درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Burnout is one of the potential threats to teachers which can negatively influence their performance and bring about many side effects such as poor health conditions, depression, absenteeism, etc. It has, however, been found teachers who use effective coping strategies to deal with stressful job conditions can resist burnout. This qualitative design study aimed to investigate the coping strategies of 15 Iranian high school EFL teachers who did not show burnout on Maslach Burnout Inventory. The participants were interviewed and observed in classrooms and they were asked to keep journals for 8 sessions. The data were content analyzed and results show that establishment of rapport with students, discussing problems with principals and colleagues, class management, reflection, ongoing learning, adherence to moral principles and adopting a traditional teaching style are among the coping strategies these teachers used. The low frequency of these strategies, however, implies that EFL teachers, even those who resist burnout, need to be trained on different burnout coping strategies. Keywords: burnout, coping strategies, qualitative design, Iranian EFL teachers   راهبردهای مقابله با فرسودگی شغلی در میان معلمان زبان انگلیسی ایرانی فرسودگی شغلی یکی از خطرات بالقوه ای است که معلمان در معرض آن قرار دارند و می تواند تاثیر منفی بر عملکرد آنان داشته وموجب  عوارض جانبی بسیاری مانند وضعیت بد سلامتی، افسردگی، غیبت از محل کار، و غیره شود. با این حال مشخص شده است که معلمانی که از راهبردهای مقابله مؤثر برای رویارویی با شرایط استرس زای شغلی استفاده می کنند می توانند در برابر فرسودگی شغلی مقاومت نمایند. این مطالعه کیفی با هدف بررسی راهبردهای مقابله مورد استفاده 15 معلم زبان انگلیسی ایرانی که در دبیرستان تدریس می کردند ودر پرسشنامه فرسودگی شغلی مازلاک فرسودگی شغلی کمی نشان داده بودند انجام شد. شرکت کنندگان مورد مصاحبه  و در کلاس های درس مورد مشاهده قرار گرفتند و از آنها خواسته شد به مدت 8 جلسه خاطرات کلاسی خود رابعد از کلاس ثبت نمایند. داده های جمع آوری شده مورد تحلیل محتوا قرار گرفتند و نتایج نشان داد که ایجاد رابطه مثبت با دانش آموزان، بحث در مورد مشکلات با مدیران و همکاران، مدیریت کلاس، تفکر و تأمل، یادگیری مداوم و پایبندی به اصول اخلاقی جزء راهبردهای مقابله مهم مورد استفاده  معلمان می باشد. یافته های مطالعه حاکی از ضرورت آموزش راهبردهای مقابله به معلمان زبان انگلیسی است تا بتوانند د رمقابل فرسودگی شغلی از خود محافظت نمایند. کلمات کلیدی: فرسودگی شغلی، راهبردهای مقابله، مطالعه کیفی، معلمان زبان انگلیسی ایرانی

Abstract: Over the last few decades, several aspects of pragmatic knowledge and its effects on teaching and learning a second language (L2) have been explored in many studies. However, among various studies, the area of interlanguage pragmatic (ILP) assessment is quite novel issue and many features of it have remained unnoticed. As ILP assessment has received more attention recently, the necessity of investigation on the EFL teachers’ rating criteria for rating various speech acts has become important. In this respect, the present study aimed to investigate the native and non-native EFL teachers’ rating scores and criteria regarding the speech act of request. To this end, 50 American ESL teachers and 50 Iranian EFL teachers participated to rate the EFL learners’ responses to video-prompted Discourse Completion Tests (DCTs) regarding the speech act of request. Raters were supposed to rate the EFL learners’ responses and mention their criteria for assessment. The results of the content analysis of raters’ comments revealed nine criteria that they considered in their assessment. Moreover, the result of the t-test and chi-square analyses of raters’ rating scores and criteria proved that there are significant differences between native and non-native EFL teachers’ rating pattern. The results of this study also shed light on importance of sociopragmatic and pragmalinguistic features in native and non-native teachers’ pragmatics rating, which can have several implications for L2 teachers, learners, and material developers.

This study tried to find out what factors underline the characteristics of acquisition of English language in EFL classrooms. To this end, the Characteristics of English Language Acquisition Scale (ELAS) consisting of 41 items was designed by the researchers of this study and administered to 388 pre University Iranian EFL students at various private and public schools in Neyshabour and Zebarkhan. Factor analysis was run to determine the number of factors underlying the scale. The application of Principle Axis Factoring and rotating the extracted factors showed that the characteristics loaded acceptably on twelve factors underlying the learners’ EFL acquisition, i.e., learning boosters, facilitation, determination, voluntary, teaching methodology, affective factors, attitudes toward foreign speakers and their culture, learner engagement, adjustment, enhancement, teachers' output and individual differences. The results are discussed and suggestions are made for future research.

