درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

This study aimed to investigate the impact of web-based cooperative teaching through strategy-based instruction on EFL learners’ speaking and listening skills. Moreover, the use of cooperative teaching was hypothesized to have impact on the EFL learners’ self-efficacy. To this purpose, the study followed a mixed-methods design by implementing both qualitative and quantitative data gathering procedures through tests, questionnaire and interviews. The population of the study was made up of 48 EFL learners in a language institute in Kerman, a city in the south east of Iran. In order to collect data, four instruments were used: Cambridge Placement Test to homogenize the participants, pre- and post-listening and speaking tests, a questionnaire to estimate EFL learners’ self-efficacy and finally an interview. Based on the obtained results, it was revealed that the learners in the online group improved much more satisfactorily than those taught through traditional teaching procedures. It was, therefore, concluded that collaborative teaching strategies were effective in the web environment. Besides, meaningful relationships were observed between the use of the applied strategies and the oral skills. Furthermore, the results of the questionnaire clearly indicated the learners’ self-efficacy improvement from pre- to post-administration. Finally, the resulted obtained from the interview showed the positive effect of web-based cooperative and strategy teaching in the oral language class. In fact, majority of the learners in the online group clearly maintained that using collaboration in the web-environment could enhance their learning level. The findings of the study are of much help to language teachers who observe learning problems among their students. They can also assist learners who suffer from communicative difficulties in the situations where they have to collaborate with other groups and exchange ideas.

Teacher identity has turned out to be of great importance in teacher pedagogical practice. A number of factors are implicated in shaping and reshaping teachers' identity. Despite numerous studies on teacher identity, language teacher religious identity has remained under-researched. Therefore, the current study examined how Iranian religious English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers are identified. To do so, 30 religious teachers were selected through purposive sampling. The data were collected through employing semi-structured interviews, developed based on Simon’s (2004) six components of identity, namely personal features, physical characters, special abilities, behavioral qualities, ideological attributes, and group membership. The results demonstrated that religious teachers tend to manifest certain Islamic-based personal attributes like fairness and kindness and also adhere to some Islamic rules of physical features like head covering for females and dignified clothes for males. In addition, religious teachers' behaviors and performances were profoundly affected by their religious background, realized in their attempts to control their anger, to avoid insulting and backbiting, and to disregard or replacing the materials which seem to be against the Islamic thought. The findings can have practical implications for teachers, institute administrators, and other stakeholders whose cognizance of religious teachers' identity could help prevent possible identity tensions.

This study addresses the acquisition of the morphological markers in Persian learners of English as a foreign language. To this end, the accuracy order of nine morphemes including plural –s, progressive –ing, copula be, auxiliary be, irregular past tense, regular past tense –ed, third person –s, possessive -ʼs and indefinite articles was studied in 60 teenage Persian EFL learners. Placement and proficiency tests and a demographic questionnaire were employed to collect the data. The total production of 2160 morphemes was manually checked, classified, and counted to rank their acquisition order. The learners’ accuracy order was ranked in a decreased order from 1 to 9 as follows: regular past tense, auxiliary be, copula be, present progressive tense, indefinite articles, plural –s, possessive -ʼs, irregular past tense and third-person singular –s. The Spearman correlation showed that Persian students’ accuracy order had a moderate and weak relationship with the accuracy order of ESL and EFL learners, respectively. This finding proves that Persian EFL learners do not learn English grammatical morphemes in a natural order. Moreover, the universal grammar does not remain fully in these learners. The minor role of UG in EFL acquisition also indicates the important role of transfer in foreign language learning.

In recent years, the personal characteristics and attitudes of teachers have attracted the attention of various scholars. The teacher’s immunity level is one of the newly proposed concepts in this area. The present study aimed at exploring the difference between the immunity level of the Iranian EFL teachers at language centers and public schools. In order to achieve this objective, one hundred EFL teachers teaching in public schools (N = 50) and language centers (N = 50), in Isfahan, were selected through convenience sampling to participate in this study. Then, the Teachers’ Immunity Level questionnaire was administered to them, and they were interviewed as well.  The obtained results revealed that teachers working in public schools have higher levels of immunity compared to the ones working in language centers. This finding can have some implications for the decision-makers in the Iranian Ministry of Education to provide adequate amenities to improve teachers’ immunity in language centers.

The present study was aimed at investigating intermediate Iranian EFL learners’ feedback preferences on their L2 writing and examining the possible differences between learners with entity and incremental language mindsets with respect to their feedback preferences. To this end, 150 EFL learners were recruited from several language institutes in Isfahan, Iran, and their language proficiency level was measured through a proficiency test. The learners were then given the Language Mindsets Questionnaire and the Feedback Preferences Scale to fill out. Frequency counts, mean scores, and chi-square for independence were employed to analyze the collected data. The results of the study indicated that teacher-student conferencing, self-correction, peer correction, and correction using prompts were the types of feedback that the learners preferred to receive, and the difference between entity and incremental mindset holders reached statistical significance for teacher correction with comments, self-correction, and teacher-student conferencing. Regarding the strategies the learners utilized to handle feedback, the two groups of learners were significantly different just in terms of asking for teacher explanation. Finally, thinking prompts received priority in the following order, L1/L2, word, and rule, while goal and fit were not favored by the learners; thinking prompt did not turn out to cause significantly different preferences in the EFL learners with entity or incremental mindsets. The significance of the obtained results are discussed and the implications of the study are then proffered

