درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Dynamic assessment (DA), premised on Vygotsky's Sociocultural Theory (SCT), constitutes a valuable venue for language teachers to promote the dialectical praxis and awareness of language assessment and teaching in the EFL context. In spite of the surge of interest in the importance of DA in assessing the dynamically emergent abilities , little has been written down regarding EFL teachers' attitudes toward DA. The current study attempted to fill that void by unearthing Iranian EFL teachers' beliefs about DA and also to determine if there is a statistically significant difference between university and language institute teachers' attitudes with regard to DA. To this end, forty Iranian EFL teachers in the two contexts (i.e., universities and language institutes) were selected through purposive and snowball sampling procedures. Adopting an exploratory design, the researchers collected the data through an Email interview. The results of the Chi-square tests indicated that there is no significant difference in the attitudes of university and language institute teachers toward DA, and both groups held a positive attitude toward it. In addition, the content analysis of the data resulted in the emergence of three major themes namely, teachers' classroom assessment practices, EFL teacher's attitudes toward DA, and impediments to applying DA principles in EFL classes. The findings of this study cater for implications for teachers to voice their concerns about the edifice of language testing and assessment in Iran.

Drawing on Walsh's (2012) idea that boosting learners' contribution and interaction can play a key role in their foreign language learning, this mixed-methods study tried to cast some light on the ways by which teachers, via their choice and use of language, create or block learners' contribution in direct interactions in the classroom. A total of 800-minute recordings of 10 teachers' talks and their learners' in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classes were studied utilizing a Conversation Analysis methodology. The interaction patterns identified in the recordings suggest that teachers could manipulate their talk either to facilitate or obstruct learners' involvement by the inserted turns they take. The findings of the study indicate that the teachers need to minimize their interventions while the learners taking their turns, and instead pave the way for a more interactive discourse. In addition, a 'listening culture' in the classrooms should be encouraged in order to create opportunities for more classroom interactive talk. A number of implications for teachers and teacher trainers are also given.

The present research was an attempt to shed more enlightening light on the current wave of English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), which is gradually sweeping the traditional ideologies in the field of ELT. To that end, this study examined the Iranian teacher trainees’ attitude towards ELF. What makes the present research markedly different from the other language attitude studies is in the context of research, namely Iran, an underrepresented country in the literature concerning ELF. To collect the data, the researchers employed mixed methods design, using questionnaires and follow-up semi-structured interviews. The results indicated that many a participant maintained contradictory and ambivalent attitudes towards ELF-related issues. Whilst they appeared to be favorably inclined to agree with the statements pertaining to ELF, they did not display uniform attitudes about ELF-related issues in an in-depth analysis of the results. In fact, the results revealed an underlying tendency towards NS norms among the participants. Results of the study may have implications for teacher trainers and ELF researchers.

Due to the importance of idioms, many researchers and teachers have long sought to find ways of making idiom teaching and learning more effective. This study compared three visual mnemonic devices (pictures, mental imagery, and movie clips) in terms of their effect on EFL learners’ recognition and recall of English idioms. Ninety intermediate level EFL learners who were preparing themselves for IELTS participated in this study. They were in three groups of thirty members each. Each group was taught idioms using one of the afore-mentioned visual mnemonic devices. Receptive and productive tests of idioms were administered to all groups after the treatment. The one-way ANOVA procedure was used to analyze the collected data. The results revealed statistically significant differences among these devices, with pictures method being the most effective on both recognition and recall of idioms. The findings of the study can have significant theoretical as well as pedagogical implications for language researchers, textbook designers, curriculum developers, teachers, and language learners. 

This study reports on the development and validation of a questionnaire for exploring the different types of EFL teachers’ possible selves. First, a theoretical framework behind possible selves theory and its types was cultivated through an extensive review of the related literature and content analysis of 24 transcribed semi-structured interviews with ELT experts. Second, the questionnaire was developed and validated through collecting three types of evidence: content, reliability and construct. Content validity was insured by submitting the questionnaire to expert judgment, and Cronbach’s alpha was checked to measure the internal consistency reliability of the scale and its subscales. Finally, confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses as well as SEM were used to estimate the construct validity of the instrument administered to 380 EFL teachers. The results indicated that the questionnaire was both a valid and reliable measure of EFL teachers’ possible selves and the resultant model hypothesized based on the data collected from the questionnaire enjoyed acceptable fitness indices. The model of EFL teachers’ possible selves (L2 selves) consists of four types including ideal, ought-to, actual and feared selves. The paper is concluded by presenting the different senses of selves within each type which together constitute the whole model of L2 self-development and how the model can be used in future studies.

