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Motivation for learning a new language is both self and time-oriented. The language learner’s motivation experiences gradual fluctuation over time and the view of oneself is different on each timescale of the study. Interaction among different timescales throughout the Second Language Development (SLD) is a novel area of investigation (de Bot, 2015). In order to probe this interactive nature, the present study tried to examine the motivational dynamics of a group of language learners in longer timescales composed of a number of tasks performed on shorter timescales. To this end, a group of university students were surveyed at the onset, while performing tasks and at the end of the course to better picture the interplay of different motivational themes over time. The results revealed different manifestations of components of L2 Motivational Self System (L2MSS) over different timescales of the study. Apart from this evolutionary manifestation of L2MSS components, ANNOVA results revealed significant difference between scores of each individual component among all three timescales. In sum, results of the study confirmed temporal and visionary variation in participants’ motivation. Finally, some implications were driven from the findings of the study.

This study, on the one hand, investigated whether or not strategies like Lexical Inferencing (LI) and Morphological Instruction (MI) can significantly affect English as a Foreign Language (EFL)learners’ reading comprehension, and on the other hand, it examined their effects on the learners’ vocabulary retention over time. For this purpose, 60 homogeneous EFLlearners were randomly assigned to two experimental and one control group each one consisting of 20 participants. After the pre-test, participants of the first experimental group received lexical inferencing strategy training for six 45-minute sessions. The second experimental group was also provided with morphological instruction for six 45-minute sessions and as for the control group, the participants followed their regular reading comprehension course without any specific strategy training. After the treatment, two post- tests with a short time interval were administered to the three groups and the obtained data were fed to different statistical tests to spot the probable differences among the three groups' first post- test performance as a measure of their learning differences and the second post-test performance as a measure of the learners’ vocabulary retention differences over time. Results of the paired t-tests for comparison of the within group differences showed that lexical inferencing instruction had statistically significant effect on EFL learners' reading comprehension development. On the other hand, it was found that morphological instruction had no statistically significant effect on EFL learners' reading comprehension development. The ANOVA analyses revealed that there was no statistically significant difference between the effects of lexical inferencing and morphological instruction on EFL learners' reading comprehension development. Furthermore, no significant difference was found between the effects of lexical inferencing and morphological instruction on EFL learners' reading comprehension development over time.

The present study aimed toassess the target and present reading comprehension needs and abilities of Iranian medical students with different levels of Englishlanguage proficiency. A total of 283 medical students and 23 ESP instructors were chosen through cluster sampling. The data collection instruments included the Persian version of Atai and Nazari’s (2011) needs analysis questionnaire and a 40-item language proficiency test. The obtained results indicatedthat ‘general vocabulary’and ‘medical terminology’were considered ‘important’ in facilitating the comprehension of medical texts. In addition, the findings revealed that medical students need to improve all reading sub-skills. Furthermore, the respondents’ perceptions were significantly different with regard to students’ target needs and present abilities in reading comprehension. Finally, there was no statistically significant difference in students’ target and present needs and abilities across different levels of language proficiency. The findings have potentialimplications for the improvement of medical EAP courses.

Listening is regarded as an interactive process involving decoding of information. This study was launched to find out the impact of bottom-up (BU) and top-down (TD)techniques on Iranian lower and upper intermediate learners’ listening comprehension.We selected a total of 120 participants in six intactclasses, three lower intermediate and three upper intermediate. The proficiency level of the groups was further verified and groups at each proficiency levelwere randomly assigned as aBUgroup who were engaged in BUactivities during the pre-listening stage of each lesson throughout the eight-session treatment, aTDgroup who performed TD activities, and a control group (CG)for whom no pre-listening attention focusing activities were used. The One-way and Two-way analysis of variance of the listening post-test scores indicated that the lower-intermediate BU group and the upper-intermediate TD group did significantly better compared to the other groups.The findings suggest thatBU processing activities were more effective atlower intermediatelevelwhile TD processing activities played a more facilitative role for upper intermediateparticipants.The findings support the interaction between proficiency level and information processing techniques and imply a number of pedagogical implications.

