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One of the main concerns in educational settings has been the degree of the learners’ involvement in learning and the extent to which they actively participate in classroom talks and interactions. The present study is an emic-based ethnographic study aimed at providing insights about patterns of talk and different degrees of interaction in EFL university classes with a specific focus on teacher’s role. To this end, three different classes were observed for twelve consecutive sessions. Students were both male and female senior EFL students at Najafabad Azad University. The age of the participants ranged between 22 and 28. These classes were taught by the same instructor so that the researcher was directly involved in observing participants’ interactions in the targeted classrooms and in the data collection procedures. The participants’ oral behavior was carefully observed and recorded. To guarantee higher validity, some participants were also interviewed. The results of data analysis revealed that male and female students showed different degrees of contribution to classroom interactions. However, the students’ degree of involvement in the classroom discussions were linked to the related schemata, type of activity, and learners’ interest in the conversation topic rather than interactants’ gender. In addition, most of the involvements were teacher-initiated and directed. Notably, the findings can be of considerable value to teachers’ professional development and can highlight the importance and the value of using specific strategies that can be introduced and employed by the teacher to increase the degree of the students’ involvement in classroom interactions as well as motivate them to take responsibility of their own learning.

Applying technologies has recently caused language education to undertake influential modifications. Hence, this study tried to investigate the impact of using technology in form of multimedia on improving grammar knowledge of Iranian high school students and also examined their attitudes toward multimedia-based mode of instruction. To do so, three intact classes of lower intermediate students were randomly divided into three groups: multimedia, multimedia + textbook, and control group. After homogenizing the groups regarding their proficiency level, the pre-test was run and results indicated no significant difference. Treatment lasted for 8 sessions, during which the first experimental group was taught through using multimedia elements like cartoons, texts, and Power Point Presentation. The second group had their textbook besides multimedia, while the control group was instructed traditionally by means of the textbook. Comparing the groups’ scores on the post-test revealed the superiority of multimedia + textbook group over the other groups in their grammar test performance. The questionnaire outcomes also showed more positive tendency of the students in this group in comparison to the multimedia only group toward application of multimedia programs. Findings of this study might open a novel way to assist EFL learners to increase their grammar knowledge more successfully.

Genuine Criticism (GC) is an evaluative expression of annoyance with an attribute in the interlocutor, whose realization may threaten the positive image of both interlocutors. The current study investigates facework and politeness in performing GCsin different contexts and for interlocutors with low social distance and high status in terms of GC realization strategies and mitigation devices that the speakers employ to soften their criticisms. Data were collected from 70 situations from movies in which GCs arise between interactants. The interactants deal with topics that happen in their daily life. The data were transcribed, categorized and analyzed based on the adapted version of criticizing categorization developed by Nguyen (2005, 2013).The results indicate that interactants with low social distance between them and the speakers who possess higher status employ direct strategies more than indirect strategies when they carry out criticism. Besides, the speakers with higher social distance utilize direct criticizing strategies more often. With regard to mitigation strategies, both groups tend to mitigate their criticisms less often. Exploring the strategies that English NSs employ can help EFL material developers realize and depict a better picture of the strategies in learning materials so that potential learning problems are prevented.

In order to be autonomous, teachers should enjoy teaching and be satisfied with their teaching. Teacher autonomy, therefore, may be related to teacher burnout and job satisfaction. The present study investigated the relationship between job satisfaction, teacher burnout, and teacher autonomy. Two hundred and seven language teachers at language institutes in Karaj and Tehran were given three questionnaires to complete. Convenience sampling was used to select language teachers in this study, and IBM SPSS (version 22) was used to analyze the data. Three non-parametric statistical tests were used to analyze the collected data. According to the findings of this study, job satisfaction had a weak negative relationship with teacher burnout, and teacher autonomy correlated negatively with job satisfaction. Moreover, no relationship between teacher autonomy and teacher burnout was found. Although the findings should be interpreted with care because of sample size, the paper ends with implications for language teachers and policy makers.

This study investigated the accuracy of scores assigned by self-, peer-, and teacher assessors over time. Thirty-three English majors who were taking paragraph development course at Vali-e-Asr University of Rafsanjan and two instructors who had been teaching essay writing for at least two years at university, participated in the study. After receiving instructions on paragraph development, participants were trained for a session on how to rate the paragraphs. For three sessions the students were given topics to write about and were asked to rate their own and one of their peers’ papers for mechanics, grammar and choice of words, content development, and organization. The teachers also rated the paragraphs according to the same criteria. Multifaceted Rasch measurement was employed to analyze the data. The results showed different patterns of performance for the subjects rated by different raters at the beginning of the experiment. However, rater bias showed significant decrease across time. The results of the study have useful implications for language teachers especially in portfolio assessment where self and peer assessment provide invaluable help.

