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Learner autonomy, which emphasizes learners’ engagement in self-dependent learning to enhance their ability to become self-reliant learners, is the key element in the language learning process. Although many studies have been carried out on learner autonomy, very little is known about the students' engagement in autonomous learning in the resource poor areas. This research uses a mixed-method research design and collected both qualitative and quantitative data from students (n=84) and teachers (n=20) from different colleges (n=15) located in Far Western Nepal and explores students’ engagement in autonomous learning and discusses the challenges and practices of learner autonomy in an EFL context in difficult circumstances. This research reveals students' over-dependence on their teachers, and teachers seemed to spoon-feed their students during their instructional practices. This research suggests how learner autonomy can be fostered in the actual instructional practices which can be of interest to the teachers, material designers, policymakers, and researchers working in developing the proficiency level of English language learners in remote and resource-poor areas.

This paper investigates the most influential factor of anxiety in the English for Specific Purposes (ESP) context through classroom observation and questionnaires in a private vocational higher education in Indonesia. It also explores the differences in the anxiety level based on the year of study. One hundred seventy-one students participated in the study. The Foreign Language Anxiety Classroom Scale (FLACS) questionnaire was adapted to find out the students’ anxiety levels. The questionnaire was administered using Google form, then collected and statistically analyzed using SPSS. It was revealed that the most influential factor of students’ anxiety was the domain of Communication Apprehension. Furthermore, the ANOVA test showed that all students in each year suffered from anxiety. The most notable cause of the Communication Apprehension domain was performing without preparation. Self-negative evaluation was the primary cause of the Fear of Negative Evaluation domain. Meanwhile, for the domain of Test Anxiety, failure in language tests was the principal reason. This study implies that teachers should frame pleasant communication in the classroom as well as create fun and collaborative activities to reduce students’ anxiety.

This study aims to determine whether the perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness can significantly predict the students’ intention to use video conferencing applications in an online classroom. This study utilized a descriptive predictive quantitative research design. This study used the survey questionnaires adopted from the study of Salloum et al. (2019). The researchers conducted an online survey using Google form for over a month. Out of 153 target respondents, 130 responded to the survey questionnaire. Linear regression was initiated using JASP 0.16.0.0. The findings revealed that the two variables perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness can both significantly predict the students’ intention to use video conferencing applications in an online classroom. The results further showed that the perceived ease of use can better predict the students’ intention to use video conferencing applications in an online classroom as compared to perceived usefulness. The findings imply that video conferencing applications used in the teaching and learning process should be user-friendly and pedagogically relevant to support students’ desire to use video conferencing applications.

Flipped classrooms refer to teaching approaches that like usual teaching is not done inside the class. It means that before the class students watch videos that the teacher carefully chooses or prepared. The selected videos have to fulfill the required content that advances the abilities of the students in their learning. This study investigates the influence of online flipped classrooms on Iranian EFL high school students’ reading ability. To this aim, the study was done on 50 EFL 12th-grade and pre-intermediate level female students. The students were set into two groups experimental and control. A reading test was run on both groups as the pre-test, at the beginning of the study. Then, after 10 treatment sessions, the post-test was given to both groups. An independent samples t-test was run to compare the means. The outcomes illustrated the significant outperformance of the experimental group over the control group. In addition, to identify the EFL high school students’ attitudes toward the flipped classroom, the students were asked to answer an open-ended question. The results of students’ responses using thematic coding showed that most of the students had optimistic opinions regarding implementing the flipped classroom. Finally, the present study indicated that this model provides an opportunity for students to learn at their own pace and time. Therefore, it has some implications for teachers, students, and institutions which can increase student-teacher interaction in the teaching-learning process.

Researchers have always been concerned with innovative approaches to facilitate the learning process for language learners. One of the facilitating strategies is guided discovery learning, which can help learners to develop their critical and analytical thinking skills. Hence, the present study is an attempt to discover the effects of guided discovery learning on the development of teenage and adult learners’ syntactic structures. The participants of this study were 34 male EFL Iranian learners in Iranmehr Language Institute, Aleshtar, Lorestan province, Iran. The participants were divided into two experimental groups based on their age (12 to 18 as teenagers, and 18 to 30 as adults). First, the Longman proficiency test was given to the participants to measure their language ability. After that, a pre-test was given to the students regarding syntactic structures before the treatment. Then, every two weeks a post-test was given to the students to assess their gradual development. One immediate and two delayed post-tests were given to the students. In this study, paired and independent samples t-tests were used to compare the development of syntactic structures in the studied groups. The results of this study showed that both groups (teenagers and adults) made an improvement but adults improved more significantly than teenagers. The findings of the study contributed to the practical employment of guided discovery learning as an effective teaching methodology, especially for adults in the process of language learning

