Teaching English Language
Volume:2 Issue: 5, Winter 2008

The disparity between the linguistic knowledge and the communicative abilities which is often observed in the performance of second language (L2) learners has recently shifted the focus of the researchers toward the FonF paradigm. Having the ability to draw thelearners'' attention to the target linguistic features in the input, FonF, as an appealing approach is thought to balance between the linguistic knowledge and communicative abilities. The present paper attempts to investigate the conditions under which the acquisition of passive syntactic structures and morphological markers of tense can be maximized, and to examine differences in noticing and learning of syntactic structures vs. morphological markers of tense. On this account, the adult college students, who had enrolled for general English, were selected for the study. They were assigned to three classes, and each class received one of the three different types of instructions: nonenhanced (NoFonF), enhanced (implicit FonF), and enhanced plus practice (explicit FonF). Results of the study revealed that explicit FonF group performed significantly better than the implicit FonF group. The study argues for the adoption of a particular type of explicit instruction – one which promotes noticing and understanding of the target linguistic features.

L1 use is commonly viewed as predominantly debilitating to L2 learning. However, more recent bilingual researchers believe that L1 is not to be taken as a barrier, but as mental weaponry which can help control or regulate L2 learning processes (Cumming,1989; Wang, 2003). To illuminate the authenticity of the recent conviction in bilingualism, the present study set out first to find out 1) if Iranian L2 learnersinvolved in L2 composing task backtrack to rely on their L1; (2) how often they do so if any at all; (3) under what conditions they rely on their L1; (4) and finally what functions are likely to be served while doing so. To this end, the study used a think-alouddata collection procedure. The analysis of the results indicated that the subjects more often than not resorted to their L1 in order to function properly in the L2 composing task. The total number of L1 use was 1519 within 7535 words produced by the participants. As to the third question, the analysis showed that the subjects resorted to their L1 under the following conditions: (1) initiation; (2) mental investigation; (3) rectification; (4) organization; (5) coherence construction; and (6) meaning confirmation. Their dependence on L1 while writing in L2 was taken to serve the following functions: (1) cognitive; (2) generative; (3) linguistic; (4) metacognitive; and finally (5) communicative. Overall, the results indicate strong positive role L1 plays in the EFL learners’ functioning in L2 and highlight the necessity to develop a theory of L2 writing, incorporating the unique features of L2 writing.

A main feature of recent scholarly work on language is its focus on identity, or the self, as a social construct, or more particularly as a discursive product (Fairclough, 1992; Ivanic, 1998). One way of viewing the self as a social construct is through the notion ‘face’, i.e. “the positive social value a person effectively claims for himself (sic) by the line othersassume he (sic) has taken during a particular contact” (Goffman, 1967: 5).Building upon Goffman’s notion of ‘face’ as a social construct and the Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory and particularly their claim to universality of ‘face’, the present study is an endeavour to investigate the ways in which Iranian women’s identity, or ‘face’ wants, affect their linguistic interaction with the members of the oppositesex.This study was conducted in a case study format and the data thus obtained were analysed using QSR.NUDIST software. The subjects were seven women working at Iranian governmental offices whose daily interactions with their male and femalecustomers were observed over a two week period.Eleven follow up interviews were conducted with the participants. The results indicate that Iranian women show a systematic awareness of the significance of their face wants in constructing their identity as ‘Iranian women’. Nevertheless, this negative face isnot entirely socially motivated and is not likely to be explicable in accord with Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory which is often postulated to be universal.

Computer-mediated learning tools have promised to be effective educational tools in language classes. This research focused on integrating tutor weblog and learner blogs into reading and writing English classes. This quasi-experimental study was conducted on 57 Iranian freshman high school students at Farzanegan Highschool. Data was obtained through a Likert scale attitude questionnaire and ten open-ended or yes-no questions regarding the effectiveness of Blog Assisted Language Learning (BALL). Data were analyzed using Chi-square test with SPSS. The results of data analysis indicated that the vast majority of students found the task of using and creating blogs appealing. Theypreferred weblog writing to the more traditional ways.Most of them believed that weblogs can improve their reading and writing skills. The students perceived that the interaction and cooperative learning among peers increased due to the blog assignments. This study yielded some practical insights and implications which are presented in this article.