Keeping pace with the continuous changes and innovations in the field of English language teaching is considered to be a necessity for the quality of teachers' teaching. There are numerous approaches to teacher development, among which self-initiated development stands as one of the noticeable trends. Although teacher development is crucial for the quality of education, it appears that there are not many studies on self-development of English language teachers in Iran. There are studies mostly concentrating on the evaluation of pre- or in-service programs in English language teaching. Addressing this call, the main purpose of this study was to investigate perceptions of 48 in-service English language teachers towards their professional development. The data collection instrument used was a researcher-made questionnaire consisting of both open-ended and close-ended items. Employing descriptive statistics, the data was analyzed. The results indicated that the teachers agreed with most of the concepts that indicate the importance of professional development. Moreover, they were aware of the importance of major professional development activities for their development. Yet, peer observation and action research were not preferred as much as the other activities.

In light of the understanding that the analysis of the generic features of different academic genres can enhance the ability of non-native members of academic discourse communities to understand, and where appropriate, to produce them, the present study aimed at investigating the dominant generic structure of research articles in mathematics. To start with a relatively narrow focus, a corpus of thirty mathematics research articles were randomly selected from The Bulletin of the Iranian Mathematical Society(BIMS), and were analyzed in terms of their macro-organizational structure. An eleven-move structure was identified in the analyzed corpus, while it was also found that the research articles in the corpus did not follow the conventional Introduction-Methods-Results-Discussion structure found in many other disciplines. Methods and Discussion sections which are frequently encountered in research articles of many other disciplines were missing in the analyzed articles. It is argued that the findings may have theoretical implications in revealing some discipline specific conventions of organizing macro structure. Since all the authors were Iranian, the emerging model should be treated cautiously because some aspects of the emerging macro structure may also be under the influence of culture specific conventions.

پرسشواره های اصلی زبان انگلیسی شامل عبارات متمم سازی هستند که در آنها کلمه پرسشی به جایگاه شاخص منتقل شده است. این اتفاق بدین دلیل می افتد که کلمات پرسشی زبان انگلیسی، که در اصل متمم فعل می باشند، آنقدر قوی هستند که به ابتدای جمله حرکت کنند و موجب وارونگی فعل کمکی شوند. فارسی زبانانی که انگلیسی را به عنوان زبان خارجی فرا می گیرند با یک دشواری ناشی از تفاوتی اساسی بین دو زبان مواجه می شوند که مربوط به فراگیری قاعده وارونگی فعل کمکی در پرسشهای استاندارد زبان انگلیسی است. پس از یادگیری قاعده مذکور، احتمال زیادی وجود دارد که فراگیران این قاعده را به شکل نابجایی به پرسشواره های غیرمستقیم یا درونه شدگی زبان انگلیسی تعمیم دهند. هدف از این پژوهش بررسی دانش فراگیران فارسی زبان درمورد پرسشواره های درونه شدگی زبان انگلیسی مخصوصا هنگام تولید شفاهی این پرسشواره ها است. بدین منظور 48 زبان آموز فارسی زبان در سطح دانشگاه به عنوان شرکت کننده انتخاب شدند. یک آزمون بیان شفاهی پرسشواره های درونه شدگی زبان انگلیسی، یک آزمون ترجمه، و یک آزمون قضاوت دستوری شامل پرسشواره های درونه شدگی به عنوان ابزارهای جمع آوری داده استفاده شدند. نتایج نشان داد که فراگیران سطح متوسط پایین در تولید و بیان صحیح پرسشواره های درونه شدگی مشکلاتی داشتند. به همین شکل دشواری هایی در آزمون قضاوت دستوری مشاهده شد. همچنین دشواری هایی برای فراگیران سطح متوسط و متوسط بالا هم مشاهده شد. نتیجه اصلی در آزمون بیان شفاهی به دست آمد، جایی که تفاوت معناداری بین فراگیران در سه گروه بسندگی زبانی در مورد تولید صحیح پرسشواره های درونه شدگی زبان انگلیسی مشاهده نشد. این یافته تایید می کند که کار بیشتری پیرامون تولید شفاهی زبان انگلیسی توسط فراگیران فارسی زبان با تاکید بر پرسشواره های درونه شدگی زبان انگلیسی مورد نیاز است.

This study aimed to determine the relationship between L2 learners' autonomy and their cognitive style focusing on reflectivity. It was conducted with 140 Iranian M.A. EFL learners from Department of English at Islamic Azad University of Najafabad. In order to have a homogeneous sample, the second version of Quick Placement Test (QPT) was administered. Then, 85 lower and 50 higher proficiency students were selected based on the scoring level chart of the QPT. In order to estimate participants' autonomy, the Learner Autonomy Questionnaire was administered. Then, the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire was used to determine the participants' degree of reflectivity. To answer the research questions descriptive statistics and correlation analysis were employed. The results revealed that, 1) There was a weak positive relationship between low proficiency L2 learners' level of autonomy and their degree of reflectivity, 2) There was a strong positive relationship between high proficiency L2 learners' level of autonomy and their degree of reflectivity. Finally, the implications of the study for EFL teachers, learners and syllabus designers were discussed.