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This paper attempted to explore the impact of dynamic assessment (DA) in improving EFL students’ writing ability. To this end, 60 homogenous pre-intermediate EFL learners from a private high school participated in this study and after administering QPT, the forty students were randomly divided into two equal groups; 20 learners in an experimental group and 20 learners in a control group with the same age and the same English knowledge and background. In the first session of instruction, the pre-test was administered in order to evaluate the learners’ writing ability. Then the control group received the traditional approach and the experimental group was exposed to dynamic assessment instruction to learn how to write with more efficiency. The treatment endured 12 sessions. The results of data analysis showed that the experimental group improved significantly. It is indicated that the dynamic assessment procedure is more efficient in teaching writing than the traditional methods. Furthermore, dynamic assessment enhances L2 writing and can play a crucial role in language learning.

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in understanding how cognitive skills influence second language acquisition. Cognitive control, a set of mental processes that include attention, inhibition, and working memory, has been shown to play a significant role in language learning. This study examines the impact of cognitive control skills on language development among adult Iranian English learners, comparing it both in online and in person settings. Forty adult EFL learners were divided into two groups and underwent a 9-week instructional period, with cognitive control skills assessed using the Attention Network Task (ANT), working memory tasks, and a Raven’s IQ test. Data were analyzed using Pearson correlation, regression, and ANCOVA to determine relationships between variables. The results of the study revealed that while aspects of cognitive control like orienting and altering do not have a significant impact on language development, the more complex, controlling aspect exhibits a positive relationship (F=4.937, p=0.033). This relationship was contingent upon controlling for differences between post-examination and primary examination of ANT results, indicating that controlling attention is a stronger predictor of language outcomes. Furthermore, the study demonstrated that the mode of instruction—online or in-person—has no significant impact on this relationship (F=0.009, p=0.925), suggesting that cognitive control operates independently of teaching mode. The study’s findings suggest that educators and curriculum developers should emphasize activities targeting the controlling component of cognitive control in language learning, as this is linked to better language development. Additionally, since the mode of instruction does not significantly impact this relationship, effective language instruction can be delivered in both online and in-person settings, providing flexibility in course design.

This study investigated the effect of CAALL on Iranian EFL learners’ self-efficacy and reading skill development. A convenience sampling was run for the selection of the participants. A sample of 220 advanced EFL learners from four private English language institutes in Iran, participated in this study. Three instruments were used including quick placement test, self-efficacy questionnaire, and reading test. The learners’ self-efficacy questionnaire and reading test were administered to all the participants. CAAL practice was implemented by autonomous and non-autonomous teachers separately for 110 participants (an experimental group and a control group). The experimental group members received CAALL in virtual mode. They were trained by two teachers on how to be autonomous in their reading performance. For the control group members, the reading practice was executed virtually. But they did not receive the practice of CAALL. They have followed the conventional teaching of reading. The practice was presented through WhatsApp Messenger. The treatment of the study was followed for 16 ninety-minute sessions. After the instructional phase, learners’ self-efficacy questionnaire and reading test were administered to all the participants again. This study has some pedagogical contributions for EFL teachers, learners, Language teaching syllabus designers, and language teaching curriculum developers.

Dialogue journal writing is extensively regarded as an effective technique for enhancing the writing motivation of EFL/ESL students. However, studies on how dialogue journal writing enhances EFL students’ writing motivation are scarce in the Ethiopian context. This study investigates the impact of dialogue journal writing on freshman EFL students’ writing motivation. Employing a quasi-experimental design, two intact groups were selected from students in the social science stream. After checking their comparability at the onset of the intervention, the two groups were randomly assigned into experimental (n = 37) and comparison groups (n = 35) using coin flipping. Following this, the experimental group was instructed writing for 10 weeks based on the dialogue journal writing approach and the comparison group for the same period, but following the conventional approach. Data were collected before and after the intervention through a writing motivation questionnaire from both groups. The collected data were analyzed using an independent sample t-test, a paired sample t-test, and one-way MANOVA. The result of the study revealed that dialogue journal writing significantly enhanced the experimental group students' overall writing motivation (p<0.05), with a large effect size (d = 1.46), and its sub-components (enjoyment, self-efficacy, instrumentality, recognition, and effort), (p<0.05), with a moderate effect size (η²p = 0.371) when these sub-components were considered combined. The finding suggests that dialogue journal writing can effectively enhance EFL students’ writing motivation. Therefore, university EFL teachers are recommended to use dialogue journal writing in their writing classes to improve their students’ writing motivation.