The present study probed 409 Iranian English as foreign language (EFL) learners' motivation and attitude toward English as an International Language (EIL) by investigating the causal relationships of their facets via Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). To do so, the Persian version of the ‘attitudes toward EIL’ scale was designed and validated. It measures five constructs of: cultural realism, linguistic cultural disposition (negative), (dis)ownership of English, EIL posture, and localization. Then, the researchers utilized the validated scale along with the adapted Persian version of motivation scale designed by Taguchi et al. (2009) to explore the causal relationship among their facets. The latter scale measures seven dimensions of instrumentality prevention, instrumentality promotion, ideal L2 self, ought-to l2 self, learning experience, motivational intensity, and integrativeness. The findings of the study revealed that students' motivational intensity positively predicted by other motivational and attitudinal factors with 'ideal self' and 'instrumentality promotion' having the highest influence. It was also found that ‘cultural realism’ was a significant predicator of ‘localisation’, and ‘localisation’ was a significant positive predictor of ‘disownership of English’. ‘EIL posture’ was also in a positive direct relationship with ‘cultural realism’, whereas ‘linguistic cultural disposition’ (negative) was found to negatively influence other aspects including ‘motivational intensity’. This study has some implications for ELT professionals to revisit EFL motivation in light of attitudes toward EIL in expanding circle.

This research aimed to screen 'essay writing' difficulties that non-native university students at postgraduate levels usually experience regarding scholarly publication in mainstream, English journals. Two sets of variables including written literacy competencies in Persian and English languages were mapped over language uses (General vs. Academic). Initial screenings from one hundred Iranian students at PhD and MA levels with publication experiences in both Persian and English languages gave rise to some fifty-five participants randomly selected from different university disciplines (Humanities, Engineering, Medicine and Basic Sciences) and diverse university settings (Public and Private) across the country and classified via stratified sampling. A validated questionnaire from a large-scale project called ENEIDA (Moreno, 2011) was used for collecting the required data. Two measures were used to assess written literacy competencies across language uses: 1) participants' assumed, self-reported written literacy competencies in using English and Persian languages for General and Academic purposes were denoted as 'perceived' measures and 2) further supported by actual measures: mostly received comments from reviewers in the mainstream, English journals by the target group above. Findings were discussed in the light of recent lines of enquiries in Academic Literacy (AL) trends.

Given the significance of teacher care and its impact on student motivation, stroke as a unit of recognition seems to be related to motivation for class attendance and language learning. In this regard, this paper aimed to investigate the role of stroke in students’ willingness to attend classes(WTAC) and their foreign language achievement (FLA) in the foreign language context. To this end, a scale was developed and validated through structural equation modeling (SEM) to measure learners` WTAC. A total number of 260 English as a foreign language (EFL) learners completed the newly developed scale along with the stroke scale. Regression analysis was used to examine the relationships among the variables. The results demonstrated that WTAC, Non-verbal, and Valuing subscales of stroke were the strongest predictors and Teacher Characteristics (TCH) subscale of WTAC was the only predictor for FLA. Finally, the results were discussed, and some implications were provided for educational settings. تاثیر نوازه بر تمایل به شرکت در کلاس درس و یادگیری زبان خارجی با توجه به اهمیت توجه معلم و تاثیر آن بر انگیزه شاگردان، نوازه به عنوان واحد دیده شدن افراد، به نظر می رسد با انگیزه شاگردان برای شرکت در کلاس و یادگیری زبان ارتباط دارد. در همین راستا، در این پژوهش به دنبال بررسی نقش نوازه در تمایل به شرکت در کلاس درس و یادگیری زبان خارجی هستیم. بدین منظور، پرسشنامه ای برای سنجش میزان تمایل برای شرکت در کلاس با مدل معادلات ساختاری تهیه و هنجاریابی گردید. از 260 نفر فراگیر زبان انگلیسی خواسته شد به این پرسشنامه و پرسشنامه نوازه پاسخ دهند. از تحلیل رگرسیون برای بررسی ارتباطات بین زیر سازه ها استفاده شد. نتایج نشان داد پرسشنامه جدید با زیر سازه غیر کلامی و ارزشیابی نوازه و ویژگیهای معلمی با یادگیری زبان ارتباط معنادار دارد. در پایان، نتایج بحث شد و برخی از کاربردهای این پژوهش برای محیطهای آموزشی ارایه شد.   کلیدواژه ها:نوازه، تمایل به شرکت در کلاس، حضور در کلاس، یادگیری زبان خارجی

The present study sought to investigate the effect of explicit instruction of lexical bundles (LBs) on the development of Iranian English for Academic Purposes (EAP) students’ writing quality and also their receptive and productive knowledge of Lexical Bundles (LB). Assigned to two experimental and control groups, the eighty participants took pre- and post-tests of writing tasks and the receptive knowledge test. Afterwards, the obtained scores were subjected to a series of Analyses of Covariance (ANCOVAs) and paired samples t-tests. Results of the within-group and between-group analyses indicated that explicit instruction of LBs enhanced the participants’ productive and receptive knowledge of LBs and also improved the overall quality of their written productions. Possible explanations are provided and the implications of the findings for the applicability of LBs instruction are discussed.