The present article dedicates to studying the syllable-internal structure in three Iranian Balochi dialects (IBDs) namely Mirjaveh Sarhaddi, Sarawani and Lashari dialects. The data analysis will be based on the onset-rhyme theory (e.g., Kurylowicz, 1948; Fudge, 1969; Vergnaud & Halle, 1979; Selkirk, 1982). Moreover, the syllable weight in IBDs will be discussed in the framework of mora theory (Hayes, 1985, 1989). The data have been collected during the research fieldwork in Sistan and Baluchestan province, Iran. The research findings demonstrate that the Balochi language is an example of a nucleus-weight language in which heavy syllables depend on the number of elements in the nucleus. Thus, CV and CVC are light syllables and CVV(C) syllable is counted as heavy syllable. Besides, the context-dependent weight of CVC syllables occurs in IBDs stress pattern system. Studying the syllable contact (word-medial consonant clusters) in IBDs shows that Balochi is among languages that admit all types of heterosyllablic clusters.

The present study explored the effects of three forms of reading-based L2 vocabulary tasks on learning and retention of 40 target words by Iranian intermediate and advanced male English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. To this end, 176 EFL learners were randomly selected and assigned to three experimental and one control condition across two levels of intermediate and advanced proficiency levels. The participants in the experimental conditions read 8 texts including 40 target words and performed word-focused (WF) tasks, oral reproduction (OR) plus summary writing (SW) tasks, and WF plus OR vocabulary tasks incorporating target words according to their task designation. The results of two-way MANOVA and Scheffe’s post-hoc test demonstrated that while all three experimental conditions significantly outperformed the control group in terms of learning and retention of target words, the WF plus OR task was found to be the most effective condition. The results are justified in light of Laufer and Hulstjin’s (2001) Involvement Load Hypothesis, Nation and Webb’s (2011) Technique Feature Analysis, the Skill Acquisition Theory, and Swain’s (1985) Output Hypothesis. The study concluded with pedagogical implications for language teachers and materials developers with regard to including both word-focused and meaning-oriented L2 vocabulary tasks in language classes and language textbooks.

The status of teaching ESP has been studied both internationally and locally. However, it seems that the challenges of teaching ESP in medical universities of Iran have not been studied appropriately. The main objective of the present study was to explore the main challenges of teaching ESP in medical universities of Iran. Due to the nature of the study, a qualitative res earch design (Phenomenological) was used. The data were gathered through interviewing 25 ESP stakeholders from two universities of medical sciences in Tehran. The data were analyzed through content analysis techniques. The results showed that the challenges are classified into three main themes: institution challenges, learner related challenges, and teacher related challenges. Institution related challenges consisted of undetermined aims, structure of the curricula, and content of syllabus, evaluation, time limitation and classroom size. The learner related challenges included lack of motivation, poor GEL background, and learners’ focus on test, and learners’ inappropriate needs’ analysis. ESP teachers’ related challenges included teacher’s language proficiency, teachers’ content knowledge, teachers’ perception of ESP, teachers’ teaching method, teachers’ familiarity with material development, and testing skills. The findings of the study can be used to promote the status of teaching ESP in medical universities.

Togetherness of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) has been the subject of many recent studies in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) and English as a Second Language (ESL) domain. Few studies, however, have addressed the impact of TBLT on ESP learners’ linguistic production. This study aimed at investigating the impact of task-based teaching on ESP learners’ speaking and writing. Furthermore, this study aimed to explore the ESP learners’ and instructors’ attitudes toward the nature of program and their perceived needs of tasks to be accomplished in the course. To fulfill this aim, 60 ESP students majoring in Law in 2 different classes at Allameh Tabataba’i University, Iran, and 10 ESP instructors were selected as the participants of the study. Accordingly, the students in one of the two classes received a one-semester long instruction based on the principles of TBLT as the experimental group, while the students in the other class were taught according to the content of the textbook developed for such courses. After the instruction was over, the students were given a set of standardized and teacher-made tests. The results of the data analysis indicated that the experimental group showed a significant difference in terms of improvement in acquiring productive skills. It was also revealed that there were significant differences between the participants’ attitudes regarding the nature of the course and their perceived needs of tasks. The findings of this research could provide an insight into designing opportune syllabi for ESP courses.

The current mixed-method research aimed to investigate the effects of self-constructs on self-regulation. To this end, a number of 127 Iranian EFL learners were chosen randomly as the sample of the study. To collect data, semi-structured interviews were designed. Also, correlation analysis and regression analysis were run on the data. The results of interview data suggested that motivated learners who reported self-regulation tended to display positive visualization of their ideal L2 self and self-efficacy beliefs. Besides, the result of correlation analysis indicated that ideal L2 self had stronger association with self-efficacy beliefs than with self-regulation, suggesting that it is necessary to hold positive beliefs towards language learning in order to visualize oneself as a proficient and successful language user. Of the two self-constructs, self-regulation turned out to be most strongly associated with self-efficacy followed by ideal L2 self indicating that what characterizes self-regulated learners is that their levels of self-efficacy is higher compared to those who are not. Finally, the result of regression analysis revealed that self-efficacy and, to the lesser extent, ideal L2 self were found as direct predictors of self-regulation. It seems unlikely to be a motivated learner without the actual beliefs in ones’ ability and a strong actualization of one’s image as a successful language user.