This study investigated the effects of different learning levels, including Remember an Instance (RI), Remember a Generality (RG), and Use a Generality (UG) in multiple-choice and essay tests on immediate and delayed retention. Three-hundred pre-intermediate students participated in the study. Reading passages with multiple-choice and essay questions in different levels of learning were given to the participants to investigate the effects on both immediate and delayed retention. The findings revealed that to evaluate immediate retention, multiple-choice questions at remember levels are effective, but for enhancing delayed retention, essay questions, especially at UG level, are more effective. The results of the study suggest that tests can be used as aids to retention beyond their primary evaluation function.

Task-based learning and teaching in the realm of teaching young learners is still considered an adventure since very few experimental studies to date have tackled its applicability in that age group. The present research was an attempt to find out whether using task-based reading activities has any impact on the development of text comprehension in Iranian young learners studying English as a foreign language at the beginner level. Two groups of 25 students, aged 11 to 13, were the participants of the study. Through a reading pretest, it was ensured that the two groups were at the same level and belonged to the same population in terms of the reading skill. Having instructed the experimental group with four task types and the control group with classical reading activities, the researcher compared the reading performance of the two groups through a t-test which, not surprisingly, manifested the better performance of the experimental group. A follow-up reading test also showed that the experimental group still enjoyed a higher level of reading skill after one month. Furthermore, the scores gained from the four task types were compared and it was concluded that the students performed better in tasks which involved creativity and gave them the experience of playing.

This research is a quasi-experimental study investigating the effect of different types of teacher Written Corrective Feedback (WCF) on Iranian EFL learners’ writing accuracy in using two functions of English articles (the first mention and anaphoric reference) and simple past tense (regular and irregular). Ninety-four Iranian learners of English were assigned into three experimental groups of direct feedback group (n=24), indirect feedback group (n=24), direct plus indirect feedback group (n=24), and one pilot group (n=22). The participating groups’ homogeneity was checked by their performance in the proficiency test and the pre-test. During six treatment sessions, each of the three groups received feedback type. The papers with attached comments were returned to the participants. On two occasions (pre-test and post-test), the participants completed a picture description task. The results of one-way ANOVA revealed a statistically significant difference in the performance of the three groups. Furthermore, Scheffe post-hoc analysis indicated that the direct group outperformed direct plus indirect group, and direct plus indirect group outperformed the indirect group.

The aim of this study was to find out whether listening to English songs can improve pre-intermediate EFL learners’ listening comprehension. To this end, a non-randomized pretest-posttest control group design as one of the quasi-experimental research designs was employed. The sample of the study consisted of 40 male and female English learners from two classes in an Institute in Marand, Iran. The two classes were randomly assigned into the experimental and control groups. Then, a PET test was used to check the homogeneity of both groups. The listening section of PET was also considered as the pretest of the study. Then, fifteen English songs were used in the experimental group during the treatment period. Each session, within 45 minutes, one song was played for and practiced with the learners. Meanwhile, the control group had their usual teacher -fronted class without listening to songs. At the end, both groups were post tested on their listening comprehension using the listening section of another version of PET. The collected data were analyzed using Independent-Samples and Paired-Samples t-tests. The results revealed a statistically significant improvement in the performance of the experimental group. It is implied that songs are not only an entertaining tool but they can also be used as a pedagogic material in improving learners’ listening comprehension.

