer tutoring led to students'' significant improvement in listening, reading and writing in the experimental group, and that this improvement was to stay over time as indicated by the delayed post-test. The findings also showed that students'' gain score in experimental group was significantly higher than students'' gain score in control group in all skills. The results have implications for instruction in primary schools.