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This study explored the effectiveness of the two computer-assisted modes: cooperative and individual on improving Iranian high school students’ reading comprehension. It was also concerned with investigating the effectiveness of the two computer-assisted modes on the participants’ foreign language learning anxiety (FLLA). The sample of the study consisted of two intact groups, each containing 24 students, which were randomly assigned into a control and an experimental group. The control group completed the study according to the individual computer-assisted learning while the experimental group was taught via computer-assisted cooperative language learning. The participants in the experimental and the control groups, which consisted of 48 female students, took reading comprehension pretest and posttest. They were also given foreign language classroom anxiety scale (FLCAS) questionnaire both at the beginning and at the end of the treatment. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS 16.0. The results of the independent and paired samples t tests indicated that the experimental group, in which cooperative learning was integrated into computer-assisted language learning, outperformed the control group in terms of reading comprehension. In addition, the level of foreign language anxiety improved after the treatment in the experimental group. The findings of this study provide some insights for teachers to consider the integrating of cooperative learning into computer-assisted language learning setting.

If the target of foreign language teaching is to use the language, communicative language teaching (CLT) seems to be an ideal teaching model. The goal of teaching with this method is to use the language as a medium of communication (Adi, 2012).The application of the communicative approach in teaching English as a foreign language, however, is associated with some problems that can cause the method turn out not to be so much successful and the learning outcome not to be efficient enough. This paper mainly intended to evaluate the problems that may lead to the failure of communicative language teaching in EFL contexts and some possible solutions for such problems. Awareness of these problems and the possible remedies can be helpful for both EFL teachers and learners, providing them with insightful ideas about how to manage their teaching and learning activities for the successful implementation of this method.

Every discourse, written or oral, is the conveyer of some hidden agenda of the producer, most importantly in such genres of speech as journalism, politics, propaganda, and advertisements. Given the role of translation in discourse, a difference exists between when the translator carries the ideological values of the elite in contrast with one with patriotic preferences. In this study a comparison was made between translation products resulting from the work of 15 postgraduates of translation studies viewed as freelancers and another published product carrying the elite’s ideology whose works appeared in published in the state media. The results of our comparisons, both qualitative and quantitative showed that there existed two types of difference: the ideology of the elite on the one hand, and the preferred culture related valuesof the freelancers on the other. The differences revealed that both groups translated under the influence of some pre-disposed influence dividable into different categories. Employing strategies of manipulation would be considered as an identity marker showing the social identity of the translator. The effect could be either their cultural preferences or, in contrast, the elite’s favorable set of preferences imposed on both the translator and the product of translation. 

A number of studies have accounted the integral role of foreign/second language learning and learner strategy use. However, a few of these studies have considered the relationships between strategic competence and its use and foreign language performance (FLP). This study applied structural equation modeling to deeply investigate the relationships between test takers’ strategy use and their performance on foreign language tests. For this purpose, 147 EFL learners from three well-known branches of a private language institute in Tehran, Iran were chosen. These participants also responded to an 80-item Cognitive and Metacognitive strategy questionnaire and took an 81-item Key English Test (KET). Consequently the hypothesized model of strategic competence vis-à-vis FL test appeared with following findings. First, metacognitive processing (MP) had no direct effect on FLP but a significant, direct influence on cognitive processing (CP), which supports the interaction notion of Bachman and Palmer’s (1996) communicative competence . Second, due to the Iranian EFL context in which Iranian students and teachers show more tendencies toward memorizing vocabulary and analyzing grammar, practicing naturalistically was insignificant and deleted while the translating variable was added, which was highly significant. Third, CP had no significant effect on listening ability which shows that listening ability is much more dependent on contextual factors rather than background knowledge and strategic competence.

Although Gardner and his associates’ work was most influential in the field of L2 motivation, from the early 1990s onwards, their work has been criticized for several reasons. Some researchers claimed that integrative and instrumental orientations were no longer able to convey the complexity of the L2 motivation construct. To examine this complexity, the present study attempted to investigate the discursive construction of four (two males and two females) Iranian EFL learners’ motivation at Shiraz University, Iran. Employing van Leeuwen’s (2008) legitimation construction framework, the study revealed that depending on their future selves, each participant employed certain discursive strategies unique to him/her to (de)legitimize his/her future self. Therefore, what was observed was the use of strategies which were idiosyncratic to that particular person, in that particular context, for a specific purpose, and for that particular moment. Additionally, given the unique political conditions of Iran in the world, it was found that integrative and instrumental orientations can be best replaced by ideal and ought-to selves in this context. The study has some implications. Motivation researchers need to broaden the unit of analysis beyond the individual learner to the interaction between the individual and the multitude of factors in diverse social settings.