حمیدرضا دولت آبادی

The present study aimed to analyze two secondary English school textbooks from Iran and Egypt to see to what extent these two middle-eastern countries with similar religious, historical, and social backgrounds include culture in their official textbooks.  For this purpose, Vision I , the Iranian secondary school textbook, and Hello I, the Egyptian English school textbook, were chosen. Four aspects of culture (topics, cultural dimensions, international/intercultural issues, and cultural references) were investigated in these two textbooks. The results show that Vision I has a more limited number of cultural content compared to Hello I . However, a lack of in-depth cultural information could be observed in both textbooks. Thus, it is necessary to take special measures concerning Vision I by including a greater array of cultural content and giving this content depth and detail. For Hello I , the cultural content needs to exceed in quality. The present study's findings might be insightful for syllabus designers, textbook publishers, and teachers to reconsider the essential role of culture qualitatively and quantitatively.

Medical practitioners’ ethnocentric orientations and English language skills contribute to the success or failure of intercultural communication in the context of health care. The present study aims to investigate the relationship between ethnocentrism and investment in learning English in the multicultural setting of English classrooms at an Iranian medical university. To this end, 200 Iranian medical students’ levels of ethnocentrism and investment in learning English were measured. The findings of this study revealed that the participants had relatively moderate levels of ethnocentrism and investment, and there was a strong negative relationship between the two constructs. Female medical students were found to be significantly less ethnocentric than male students, but were not significantly different from them in terms of investment. These findings were explained considering several contextual factors such as the participants’ linguistic loyalty, intercultural contact, and social comfort in English classrooms. Practical implications, direction, and limitations are discussed.

To explore the effectiveness of flipped instruction in influencing second language learning outcomes, the current research investigated the contribution of flipped classrooms of an English-as-a-Foreign-Language (EFL) writing course to Iranian learners’ writing development and writing motivation. In so doing, two intact classes were chosen as the participants (N=43) of this research and they were randomly assigned to a Control Group (N = 18) and an Experimental Group (N = 25). During one semester, the Control Group underwent the traditional writing instruction, while the Experimental Group received a flipped writing instruction. Second Language Writing Motivation Scale (SLWMS) and two timed writing tasks were given to gather the required data. The results demonstrated that the flipped method of teaching was substantially effective in improving the L2 writing performance of the experimental group ( F = 22.20, p = 0.000, partial eta squared = 0.35) . Also, the results indicated that the flipped instruction had a statistically significant effect on learners’ writing motivation ( F = 51.67, p = 0.000, partial eta squared = 0.56) . The findings have remarkable implications for L2 writing methodology.