In L2 development, the cognitive complexity of tasks plays a crucial role in task performance and language features produced. However, there have only been few studies addressing the impact of task complexity on EFL learners' attention to L2 system and form-focused self-repairs (FFS).This study explores the role of increasing cognitive task complexity in EFL learners' form-focused attention (FFA) to L2 system (i.e. grammar, lexis, and phonology) and FFS and the effect of increasing procedural task complexity on EFL learners' FFA to L2 system and FFS. The participants comprised one hundred EFL junior students of TEFL. The sample was chosen from the cohort of EFL students at Islamic Azad and state universities in Isfahan and Shahrekod. The participants performed under task conditions of−/+ casual reasoning and −/+ planning time. After each stage, each participant filled in a Likert-type scale to examine his/her attention to different aspects of L2 system .Finally, Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test was used to compare the learners’ instances of of self-repairs at un-increased and increased task complexity occasions. Repeated-Measures ANOVA was used to examine the data. Results showed an overall effect of task complexity on EFL learners' attention to L2 system and FFA behavior across task types.

This study examined the effect of two types of feedback, post-text as a written feedback and recast as an oral one on written grammatical accuracy of Iranian intermediate EFL learners. To this end, 45 intermediate students who were studying at Ideal Language Institute in Sari were selected based on their performance on the Nelson proficiency test, and then divided into three groups (two experimental and one control groups) randomly. As pretest, the participants were asked to write 150-200 words about the worst memory they had in their life. Then, they were exposed to 10 weeks of treatment. Each week, they received a topic to write. One of the experimental groups received post-text feedback and another one recast. Afterwards, the three groups sat for the posttest. The obtained results were compared using ANCOVA. The findings revealed that there was a significant difference between the post-test scores of the students in different groups. It was made clear that both treatments were effective on the reduction of students grammatical errors in writing, but post-text feedback was much more effective than recast.

From a Systemic Functional perspective, Grammatical Metaphor (GM) as is taken to be a chief driving force in the discourse of different genres, an important adult language machinery for ideational meanings to be semantically cross-mapped and realized through a different form in the stratum of the lexico-grammar, in order to convey changed meanings and tinker with the discursive flow and development of text in real time, mainly through nominalization of adjectives and verbs. Using a number of established works of the English novel as data, this study draws upon the author’s previous model for the categories of GM used in modern prose fiction, with the main focus placed on one of the six categories, Prepositional GM (PGM). PGM figures with a very high frequency in fiction and occurs when a GM is preceded by a preposition. This study finds that the language of prose fiction in English deploys some of these PGMsin either of two different meaning sof the adverbial, varying according to context. Again, as seen to be the hallmark of GM by many, GM is found to open up vast ideational meaning potentials in the semantics stratum, from which the lexico-grammar makes choices according to context and intended meaning. As argued elsewhere in the literature and here, and as backed up by the author’s own experience of the advanced teaching of writing and reading, broadened understanding of GM is a critically important component to writing instruction and its effectiveness, as seen in the large-scale horizons and agendas for effective teaching of English as a Foreign Language in Iran and beyond.

La langue persane fait partie des langues dont le groupe consonantique finale de la syllabe CVCC est soumise à certaines contraintes du point de vue de la succession des sons. Le présent article se fixe, comme objectif, d’étudier les emprunts lexicaux qui, dans les groupes consonantiques en position finale, comprennent une consonne labiale non appartenant au persan contemporain mais qui y ont trouvé leur place. Pour ce faire, toutes les syllabes en CVCC ayant une consonne labiale en position de C 1 ou C 2 seront étudiées. Elles seront ensuite comparées en fonction de leur statut (lexique pur ou empreint) dans la langue. Seront ainsi étudiés la fréquence d’occurrence de chaque consonne, tous les ordres possibles de leur apparition ainsi que l’ordre de leur succession. Cette recherche s’inscrit dans le cadre des recherches descriptives et analytiques basées sur des données statistiques. Le dictionnaire Mochiri comprenant 40.000 entrées, a été utilisé comme source principale pour l’extraction des données de cette recherche. L’article est présenté dans le cadre théorique des principes de phonématique et du principe de l’ordre (de la succession) des phonèmes en fonction de leur degré de sonorité. Les résultats de cette recherche montrent que le lexique purement persan a un comportement totalement différent du lexique emprunté en ce qui concerne le type de succession dans le groupe consonantique, l’ordre de la succession sonnante et la sélection du noyau de la syllabe. En persan pur, la consonne /f/ en tant que premier élément constitutif du groupe consonantique et la consonne /m/ en tant que deuxième membre de ce groupe, sont les plus fréquemment employées, parmi les consonnes labiales.

This study intended to explore Iranian EFL teachers’ life satisfaction as well as their empathy levels. Furthermore, the relationship between Iranian EFL teacher’s life satisfaction and their empathy was investigated. To achieve these objectives, a group of 245 male and female Iranian EFL teachers with the age range of 20 to 55 years old participated. Data were collected through Life Satisfaction and Empathy Questionnaires. Results revealed that EFL teachers were satisfied with their life and were empathic teachers. Moreover, a significant relationship was found between these two variables. The main conclusion is that life satisfaction can have positive impacts on certain aspects of life; hence, it is recommended that proper conditions be provided for the EFL teachers. Additionally, having empathy with students may create happiness in both students and the teacher. Such happiness can presumably make the student bear a positive perspective towards language learning, thereby making them more motivated to learn English.