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This research attempts to investigate the effect of the English language test of the University Entrance Examination (UEE) in predicting the academic achievement of Iranian EFL learners. To achieve this goal, Isfahan, Tabriz, Mashhad, Shiraz and AllamehTabatabaeiUniversities were randomly selected. Then, the scores of the English majors admitted to those universities were collected from the aforementioned universities. Subsequently, the scores of special courses were included and the scores of the general ones such as theology, Ethics, etc. were excluded. Afterwards, the English scores of the learners were obtained from the Educational Testing Measurement (ETM) to investigate the relationship between the set of scores from the ETM and their achievements at the aforementioned universities. The results showed significant relationships between the UEE scores and the academic achievement in all fields of the study when quota (Q) six was included. However, in the same fields of study when Q six was excluded, the observed correlation was rather low except for the scores of the English majors in ShirazUniversity. It was also discovered that the correlation observed between the two sets of scores of the English majors in MashhadUniversity did not reveal significant relationships when Q six was excluded.

The view that academic writing is purely objective, impersonal and informational, which is often reflected in English for Academic Purposes materials, has been criticized by a number of researchers. By now, the view of academic writing as embodying interaction among writers, readers and the academic community as a whole has been established. Following this assumption, the present study focused on how second/foreign language writers enact, construct, and invent themselves through writing. In this study, the theoretical stance on identity is grounded on Ivanič’s (1998) four interrelated aspects of writer identity, namely autobiographical self, discoursal self, authorial self, and possibilities for self-hood in the socio-cultural and institutional contexts. Hyland’s model of metadiscourse (2004a) was used as the analytical tool for analyzing texts. Based on a corpus of 30 research articles, the overall distribution of evidential markers, hedges, boosters, attitude markers, and self-mentions were calculated across four rhetorical sections (Abstract, Introduction, Methodology, Discussion and Conclusion) of the research articles. According to the results of this study, identity is a critical aspect of writing which should be brought into the mainstream of second/foreign language writing pedagogy through consciousness -raising or the specific teaching of certain features.

The current study aimed at investigating the relationship between life-wise syllabus- as a new type of syllabus which emerged as the result of recent developments in applied ELT and corresponding to the "education for life"- and teacher success in an EFL context. Life-wise syllabus introduced by Pishghadam in 2011 directed English teachers’ attention to give priority to life issues rather than language in class. These new concepts encourage curriculum development based on life and all of its manifestations which is the core principle of humanistic education. Then teaching should not only comprise mathematics, chemistry, or literature, but also emotions, relationships, attitudes, thinking styles, feelings, and states of mind. Due to the recent emergence of this syllabus and the dearth of research over its effectiveness, this research study was carried out to shed more light on the issue. To this end, 200 teachers- 100 from private sector and 100 from public sector- and their 1771 students were chosen as the participants of the research study from Mashhad and Ghaen cities. In this study, the teachers were given "Life-Responsive Language Teaching beliefs Questionnaire" (hereafter LRLTB), and their students were given the "Characteristics of Successful EFL Teachers Questionnaire" (hereafter CSET). The results of the correlational study indicated that the main variables and also their subscales were highly correlated. The comparison between male and female teachers regarding correlation between variables did not show any significant difference. But the comparison between private and public school teachers in terms of the relationship between the variables displayed that they were more strongly correlated for the latter.

The cultural background in language teaching has, for a number of reasons, recently moved to the foreground. Broadly speaking, there has been a shift in emphasis in course design from a pre-occupation with form to an interest in content. This article describes the results of a survey designed to elicit the views of students on what language teaching should be about. 400 students learning English in Kish-Language Institute, Kashan branch were chosen as participants of the study based on their proficiency level (Starter, Elementary, Intermediate and Advanced) in order to answer the questionnaire. Each question was designed in the form of a five point Likert Scale. The results were analysed using Binomial and MANOVA Tests. The obtained Results in this study indicate that except for Elementary level, other levels favoured bilingual/bicultural teacher. In relation to varieties of English, American English was liked most by Intermediate and Advanced students. All students had an overall positive attitude towards the native speaker pronunciation and finally the most favoured course contents were revealed to be science and social facts, students’ past experiences, English/American Literature along with culture of other countries.

Acquiring adequate vocabulary in a foreign language is very important but often difficult. Considering the importance of learner’s vocabulary learning and retention, the present study aimed at examining the impact of playing word games on young Iranian EFL learners’ vocabulary learning and retention at Irandoostan language Institute in Tabriz. To that end, 50 female learners at the age range of 8-12 were selected and assigned into an experimental (n=25) and a control (n=25) group. The design of the study was quasi-experimental with pretest, immediate posttest and delayed posttest. The content of the tests were based on the students’ course books and consisted of 20 items. The researcher utilized the word games in order to teach the selected vocabulary items during the course which lasted for a month and a half. The games were played each session for about 15 minutes. The experimental group was engaged in playing word games as a treatment and the control group received usual instruction. After the treatment, the participants in both groups took the post-test and after two weeks the learners were asked to take the test once more. This time their scores were assigned as the retention post-test scores. The mean scores of two groups were compared three times through the independent samples t-test. The results of the data analysis revealed that playing word games were effective in helping learners to improve their vocabulary learning and retention.

