Issues in Language Teaching

Classroom performance assessment has gained prominence parallel to the multiplicity of the purposes ahead of assessment. Of many, the major controversy, which was the motive behind this study, is the incorporation of L1-based elicitation as a valid measure of second language (L2) performance assessment. To shed empirical lights on this issue, this explanatory sequential mixed-methods research employed 87 Iranian intermediate EFL learners, whose L2 classroom performance was assessed through L1-based elicitation techniques. In order to validate this mechanism, multi-method mono-trait model (namely, Pearson correlation, structural equations, exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, composite reliability and convergent validity) suggested by Henning and Mesick’s Unitary Concept of validity were applied. The results from these multiple sources of evidence yield support to their common consensus that L1-based elicitation techniques are valid measures of L2 performance assessment. The findings then offer legacy to the educational implications of L1-based mechanisms both in L2 instruction and assessment.

Despite the significant role of emotions in any aspect of language learning, including its pragmatic aspect, there have been few research studies on this topic. As a stride toward narrowing this research niche, the objectives of this research were threefold. Firstly, it aimed to examine the two face-threatening speech acts of request and apology as indicators of learners’‎ interlanguage pragmatic competence (ILP) and its relationships with learners’ Emotional Quotient (EQ). Secondly, it sought to investigate ‎whether gender as an intervening variable would have any significant relationship with ILP and EQ, and thirdly whether EQ could predict ILP ‎development. To this end, 72 (50 females and 22 males) Iranian lower-intermediate level learners ranging ‎in age from 17 to 25 from two universities took part in this research. A multiple-choice discourse completion test ‎‎(MDCT) (Liu, 2004) and Bar-Onʼs ‎(1997) EQ scale were used and correlation analysis was done to search for any linkage between ILP and EQ. The Pearson product-moment correlation outcomes ‎revealed no significant relationship between EQ and ILP. However, a significant relation was found between Independence as a component of EQ and ‎EFL learners’ ILP competence. The independent samples t-test outcomes indicated ‎that female participants had a higher level of (ILP) competence than male participants; however, male and female participants did not differ significantly regarding their EQ level. The findings indicate that ‎EQ, in general, is not influential in EFL learners’ ILP competence. The paper concludes by providing pedagogical implications for EFL learners and instructors.

Teaching and learning languages via the Internet is becoming increasingly common all over the world and therefore, the experts growingly debate around the positive or negative effects of online education. The present study aimed to critically investigate into science and technology lessons of the VOA English Learning Website in a two-year interval, which claims to teach new words and phrases through the authentic VOA world news. Applying van Dijk’s (1998) Ideological Square Model of CDA, the researchers attempted to critically analyze the representation of the key term the United States within the collected VOA news story transcripts in order to observe whether the Website was trying to manipulate the learners’ minds through in-group favoritism and out-group derogation. The findings revealed that the VOA online lessons promoted certain American political, economic, cultural, social, and ideological values through particular discursive structures that tend to describe in-group members in a positive or at least neutral manner. Thus, as McPhail’s (2006) Electronic Colonialism Theory assumes such free online lessons on the VOA Website, which is a core country multimedia giant, struggle to convert and capture the attitudes, desires, beliefs, faiths, lifestyles, and consumer behavior of the other countries. Therefore, it is highly recommended that English teachers and learners try to inspect the content, reflect on the purposes, and evaluate the merits of similar online authentic materials before and while applying them to facilitate the language learning process.

The teachers' competencies in the process of internationalization of higher education (IHE) are of vital importance (Brandenburg & Federkeil, 2007; van der Werf, 2012). The extent of IHE in a university is in a close relationship with the teachers' competencies (Harari, 1981). However, the required competencies of teachers in IHE are not a well-studied topic. Similarly, the "dearth of literature on EAP professional development" (Blaj-Ward, 2014, p. 113) has complicated exploring the EAP teachers' competencies. The absence of a competency model addressing the needs of EAP teachers to effectively engage in the education fitting the IHE objectives and policies gave impetus to this study. In line with this objective, an instrument measuring EAP teachers' competencies was designed and validated. The following steps were taken to develop the instrument: the theme extraction and item generation phase, the piloting phase, and the validation phase. The extensive review of the literature and interviews with IHE experts and EAP teachers yielded 8 competencies. This initial framework led to the development of the preliminary version of a 22-item questionnaire. The piloting phase resulted in 23 items. 74 EAP teachers from both camps (language and content) participated in the final administration. Various factor analyses, internal consistency, and correlation of all of the items were performed. The data obtained confirmed a sufficiently reliable and valid scale, consisting of 6 components (with the same underlying themes of 8 competencies extracted earlier) and 23 items for measuring the EAP teachers' competencies.

