Iranian Journal of Language Teaching Research
Volume:10 Issue: 1, Jan 2022

The current study investigated differences in lexical knowledge of Arabic learners whose age of onset (AO) of exposure to English medium instruction (EMI) was at the elementary, secondary, and tertiary educational levels. Ninety undergraduate students enrolled in a public university in the UAE took part in the study. Data collection involved a background questionnaire, a vocabulary size task, and a vocabulary depth task. Using the background questionnaire, the participants were separated into the early, middle, and late learners - those exposed to EMI in elementary, secondary, and tertiary levels, respectively. The results revealed a significant multivariate main effect for the AO to vocabulary knowledge. The post hoc analysis confirmed a significant effect for vocabulary size only; no such effects were observed for vocabulary depth. Theocratical, methodological, and pedagogical implications are discussed.

Digital Storytelling (DST) is a globally accepted approach in teaching English. However, in the Indonesian EFL context, little attention has been paid to DST as a pedagogical approach, particularly its potential to create a bridge between the students’ primary culture and that of English cultures. We report on how DST helped Indonesian junior-school students make meaning in English through a local culture-based DST narrative project. As part of a case study approach, we used various qualitative data collection methods, including focus group interviews, students' reflective journals, classroom observations, and the DST product itself. Finally, multimodal transcription and thematic content analysis were used to interpret the data. The study shows that the digital story is an effective tool to express the students' identity and make meaning through their local culture stories. Participating in these activities also increased student motivation. Working collaboratively in a group helped them to make meaning and focus on topics that resonated with them personally, reduced stress, and allowed them to focus on communication. Drawing on their local culture also assisted to build a bridge between the familiar lexical content and terminology and the less familiar English cultural content and vocabulary, resulting in enhanced engagement and achievement in English. Practically, the DST project-based learning assisted EFL teachers to integrate authentic and communicative learning experiences into a packed curriculum.

Contemporary EAP research and teaching academics constantly elaborate new and better methods and re-evaluate those in use to facilitate students’ academic growth. The article considers some options for teaching EAP to undergraduates highlighting the results of the experimental study conducted in the context of higher education in Russia and motivated by the researchers’ perceptions about university level students' difficulties in acquiring proficiency in academic English. The data for this paper comes from 192 undergraduates’ research project proposals. The approach offered is largely in line with traditions of the genre analysis and combines some novel features and conventional elements of the genre, product and process approaches. The innovations imply the use of recurring pattern phrases which are presented as sets of structural templates grouped in genre-based functional categories and organised around the framework of the project proposal.  The article analyses applicability and functionality of this complex methodology developed by the authors relying on criterion-referenced measurement of students’ writing performance by independent raters using analytic rating scales for assessment. The benefits of the methodology under discussion largely pertain to improvement in academic style and text organisation, and a learner-centred approach adopted helps students develop their own models for step-by-step writing project proposals. The findings of this study can have implications for EAP teaching practice in NNS educational settings.

Although previous studies support using pair work in the language learning classroom, some have shown that getting L2 learners into pairs without raising their awareness about the global norms of collaboration will not necessarily create quality opportunities for interlanguage development. In this study, we investigated the contribution of teaching collaborative ground rules through peer modeling to a learner’s routine participatory patterns over time. Using a qualitative single case study methodology, we focused on one intermediate EFL learner interacting with different peers in pairs in an intact class. According to the syllabus of the course, learners had to pair up each session (9 sessions in total) with three different partners to do a narrative task. On the fifth session, a model performance with collaborative ground rules knitted into it was demonstrated to the class to find out how the provision of peer modeling would change the pair participatory patterns. Our analyses of the data from the learner’s audio-recorded performances prior and subsequent to the modeling session suggest that the provision of peer modeling has qualitatively expanded the learner’s interactive patterns in pair interaction. This study contributes to our understanding of collaborative tasks, and it also suggests that peer modeling could be used as a useful pedagogical technique for teaching learners how to collaborate meaningfully in dyadic interaction.

Recent conceptualizations of L2 motivation have regarded target language learners’ goal-directed visions as the core feature of directed motivational currents; that is, a period of intense and enduring motivation in pursuit of a favorable personal vision. This study reports on a multiple-case study designed to explore the effective factors on  language learners’ vision generation process in the context of Iran based on the framework developed by Dörnyei and Kubanyiova (2014). Taking into account that the notions of motivation and vision are no longer seen as stable individual difference factors, but as dynamic and continuously fluctuating ones, the present study takes an ecological analytical framework towards the issue applying Bronfenbrenner's (1979, 1993) nested ecosystems model, involving four layers of context as: microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, and macrosystem. The participants of the study were four university students and the data were collected through semi-structured interviews, learning journals, and classroom observations during a period of six months. The results of the study revealed the existence of different eco-systemic agents and affordances in the emergence of the participants’ goal-directed visions. They were parents’ expectations and teachers’ behavior at the microsystem, learners’ background experiences at high school at the mesosystem, types of tests and materials at the exosystem and Iranians’ competitive spirit at the macrosystem.

