درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

از آنجایی که تحقیقات قابل توجهی بیان کننده نقش مهم حافظه کاری در فراگیری زبان اول می باشد، تحقیقات بر روی چنین نقشی از حافظه کاری در زبان خارجی به عنوان یک حوضه تحقیقاتی جدی، در حال وقوع است. در تحقیق حاضر، نقش حافظه کاری در توانایی خواندن در زبان خارجی مورد بررسی قرار گرفت. بدین منظور، ٥٥ نفر زبان آموز در سه سطح مهارت زبانی مبتدی، متوسط و پیشرفته از یک موسسه خصوصی زبان در این تحقیق شرکت کردند. از کلیه این افراد دو تست حافظه که شامل یک تست تعیین ظرفیت حافظه کاری از طریق خواندن و یک تست تعیین ظرفیت حافظه کوتاه مدت واجی گرفته شد. از شرکت کننده گان در تحقیق همچنین خواسته شد که در یک تست درک مطلب که شامل خواندن دو متن و پاسخگویی به سوالات آن بود شرکت کنند. سپس از عملیات آماری رگرسیون استفاده شد که مشخص شود آیا رابطه ی معنا داری بین توانایی حافظه و توانایی خواندن وجود دارد یا خیر. نتایج این تحقیق بیان کننده ی رابطه معنا داری بین توانایی حافظه کاری و توانایی خواندن فقط در سطح مبتدی بود که دلایل احتمالی آن در این تحقیق مورد بحث و بررسی قرار می گیرد.

This study aimed to explore the relationships between foreign language learners’ self-identity changes, motivation types, and Foreign Language proficiency associated with learning English in private language schools in Iranian context. Based on a stratified sampling, 204 English as a foreign language learners from three language schools in Tehran were selected to participate in the study. The instruments were a 30-item Likert-scale questionnaire on motivation types in seven categories: intrinsic interest, immediate achievement, learning situation, going aboard, social responsibility, individual development, and information medium; a 24-item Likert-scale questionnaire on self-identity changes in six categories: self-confidence change, additive change, subtractive change, productive change, split change, and zero change. Results revealed that self-confidence change was the prominent change common among foreign language learners. Canonical correlation analysis revealed that motivation types and self-identity changes were related through three pairs of canonical variables: intrinsic orientations related with personal identity changes, instrumental orientations related with cultural changes, and instrumental orientations related learners’ self-confidence change. Theoretical and pedagogical implications for foreign language learning and teaching are also discussed.

Based on the learning-centred approach to needs analysis, the current study aimed at investigating the academic target needs of undergraduate students of English Language and Literature in Iran as a non-native context nationwide by employing a triangulation of instrumentations namely, questionnaires, class observations, and semi structured interviews. To this end, 320 stakeholders from eight different Iranian state universities participated in the current study. The results of this study revealed a discrepancy between the target needs of the students and the actual EFL courses they undertake during their academic and pre-academic studies. During pre-academic studies, students are not adequately equipped with critical thinking abilities, study skills, and general English proficiency which are required by their prospective academic needs. Likewise, the prevalent lecture-based teaching methodologies as utilized by Iranian content specialists at the tertiary level, seemed to be ineffective in sufficiently equipping the students with sound literary knowledge as well as professional writing and reading skills. The findings may promise implications for establishing a consistent nationwide pedagogical framework for EFL instruction at the non-native academic and pre-academic levels by a synthesis of different communicative and learning-centered approaches to language teaching based on a systematic cooperation among different stakeholders.

This paper examines the effect of gender and type of stem on Iranian test takers’ performance on the grammar section of a nation-wide language proficiency test. In so doing, the scores of 2931 examinees (1107 female and 1824 male) who sat Tarbiat Modares English proficiency test were obtained. The examinees’ scores on three types of MC grammar items with different kinds of stems (i.e., blank filling, error recognition, and cloze) were compared to see if the type of stem has any effect on performance. Grammar scores of males and females were also compared to see if there is an effect for gender on the examinees’ performance on the grammar test in general and on its three item types in particular. The results indicated that test takers performed better on cloze items than the other two types. It was also found that females outperformed males on both the whole test, and also on items with blank filling and cloze types of stems. Due to the particularity of the context and the small effect sizes found, the study calls for more research to be conducted on this topic.