Measurement has been ubiquitous in all areas of education for at least a century. Various methods have been suggested to examine the fairness of education tests especially in high-stakes contexts. The present study has adopted the newly proposed ecological approach to differential item functioning (DIF) to investigate the fairness of the Iranian nationwide university entrance exam. To this end, the actual data from an administration of the test were obtained and analyzed through both traditional logistic regression and latent class analysis (LCA) techniques. The initial DIF analysis through logistic regression revealed that 19 items (out of 70) showed either uniform or non-uniform DIF. Further examination of the sample through LCA showed that the sample is not homogeneous. LCA class enumeration revealed that three classes can be identified in the sample. DIF analysis for separate latent classes showed that three serious differences in the number of DIF items identified in each latent class ranging from zero items in latent class 3 to 43 items in latent class 2. The inclusion of the covariates in the model also showed that latent class membership could be significantly predicted from high school GPA, field of study, and acceptance quota. It is argued that the fairness of the test might be under question. The implications of the findings for the validity of the test are discussed in detail.

Although a plethora of research endeavors have investigated the rhetorical structure of the Research Articles (RAs) through the lens of move analysis, Move Recycling (MR) across RA sections has remained unnoticed. The current study sought to bridge this gap by exploring cross-disciplinary variations in the recycling of the Objective move (research questions/hypotheses/purposes) across four conventional sections (Introduction, Method, Result, and Discussion) of RAs. To this end, 600 English RAs from four prestigious journals in six soft science disciplines, published between 2006 and 2018, were selected. The quantitative data analysis results revealed that the Objective move’s recycling was sensitive to the disciplinary variations and RA sections. That is, Economics RAs were the main platforms for recycling the Objective move, and Psychology RAs witnessed the least amount of its recycling. Moreover, Objective move recycling was observed most frequently in the Discussion sections and least frequently in the Method sections of RAs. In the study’s qualitative phase, the RA authors’ rationales for MR, which were received via email, underwent content analysis. Based on the recurrent themes in the RA authors’ responses, four main reasons for MR, including editorial policy, readers’ guidance, discipline conventions, and RA length, were identified. This study’s findings might provide a concise view of MR for researchers, teachers, and students in various disciplines. EAP instructors can raise students’ awareness of MR and encourage them to use it in their RAs as a comprehension facilitator.

The notion of teacher professional identity has become a regular fixture in numerous theoretical and empirical studies in both mainstream and L2 teacher education. Consequently, a number of scales have been designed and developed to quantify this construct. To be sure, the extant instruments are general with regard to both context and subject matter, and this line of inquiry has not addressed the quantification of the concept in the ELT profession. The present study was, therefore, an attempt to provide a (re)conceptualization of L2 teachers’ professional identity through exploring its underlying components. To this end, an initial 61-item, self-assessment questionnaire was developed using a comprehensive review of the related literature and experts’ opinion. The trial scale was then administered to a sample of 676 ELT teachers. Results of exploratory factor analysis reduced the instrument to 42 items, leading to a six-factor model which indicated that L2 teacher identity includes: researching and developing one’s own practice; language awareness; institutional and collective practice; engaging learners as whole persons; appraising one’s teacher self; and sociocultural and critical practice. Confirmatory factor analysis substantiated the resultant six-factor model as a robust and valid tool for measuring ELT teachers’ professional identity.

Morphological complexity is one of the dimensions of complexity that has been increasingly analyzed over the last few years. However, results from previous studies drawing on only a single text type are inconclusive. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of text types (descriptive, narrative, and expository) on the morphological complexity of essays written by Iranian English language learners. The participants included 87 lower-intermediate male and female L2 learners at six language institutes in Qazvin, Iran, who were selected from 127 language learners taking an Oxford Quick Placement test. The participants wrote on each text type in three consecutive weeks as a part of their classroom activity. The morphological complexity of verbs and nouns was separately calculated using the morphological complexity index. The data were analyzed using a series of Friedman and Wilcoxon Signed Rank Tests. The findings did not show any statistically significant differences across text types for nominal inflectional diversity; however, verbal inflectional diversity was statistically significant across text types, with narrative essays morphologically more complex than descriptive and expository essays. The findings may have theoretical and pedagogical implications for researchers and L2 teachers.