Globally various barriers hinder English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners from developing English communicative competence. Concern in this regard is also raised in the context of Iran. Two themes that strongly emerge from the vast number of publications on the causes of poor EFL learning outcomes in Iran include the need for teacher reflectivity and teacher autonomy. Scholarly publications outside the context of EFL underline these two constructs as necessary components of teacher self-directed learning as a prerequisite for the transformation of education. The frequent focus on these two elements in the literature in the context of EFL in Iran has motivated a systematic literature review to determine how these publications point towards a possible relationship between these two elements, with a specific focus on the role such a relationship could play in self-directed learning by EFL teachers in order to change poor learning outcomes. Using commonly agreed criteria for inclusion into the data set, the two researchers perused an initial 1006 publications identified through a systematic review of the literature, after which 43 publications were selected for analysis. The 6 themes that emerged from the analysis strongly point to a relationship between EFL teacher autonomy, teacher reflectivity and teacher self-directed learning. Role players in EFL, not only in Iran but also globally, should pay heed to the voices raised in the literature concerning the consequences of under-valuing these constructs in EFL teacher preparation courses if the aim is to secure sustainable transformation of EFL practice.

Differentiated Instruction (DI), as a single instructional technique that focuses on the challenges of meeting varied needs and qualities of learners in inclusive educational contexts, has recently attracted great attention in the field of education. The present study aims to explore the effects of differentiated instruction (DI) on foreign language achievement (FLA), foreign language motivation (FLM), and learner autonomy (LA) of English learners at a state school in Istanbul, Turkey. Additionally, the study attempts to explore how students and their teacher perceive the use of DI in English classrooms as well. The participants were 24 students and one teacher enrolled in the 8th grade (secondary level) English program at a state school in Istanbul, Turkey. The data were collected quantitatively using the Foreign Language Motivation Questionnaire, pre-and post-achievement tests, and the Learner Autonomy Scale. To complement the quantitative data, qualitative data were gathered from student interviews and teacher reflective journals. The findings demonstrated that incorporating DI enhanced the participants' overall FLA as well as FLM and LA.  Both students and their teacher perceived DI to be effective and useful while studying and teaching English. Based on the obtained findings, the study provides suggestions and pedagogical implications about incorporating DI in secondary-level English classrooms.

Although it is generally defined as the verbal or written transfer of feelings and thoughts, there is no unanimity on a frame regarding the process, content, method, feature, meaning and importance of literature (Eagleton 1996, Hernadi 1978, Meyer 1997). In his definition of literature, Eagleton says that “literature we are told is vitally engaged with the living situations of men and women, it is concrete rather than abstract, displays life in all its rich variousness” (1996, p. 171). Literature has always been, and will continue to be, one of the universal denominators of human experience through which people may identify and communicate with one another, regardless of their professions, life ambitions, geographical and cultural regions, or personal situations. It enables one to dream, to fictionalize the future through combining the past with the current time. Literature also provides us with insights into the past eras, the origins of our society and our current environment. In a nut shell, literature helps us to appreciate the richness of humanity's inheritance in ethnic and cultural diversity, because, it is a powerful tool for delving into the culture of a specific period, socioeconomic class, or social group.

As assessment assumes a pivotal role in language education, the quest for the most valid, reliable, practical, and all in all, effective assessment has gained momentum (Kremmel & Harding, 2020).  This quest has led to the emergence of different types of testing techniques, one of which is the cloze test (Gellert & Elbro, 2013).  Rooted in his Ph.D. dissertation, Karim Sadeghi endeavors to provide a thorough treatment of the extent to which the cloze test can be employed as an appropriate and valid measure of reading comprehension in his recently published book Assessing Second Language Reading: Insights from Cloze Tests. The book comprises 10 chapters and offers an authoritative account of L2 reading and the cloze procedure before evaluating a range of cloze tests both quantitatively and qualitatively.

Interfacing the domains of second language (L2) writing and assessment, Assessing Change in English Second Language Writing Performance authored by Khaled Barkaoui and Ali Hadidi purports to advance our understanding of the nature and outcome of instruction on L2 learners’ writing development over an extended period of time. In this succinct volume, the authors present a writing assessment model and then describe a study that set out to validate the proposed model. As L2 writing teachers and researchers, we are constantly faced with the choice of how best to assess learners’ writing development.  As such we were keen to review a book which provides a model that identifies and evaluates a number of different measures of writing dimensions.