With numerous variables mediating the way learners interact with teacher corrective feedback (TCF), one may not comment on its efficacy before such intervening variables are adequately addressed and learners’ attendance to TCF is ensured. Among those variables, motivation is one of the most prominent ones largely affecting the degree to which students benefit from TCF. Draft-Specific Scoring (DSS), a scoring system giving learners’ a reason to notice TCF by rewarding them for the revisions they make through a flexible system of scoring, was implemented to investigate if TCF could help learners improve their use of subordinate clauses. To do so, two groups of students studying English Language Literature at the University of Tehran, consisting of 55 participants who were randomly assigned as treatment and control groups, were studied. The results of the gain analysis indicated an improvement for both groups over time in the total number and accuracy of the subordination clauses used; however, the treatment group significantly outperformed the control group. While the two groups did not differ in their use of noun clauses, the DSS group was found to outperform the non-DSS group regarding the adverb and adjective clauses. This indicates that motivation to attend to teacher feedback is of great importance if TCF is to be effective.

The present research was an endeavor to examine and compare the effects of digitally self-regulated and guided discovery learning instructions on Iranian EFL learners’ vocabulary acquisition. To this end, by conducting the Oxford Placement Test, 60 out of 140 Iranian EFL male and female learners from three language institutes in Isfahan, Iran, were randomly selected, and divided into three equal groups (i.e. two experimental groups and one control group). Prior to the instructions, a vocabulary pretest, designed and validated by the researchers, was conducted. Then, the experimental groups received two types of instruction, separately. The first experimental group was taught via digitally self-regulated learning (SRL) instruction based on Santangelo, Harris, and Graham’s (2008) six-stage model. The second experimental group was instructed via guided discovery learning instruction based on Brown and Campione’s (2011) stages. In contrast, the control group received the traditional method of teaching vocabulary such as word lists, dictionary use, and word translation. After conducting eight-session instructions, a posttest was administered. The data were analyzed via ANOVAs and post hoc analysis using the Tukey test. The findings of the study revealed that both digitally self-regulated and guided discovery promoted Iranian EFL learners’ vocabulary acquisition. Additionally, the findings indicated that digitally self-regulated instruction was more effective than guided discovery instruction regarding vocabulary acquisition. Eventually, the theoretical and pedagogical implications regarding language learners, teachers, and curriculum designs are also provided.

The present study aimed at realizing and developing a scale and a model of English language teachers’ pedagogical competence (ELTPC). By reviewing the related literature and adapting Thomas’s (1987) langugae teacher competence, TESOL (2010) standards of professional EFL teachers, and teaching skills and model of pedagogical competence developed by Olsson, Martensson, and Roxa (2010) resulted in a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire consisting of seven constructs, namely preparation, management, teaching, subject mastery, assessment, attitude, and belief with 87 variables. The questionnaire underwent the scrutiny of experts’ opinion and reliability estimates, which resulted in an instrument of 60 variables for the constructs. Next, the constructs were validated with 320 high school English teachers through a principal components analysis carried out via exploratory factor analysis. The result showed the constructs enjoyed high factor loadings, and with seven variables removed from the questionnaire, a 53-variable scale was developed. Finally, a model was developed based on the seven-construct questionnaire of ELTPC. The researcher hopes that English teachers and the educational system monitor, assess, and improve the quality of teaching based on the developed scale and model of ELTPC

Although the EFL teachers' challenges in developing and enhancing Professional Identity Formation (PIF) in face-to-face and virtual instruction contexts have extensively been explored, there were a limited set of practical and advantageous strategies, particularly for the novice teachers, in promoting their PIF in E-teaching especially since the emergence of changed priority of teaching contexts amid the COVID-19 outbreak. Accordingly, this study attempted to check the Iranian novice EFL teachers’ PIF, uncover the potential impacts of utilizing Online Image Management (OIM) strategies in promoting their PIF, and identify the most-preferred OIM strategies. Based on the convenience sampling, 184 male and female Iranian novice EFL teachers were selected to participate in this quasi-experimental study. Two instruments, including a Questionnaire of Perceived Professional Identity (QPPI) and a series of Quantitative Online Interviews (QOIs), were used to collect the data via the virtual platform of Survey Planet. The descriptive statistics and Independent Samples t-Test packages in R were utilized to analyze the data. The results confirmed the low levels of professional identity among Iranian novice EFL teachers, verified the significant effects of OIM strategies in promoting PIF of Iranian novice EFL teachers, and shed light on reflection practices and strategies in enhancing digital literacy as the most-favored OIM strategies in promoting PIF among these teachers. This study may provide implications for EFL teachers and trainers in helping novice EFL teachers to promote their PIF with OIM strategies.