Despite growing interest in diagnostic assessment tools in second language writing, limited empirical research has addressed their development for EFL contexts. Responding to this need, this study aimed to develop and validate a diagnostic-oriented rating scale designed to deliver targeted feedback on Iranian EFL learners’ academic writing. Using a mixed-methods approach, essential descriptors reflecting core writing skills were identified through think-aloud protocols and expert feedback, followed by quantitative analyses to ensure reliability and validity. The findings indicate that the 21 empirically derived descriptors capture essential aspects of academic writing—content fulfillment, organizational knowledge, and language use—enabling instructors to assess learner proficiency with greater precision. The scale’s validation process, including inter-rater reliability, content validity, and criterion-related validity checks, supports its effectiveness as a diagnostic tool closely aligned with expert evaluations. This tool is a valuable resource for both large-scale assessments and classroom applications, supporting a learner-centered approach and empowering students to address specific writing challenges.

This case study examines the influence of students’ motivation on their EFL performance to identify motivational factors and as a result, it was created a proposal for increasing their motivation. The population selected was 126 first-semester students and 5 professors in charge of the EFL process at a private university in Colombia, Bogotá in the first and second semesters of 2023. Moreover, the methodology used was qualitative with a social constructivist worldview to research based on students' and professors’ perceptions. That way, the collected results show that most students’ extrinsic motivation causes their low EFL level when entering the program as students may be goal-oriented and short-term sustained, which can contribute to dropping out of the program. Therefore, it is recommended that professors take action to increase students’ motivation by teaching students relevant topics, exposing the benefits of learning EFL, encouraging them to be self-directed students, promoting a safe environment, making them use e-learning tools and using gamified assessment/activity tools so that students can improve their academic performance.

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.

For centuries the speculations on man's mental functioning posed a great challenge for the scholars in various disciplines such as philosophy, psychology, sociocultural studies, education, ethnolinguistics, discourse analysis, literary criticism. Researchers have been pondering over the ticklish question: is it the mind making the human society, or is it the society that shapes up the human mind? Researchers not informed in Vygotsky's contribution to the resolution of the issue, may still find the vicious circular question glaring in the face. But thanks to Vygotsky's sociocultural theory (SCT), the hazy horizon has cleared away and today we are convinced of the truth of Vygotsky's claim that man's mental functioning is mediated by sociocultural artifacts (physical and psychological tools) which imbue us with the capacity the shape natural environment, and in so doing change the natural circumstances in which we live, and the capacity to organize and gain voluntary control over our biologically specified mental functioning. The pivotal concept in this outlook is that man, released from biological constraints, emerges as the master of his own destiny. It goes without saying that a conception as such invests the educationists, social reformers, statesmen with a grave responsibility regarding the necessity of providing appropriate conditions for individual's cognitive, ethical and social development. Indeed, Vygotsky's position on the genesis of man's higher mental functioning which is said to be hinging on the social, cultural, and historical variables provides a viable solution to the mind-society enigma. This said, we intend to submit some ethnomethodological evidence in support of Vygotsky's claim regarding the genesis of man's higher mental conditioning.

Several studies of L2 learners’ interlanguage have addressed the complexity of the English adpositional system due to several reasons like L1 transfer, lack of knowledge in L2 and the strong collocational relations of prepositions with other elements of the English language. The major purpose of the present study is to evaluate the performance of Iranian students in dealing with three broad categories of spatial, non-spatial and idiomatic adpositions in English. To achieve the inclinations of the research project, 60 students majoring in TEFL at Roudehen University were selected. A paper-based TOEFL test of English Proficiency was administered to obtain some information about the participants’ general language proficiency. Three completion tasks with the division of spatial, non-spatial (nominal, adjectival and verbal) and idiomatic adpositions were administered. The obtained results represented the fact that the Iranian participants were considerably inclined to transfer their L1 adpositional patterns to their L2 production. The correlational analyses indicated that whereas the scores related to adposition task in general, non-spatial as well as the idiomatic subtests were strongly correlated with the scores obtained from the TOEFL test, there was a moderate correlation between the spatial subtest and the TOEFL one. The independent sample t-test results between the freshmen and sophomores dealing with spatial, nominal and adjectival subtests were considered to be significant. However, in reference to the verbal subtest, the difference between the two groups was not significant. The results obtained from the independent sample t-test indicated no significant differences between the freshmen and sophomores in their performance on idiomatic adpositions. Finally, the result of the correlation coefficients showed high correlation coefficients between the whole adposition test and the three subtests of spatial, non-spatial and idiomatic ones. Moreover, high and moderate correlations were reported among the three subtests with the highest correlation between the spatial and non-spatial subtests and the lowest between the idiomatic and spatial ones.

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.