The present study investigated whether word learning and retention in a second language are contingent upon a task's involvement load, i.e., the amount of need, search, and evaluation the task imposes. Laufer and Hulstijn (2001) contend that tasks with higher degrees of these three components induce higher involvement load, and are, therefore, more effective for word learning. To test this claim, 64 Iranian intermediate EFL learners were selected based on their performance on the Preliminary English Test (PET). The participants were randomly assigned to two equal groups. Each group completed different vocabulary learning tasks that varied in the amount of involvement they induced. The tasks were jigsaw task (Group A) and information gap task (Group B). During the ten treatment sessions, recall and retention of the 100 unfamiliar target words were tested through immediate and delayed posttest. Data were analyzed using repeated measure ANOVA. The results indicated that learners benefited more from jigsaw task with higher involvement load. This study supported the Involvement Load Hypothesis, suggesting that higher involvement induced by the task resulted in more effective recall; however, no significant difference was observed between the two tasks in the retention of the unknown words.

This article sets out to examine the effect of utilizing different culturally-based materials on EFL university students' foreign language reading anxiety, reading comprehension self-efficacy, and reading proficiency within project-based classes. The research was carried out with two classes of intermediate freshmen majoring in English Language Teaching. The comparison group had to present their projects based on the reading passages of the book "Active" (L2 culturally-oriented texts) and the experimental group had to deliver their projects based on their L1 and L2 culturally-based reading texts designed by the researcher. Reading comprehension self-efficacy scale, foreign language reading anxiety scale, and the reading section of the Michigan Test (1998) were administered to students as pre-tests and post-tests at the beginning and at the end of one academic year consisting of two project-based reading courses. ANCOVA was utilized for analyzing the data. The results indicated that although in both groups significant improvements were observed regarding the three aforementioned variables, it was the experimental group that showed significantly less degrees of anxiety, compared to the comparison group. However, no differences regarding reading self-efficacy and reading proficiency were observed between the two groups. The findings of this study suggest that EFL teachers, material developers and syllabus designers can take advantage of cultural familiar texts when generating their own learning materials.

Alternative assessments have evolved from an epistemological change in education. They see assessment and instruction as two sides on the same coin which go hand in hand. The traditional roles of both teachers and learners are, consequently, modified which is essential for better language development. In this line, the present study aimed at comparing the effects of portfolio and journal writing assessment on EFL learners’ autonomy. The study followed a quasi-experimental design with two study groups having a pre-test, treatment, post-test format. To this end, 39 EFL learners whose scores on PET test were one standard deviation above and below the mean were selected for the groups which were then randomly assigned for two treatment types, namely portfolio assessment (PA) and journal writing assessment (JWA). The groups’ autonomy levels were compared by one-way ANCOVA, the results of which did not reveal any significant difference in the positive effects of these two common alternative assessments. It was inferred that language teachers can take the advantage of any or both of these alternative assessment types to improve their learners’ autonomy and make them lifelong language learners. The great role of autonomy in language learning and further pedagogical implications for the findings for language learners, teachers, and curriculum developers are discussed in the paper. 

The learners’ identity is one of the most important key elements of learning to motivate learners to learn English. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the male and female EFL learners’ motivation and their identity with a focus on gender. The study had a descriptive correlational design. The participants of this study were 50 Iranian male and 50 female postgraduate English majors, aged between 23 and 41, who were selected through convenient sampling. Three questionnaires of motivation, hardiness, and perfectionism were distributed among the participants. The results of Pearson correlation analyses demonstrated that there was not a significant relationship between EFL learners’ motivation and their hardiness in both genders. Also, the results showed no significant relationship between EFL learners’ motivation and their perfectionism in the two groups. Moreover, the results of independent-sample t-tests failed to find any significant difference between male and female students’ motivation and their hardiness and perfectionism.