سعید یزدانی

The present mixed-method study sought to investigate the efficacy of using an interventionist dynamic assessment and specifically its formats namely the cake and the sandwich ones on learners’ grammatical English Tenses. In doing so, 45 advanced learners of English language at Iran Language Institute (ILI) in Shiraz, Iran were selected. They were randomly assigned to 3 groups, each including 15 participants. Two experimental groups namely the cake and the sandwich ones received the interventionist dynamic assessment test while the third group received a non-dynamic grammar test which was functioning as a control group. As the study utilized a sequential exploratory design (QUAN → qual) of mixed method approach (MMR), the quantitative part was carried out via a well-established grammar test and in the qualitative component, six informants (3 from the cake group and 3 from the sandwich group) were selected to be interviewed and their quotations were descriptively analyzed through a sociocultural perspective. The quantitative component of the study revealed the outperformance of the two experimental group over the control group. However, the two modes of delivering mediation in experimental groups had no statistically significant difference on the degree of the acquisition of grammatical English tenses by learners. The interview analysis of the negotiations also demonstrated positive viewpoints of learners about the two experimental groups. Merging the quantitative and qualitative analyses, the study found that interventionist dynamic assessment, in both modes, could have positive effects on learners’ ability to improve their acquisition of English tenses.

There are two different trends for the study of metadiscourse, including interactive and reflexive. The reflexive model suggested by (Mauranen, 1993) and (Ädel, 2010) cares about reflexivity in language. As reflexivity plays a pivotal role in spoken genres, this study aimed to study the frequency and functions of reflexive metadiscourse markers in academic interviews. Hence, this study focused on a corpus of three academic interviews carried out in English native academic context that was taken from “The Michigan Corpus of Academe Spoken English” (MICASE). The corpus was analyzed using the model by Ädel that includes four functional categories of metalinguistic comments, discourse organization, speech act labels, and references to the audiences . The results showed that about one-quarter of the personal pronouns were metadiscourse. Besides, among the personal pronouns that perform metadiscourse function, singular first-person pronoun was the most frequent while plural first-person pronoun was very rare. It was also found that among the four functions, the interviewees and interviewers paid more attention to metalinguistic comments and references to the audience . The results of this study could add to the knowledge of those participating in interviews in general and in the academic context in particular.

The fast development cycle of the metropolitan populace, the backwardness of public monetary development, the failure of certain frameworks and programs, and the thoughtlessness of the public associations for metropolitan administration to wasteful metropolitan areas have prompted the rise of wasteful areas and zones in Iranian urban communities. It is without a doubt exorbitant to rejuvenate back burnout surfaces, yet not as much as to fabricate another surface. All things considered, advancement is a terrific worth, however not for wiping out and disregarding the set of experiences, innovation, and idea of the city. In any case, the wasteful surface is an unopened hub in Iranian city life and yard, and ignoring it doesn't stay just in the equivalent burnout surface and mirrors its authority deformity in the whole metropolitan framework. The soul of an incorporated metropolitan recovery plan depends on the local area direction and its local investment of the individuals, and the advancement of the social and monetary strengthening level individuals living in the areas should be plainly characterized; thusly, the presence of an institutional contextualization and help plan and heightening the limits of neighborhood foundations non-administrative associations (NGOs) is crucial. The current article, by utilizing subjective examination technique and substance examination procedure, hypotheses, explanations, and global sanctions and dependent on the examinations performed through field insights, upstream reports and meeting with inhabitants have been explored that has eventually brought about clarifying the part of neighborhood improvement foundation in understanding the objectives of manageable metropolitan recovery with an incorporated methodology. Additionally, having clarified this relationship and in addressing the inquiry that "What will be the effect of social instruction on the cycle of local area situated metropolitan recovery?" the current hypotheses and encounters have been examined. The examination results show that if the way to deal with recover is local area situated, coordinated, extensive and vital, and is toward making society, limit building, standardization and instrumentation, and through schooling, illuminating, documentation, advancement, arranging and setting up the plan, it gives the fundamental setting to the acknowledgment of feasible recovery programs in the Rey Entryway neighborhood of Qom City with the greatest presence of individuals, at that point the incorporated recovery approach will be accomplished without anyone else.

The design, implementation and outcomes of curriculums must be ongoingly evaluated. Using quantitative gap analysis, this study evaluated Iranian EFL teachers’ satisfaction with their pre-service education in developing their assessment literacy in reference to the perceived importance of knowledge and skills areas of classroom language assessment.  To this end, the study included 100 EFL teachers who graduated from state universities in Iran with at least a Bachelor’s degree and three to five years of teaching experience at public schools. Data were collected using a 44-item researcher-made semantic differential Likert scale. It involved two parts tapping into their perceptions of importance and the level of their pre-service preparation. Descriptive analysis and inferential statistics revealed that the teachers rated all the areas almost highly (M ≥ 4.67 out of 6). The participants attached the highest importance to the areas of "assessing different language skills and sub-skills". In contrast, the areas relating to "interpreting students’ test performance” and “making the appropriate decision about the students’ test results and test washback" were perceived to be the least significant in classroom assessment. The gap analysis also indicated that there was a significant difference between the teachers’ perception of the importance of assessment knowledge and skills areas and their level of pre-service education, construed as their under-preparedness for classroom assessment. Further, the gaps were perceived to be sharper in assessment skills areas.  The study discusses the implications of the findings in the context of teacher education and classroom assessment in Iran.