An extremely important issue in any approach of teaching and learning second/foreign language is that students receive feedback on their activities in second/foreign language learning milieu. There are many strategies that teachers adopt to provide studentswith evidence that what they have just produced in their writing activities is incorrect. However, there has not been much attempt to investigate the effect of considering the students'' attitudes in adopting these error correction strategies. The present study was an attempt to explore the effect of considering student''s attitudes towards error correction on the grammatical accuracy of their English writing. For this purpose twogroups, experimental and control, passing writing essay course as partial requirement of their study at university, were selected. The students in both groups took part in an original IELTS test as a pre-test. For the first half of the term (8 sessions) the students in both groups received similar writing instruction. They also received feedback on their writing activities. Then, a questionnaire was given to the teachers to find out howcorrelated their methods of error correction are. The results showed that the methods used by them were different. After that, an early version of a questionnaire developed by Icy Lee (2005), after some modifications, was given to both experimental and control groups to check the students'' attitudes towards writing error correction strategies. The data obtained from this questionnaire was analyzed to highlight thoseerror correction strategies prefered by most students.Then, the teachers in both groups were informed aboutthe result of the questionnaires. The teacher of theexperimental group adjusted and modified his errorcorrection methods according to those preferred by thestudents for the second half of the term. The teacher inthe control group, on the other hand, ignored thestudents preferences in writing error corrections.Finally, both groups took part in IELTS test as posttest.The result showed that the students in theexperimental group outperformed the students in thecontrol group on grammatical accuracy in Englishwriting.

The importance of learning context has stirred debates in the field of second language acquisition over the past two decades since studying a second language (L2) abroad isbelieved to provide authentic opportunities that facilitate L2 acquisition and development. The present paper examines whether language performance of learners studying English in a formal language classroom context at home (AH) is different from performance of learners who study English abroad (SA) where they would have to use English for a range of communicative purposes. The data for this comparative study is part of a larger corpusof L2 performance of 100 learners of English, 60 in Tehran and 40 in London, on four oral narrative tasks. The two groups’ performances are compared on a range of different measures of fluency, accuracy, syntactic complexity and lexical diversity. The results of theanalyses indicate that learners in the two contexts are very similar with respect to the grammatical accuracy and aspects of the oral fluency of their performance. However, the SA group appears to have benefited from living and studying abroad in producing language of higher syntactic complexity and lexical diversity. These results have significant implications for language teaching in AH contexts.

Drama is a composite art, a mixture of literature and many other arts, originally written to be performed, since its proper appreciation depends on its being observed, not just read. A play is not fully a work of dramatic art until the text is transformed to action and sound (Rezai, 1992). The performance of the text will reveal many indicative clues to the discovery of the theme, characterization and symbolism of the play. In our academicenvironments, however, all courses designed to teach drama focus on the written text, and almost no effort is made to incorporate the theoretical analysis of the text with the unparalleled experience of watching the live dramatic performance of plays. The present study undertakes to examine how effective this experience can be on the students’understanding and evaluation of drama. For this purpose, an intact group of the students of English literature in Islamic Azad University, Rasht Branch, all at the same level of academic education, were chosen and randomly divided into two groups. A pretest determined their similar level of language proficiency before hand. The treatment, i.e. theoretical discussion and critical evaluation of a play, Sophocles’ Antigone, plus watching its live performance, was implemented in the experimental group for at least 10 sessions. The final step was the administration of a posttest for both groups to estimate to what extent they acquired the ability to the successful analysis of the dramatic workpresented to them. The statistical analysis revealed that the experimental group which was offered the chance of theoretical discussion of the text and watching the play yielded more satisfactory results.