Although global English Language Teaching (ELT) coursebooks have been subject to numerous (critical) analyses, the changes occurring to their contents over different editions have received scarce attention. In this study, the researchers examined the transformations over different editions of Interchange series (level 2) regarding some selected aspects of their textual contents. Seeking experienced English teachers’ views of the global coursebooks’ transformations over the past decade was another aim of the study. The analysis and comparison of the included topics and titles, characters, sites and contexts in Interchange series as well as interviews with 12 English teachers revealed that the content-based changes of different editions of this coursebook are superficial and cosmetic-like and despite the claims for globality, fallacies such as real-life-ness, representation and globality are still evident. We hope the findings of the study would aid curriculum and policy makers, institute managers, and language teachers to reconsider the functioning and value of current global ELT coursebooks.

Regardless of the appreciation of language learners’ achievement in task-based language teaching, not much has been hinged upon learners’ perception and reception of various elements. This study examined task complexity and modality effects on Iranian EFL learners’ comprehension of task difficulty, competencies, and difficulty-skill balance as well as the learners’ task experience. The Flow Outlook features were also applied to investigate how difficulty-skill balance anticipated flow experience. Via a repeated-measures design, and with a focus on task complexity (simple vs. complex) and task modality (written vs. spoken), 49 EFL learners carried out four argumentative tasks (two simple written and spoken vs. two complex written and spoken tasks); then, they ticked the flow questionnaire to gauge their perception of task difficulty, competence, and task experience. Repeated-measures MANOVA revealed although task complexity influenced task difficulty and difficulty-skill balance significantly, the skill was not affected significantly; task modality influenced task difficulty and skill significantly while difficulty-skill balance received no significant effect. The follow-up post hoc test indicated that complexity and modality significantly influenced flow, attention, and control, but not interest. Linear regression revealed difficulty-skill balance was a predictor for learners’ flow experience for both writing tasks and simple speaking task but not for complex speaking tasks. Pedagogically, the findings of this research may have some implications for English language teachers, learners, and materials developers.

The use of storytelling on students’ first language literacy and development were extended to foreign/second language learning, and a large number of researchers interested in the field attempted to use storytelling and story reading strategies in teaching oral language skills to foreign/second language learners. Despite the existence of a number of studies on the impact of storytelling on English language skills, the number of studies on the impact of storytelling and story reading approaches on pre- intermediate EFL learners’ oral language production and comprehension seems to be scanty. To do so, a quasi- experimental study was employed. Ninety Iranian language learners, from 6 intact classes (each consisting of 15), were divided to three sub-groups: storytelling, story reading and conventional groups. To one group, stories were told, one group only read the stories, and the third group received no stories. The data were collected through researcher developed oral language production and comprehension tests. One-way-ANOVA test and three independent samples-tests based on Bonferroni test were employed to analyze the data and locate the sources of the differences. Findings revealed that storytelling outperformed story reading groups on both production and comprehension tests. Story reading group outperformed the conventional group. It can be concluded telling and reading stories are effective techniques for improving EFL learners’ oral language production and recognition.

The popularity of integrating technology in language instruction and its fundamental effect on the language learning dimensions has been widely acknowledged whereas learners’ motivation and attitude are expected to be improved in a web-based Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) environment. Therefore, this paper aimed to investigate the Iranian EFL learners’ motivation to learn English and attitude in a CALL environment. The participants of this study were 120 intermediate EFL learners from two private English language institutes in Isfahan, Iran. They were divided into two equal groups; one experimental group (EG) and one control group (CG). Then, a motivation questionnaire pretest was administered out to check the participants’ motivation at the beginning of the course. As the treatment, the EG learners were taught through CALL-based instruction and the CG learners were taught traditionally. After the treatment, a posttest of motivation and an attitude questionnaire were administered. The outcomes indicated that the CALL-based instruction promoted the participants’ motivation as checked by the Motivation Questionnaire. Moreover, as measured by a 20-item A-CALL attitude questionnaire, it was discovered that the learners in the EG had positive attitudes toward using CALL-based instruction. In light of the findings, a number of conclusions are obtained and several implications are put forward.