Human beings employ different forms of linguistic politeness to ease communication and reduce the likelihood of conflict. With the rise of technology and social media platforms such as Email, Telegram, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, the concept of politeness has faced new challenges. The present study focused on Instagram comments and analyzed politeness strategies based on Leech’s grand strategy of politeness. The study examined a 20043-word corpus developed based on 696 posts across various topics on Instagram. The results revealed that Instagram users predominantly utilized negative politeness strategies (63.3%). Among the positive strategies, agreement constraints were the most frequently employed (32.7%), while tact constraint violations (32.1%) were the most common within negative strategies. The study utilized repeated measures of ANOVA and Tukey post hoc analysis via SPSS to examine differences among various constraints and their violations. Significant differences were found among most constraints, except for tact and modesty, generosity, and feeling reticence. In terms of constraint violations, no significant differences were observed between approbation and obligation of the speaker to others constraint violation, between agreement constraint violation and generosity constraint violation, between agreement and obligation of others to a speaker constraint violation, between agreement constraint violation and opinion reticence constraint violation, between sympathy and modesty constraint violation, between sympathy and feeling reticence constraint violation. The findings underscore the importance of analyzing language in specific media, providing insights into politeness and impoliteness in a specific medium. The results can enhance students' pragmatic skills and improve their online communication, prompting materials developers to consider such pragmatic dimensions.

The present study aims at the description and analysis of the phonological and lexical development of a child who is acquiring Farsi as his first language. The child's language production at the holophrastic stage of language development, mainly single words, is observed and recorded longitudinally for nearly seven months since he was 16 months old until he turned 23 months. An attempt is made to see if the phonological and lexical findings of the same period found in other languages are confirmed in the case of Farsi (an Indo-European language). Issues like noun dominance in the early words, vocabulary spurt of the toddlers, and the dominant CVCV, CVC, CV syllabic structures are the focal points in this study. The significance of the study lies in the fact that the number of the studies done on the language development of monolingual Farsi speaking children is very few.

In a world with globalization and communication development as its main features, arriving at a common understanding and correct transition of meaning is an unavoidable necessity. Here the responsibility and duty of the people who hold the task of translation is of great importance and one of the issues that should be considered in translation is using euphemism. The current research seeks to find the relationship between translators’ gender, education, and age and their use of euphemisms in translation. The study consists of four hypotheses, this is descriptive research and a questionnaire is used to find the relationship between translators’ gender, education, age, and their use of euphemisms in translation. It has been distributed among the research population which consists of translators who are members of the Iran Translation Association. The results show that euphemism exists at a suitable level in the translation of the translators who are members of the Iran Translation Association. Moreover, the translators’ gender affects their use of euphemisms in translation. There is a direct relationship between translators’ age and their use of euphemisms in translation. Finally, the translators’ level of education does not influence their use of euphemisms in translation.

This study investigates the effect of corrective feedback on Iranian English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners’ interlanguage pragmatic (ILP) development in the context of invitation acceptance and declination. Three intact experimental groups were selected via convenience sampling from an English institute in Tehran: a recast group (N = 13), a metalinguistic group (N = 17), and a clarification request group (N = 12). Prior to the treatment, the groups participated in a dialogic extended discourse pretest. The dialogues for invitation acceptance and declination were drawn from Top Notch, American English File, English Result, and Four Corners. Learners’ performance was assessed using two checklists—one for pragmalinguistic and the other for sociopragmatic knowledge—based on a five-item Likert scale ranging from inappropriate to most appropriate. Treatment sessions were conducted three times per week, each lasting 60 minutes, over a period of one month. The findings reveal that corrective feedback significantly enhanced ILP development. Notably, the metalinguistic group outperformed the recast and clarification request groups. Consequently, metalinguistic corrective feedback proved more effective than recast and clarification feedback in fostering Iranian EFL learners’ ILP development concerning invitation acceptance and declination.