تاکنون روند تهیه و تدوین مطالب اموزشی زبان از زوایای مختلفی بررسی گردیده است. برای مثال اهمیت تأثیر نگاه اجتماعی به طراحی و تدوین کتب آموزش زبان تأکید و بررسی شده است. هدف از نگارش این مقاله پرداختن به این مطلب است که ایا ایده تهیه و تدوین مطالب تا چه اندازه تحت تأثیر مک دونالدیزاسیون قرار گرفته است. مک دونالدیزاسیون در تهیه مواد آموزشی زبان را به عبارتی می توان این گونه تعریف کرد: تأثیرپذیری مطالب در واکنش به تغییرات اجتماعی و رابطه بین این تغییرات فراتر از سطح کلاس ارائه جزییات کامل در مورد شرایط کنونی ایران و عواقب به استعمار گرفتن مواد آموزشی زبان از دیگر اهداف این مقاله می باشد. برای پاسخگویی سوال مهم مطرح شده چگونگی رابطه مک دونالدیزاسیون و آموزش زبان سعی بر این بوده تا هر چه بیشتر تصویری واضح از شرایط مواد آموزشی و نحوه تدوین مواد آموزش زبان در ایران ارائه شود و اهمیت استانداردسازی أن که دغدغه بسیاری از اهالی این علم می باشد نشان داده شود. نتایج بررسی ها در این تحقیق حاکی از اهمیت حضور نوعی یکسان سازی مطالب در کلاس های آموزش زبان است. بررسی ها نشانگر این مطلب است که نقش معلم زبان به عنوان مصرف کننده مطالب در ایران نسبت به طراح مطالب در آموزش زبان ایران تأکید شده است. راه هایی همچون ارتقاء سطح کیفی معلمین و برگزاری کلاس ها و دوره ها و برنامه هایی برای پیشرفت هر چه بیشتر علمی انها نیز پیشنهاد شده است.

This paper reports a study which investigated if there was a match between students’ English vocabulary size and the vocabulary load of a locally produced textbook. The analysis of the passages of the pre-university English textbook currently in use in Iran’s education system using RANGE program indicated that in order to comprehend the texts, students need to know not only words from 2000 high frequency word list, but also words from academic and low frequency lists. On the other hand, results of the 2000 vocabulary level test administered to 464 Iranian pre-university students, male and female, showed that students did not possess sufficient vocabulary knowledge in order to comprehend the texts and that their vocabulary knowledge was limited far below 2000 words. Other analyses of the textbook, including exercises and word glosses provided more evidence for the inadequacy of the textbook. The paper concludes that the pre-university textbook is flawed in terms of the required principles and standards in materials development which results in students’ frustration and disappointment in learning English. The findings of the study are discussed, which should be of much interest to local and international ELT stakeholders, especially textbook writers.

Incidental vocabulary learning is often seen as superior to direct instruction on many occasions. Meanwhile, upon the emergence of the World Wide Web, second language (SL) learners have been introduced to 'podcasts' (recorded audio and video online broadcasts) which could be authentic sources of vocabulary learning. The relatively recent phenomenon of video podcast (vodcast) might be considered as a reliable complementary source of input to the written text or the audio track which are predominantly used to represent the platforms of SL instruction. To examine this assertion, three groups of Iranian EFL learners (n=63) were independently exposed to different modes of input (the reading text, audio track, and vodcast) during a series of classroom sessions under highly controlled circumstances. Immediate and delayed passive recall tests of vocabulary were administered to investigate their incidental gains. A multivariate analysis of variance revealed that both dependent variables (immediate and delayed recall) were significantly affected by the input modes. The post-hoc tests indicated no significant difference between the written and the audio groups while the vodcast group significantly outperformed the other two. The rich contextual clues made available by this audiovisual source seem to account for its superiority