درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

This article reports on the findings of a study that investigated the impact of manipulating task performance conditions on listening task performance by learners of English as a foreign language (EFL). The study was designed to explore the effects of changing complexity dimensions on listening task performance and to achieve two aims: to see how listening comprehension task performance was affected and to investigate possible overlaps between EFL learners’ perceptions of task difficulty and hypothesized task complexity. A purposive sample of 54 first-year EFL learners randomly assigned to two parallel conversation classes in an English department of a major public university participated in the study and performed listening tasks in a language lab. The instruments used for data collection were seven tasks taken from a TOEFL Test Preparation Kit, each followed by listening comprehension questions and an item on the participants’ personal perception of the difficulty of the task. During counter-balanced administrations, the tasks were manipulated for one of the four dimensions of task difficulty (adequacy, immediacy, perspective, and prior knowledge). The resulting data included the participants’ perception of difficulty as well as their performance scores under less complex and more complex conditions. One-sample T-test and correlation analyses of the data revealed that for all of the four complexity dimensions, the hypothesized less complex task condition led to better learner performance. The correlation between learner-assigned difficulty score for the task at hand and theoretical task complexity level was significant only for the immediacy dimension (r=-0.67, p<.05). The results offer support for task complexity frameworks, raise doubts about learners’ perceptions of tasks, and imply possibilities for task manipulation in language learning contexts.

The present study was an attempt to investigate the significance of verbalization and teaching the concepts of listening on the development of listening performance among Iranian EFL learners. To do so, an experimental study was designed in which the participants were sixty pre-intermediate learners selected based on the results of their performance on a standard version of Oxford Placement Test (OPT). The participants were divided into two experimental groups. The learners in experimental group I (Systemic Theoretical Instruction- Explanation and Materialization (STI-EM), were exposed to materialized tools which consisted of presenting the target concept in charts accompanied by the examples and related strategies to extract the concept, while Group II students (Systemic Theoretical Instruction- Explanation, Materialization, and Verbalization (STI-EMV), enjoyed materialized tools as well as collaborative verbalization. The learners in both groups went through pre-test, intervention, and post-test. The collected data were analyzed through employing analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). The results indicated that the group which practiced collaborative verbalization in L1 outperformed the one which was just mediated by teacher's oral explanation and materialized objects

The present study takes Engeström human activity system model (1987, 1999) as a theoretical framework to investigate the CLT-based English curriculum reform in Iran which was initiated in 2013 by the Ministry of Education in public schools. With the premise that human activity is artifact-mediated and goal-directed, activity theory makes it possible to demonstrate the complex and dynamic relationship between various institutional, social, and individual factors by revealing different contradictions that language teachers would experience as they attempt to implement CLT in their classroom contexts. In addition to 23 language teachers who consisted the main participants of this study, three other groups including 17 teacher directors, 23 students, and 20 parents took part. Document analysis, semi-structured interview, and classroom observation comprised the data collection instruments. The results indicated that despite their optimism about and keen interest in CLT-based reform, Iranian language teachers could not successfully implement CLT due to their inability to successfully resolve the contradictions that emerged in their activity system. These contradictions in turn stemmed from a number of difficulties that emanate from various sources including teachers themselves, students, their parents, school staff, educational system, and the new package. Based on the findings, a number of implications and suggestions are provided for the Iranian curriculum developers, language teachers, parents, and teacher directors

The current study aimed at investigating the academic learning needs of Iranian undergraduate students of English Language and Literature from the perspective of 320 stakeholders including undergraduate students (n=252), graduates (n=51), English literature instructors (n=7), and language instructors (n=10). To this aim, atriangulation of the most important data collection instruments of needs analysis (i.e., questionnaires, class observations, and semistructured interviews) was adopted for data collection at eight different Iranian state universities. The results of data analysis revealed that the above-mentioned students are not adequately equipped with learning and communication strategies during their academic and preacademic studies. The results of the current study may promise implications for the provision of some extracurricular EFL courses at the tertiary and senior high school levels in order to enhance students’ sociocultural and strategic competence based on the shared decision-making process among different stakeholders in the course design community

The present study sought to investigate the evidence for cross-linguistic transfer in a partial English immersion and non-immersion educational setting. To this end, a total of 145 first, third and fifth graders in a partial English immersion program and 95 students from the same grade levels in a non-immersion program were chosen. Six different English and Persian tests were administered: the Cambridge English for Young Learners (YLE) Test for Reading, a Persian reading achievement test, the English and Persian Phonological Awareness Sound Detection tests and the English and Persian Rapid Automatized Naming Tests. Given the nature of the research question and the design of this study, linear regression analysis was run through Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). The findings suggest that there is an apparent cross-linguistic transfer between English reading achievement and Persian cognitive predictors in both educational settings. Relatively speaking, Persian cognitive predictors can moderately predict English reading achievement in Grades 1 and 5 and can weakly predict English reading achievement in Grade 3.

استقلال فراگیر همواره یک مسئله بحث برانگیز میان زبان شناسان کاربردی بوده است. مطالعات متعددی به منظور بررسی برداشت معلمان و یادگیرندگان از استقلال فراگیر و همچنین امکان استقلال فراگیر انجام شده است. با وجود اهمیت استقلال فراگیر و وجود چندین مطالعه مرتبط، چالش در ترویج استقلال فراگیر در موسسات ایرانی به زعم محقق انجام نشده است. هدف اصلی این مطالعه بررسی چالش ها در ترویج استقلال یادگیرنده از دیدگاه معلمان زبان انگلیسی ایران بود. برای این کار، یک طرح تحقیق کیفی استفاده شده است. برای انجام این تحقیق ، 23 معلم زبان انگلیسی ایرانی در دانشگاه های مختلف در تهران به صورت هدفمند انتخاب شدند. داده ها از طریق مصاحبه عمیق جمع آوری شده و از طریق تحلیل محتوا بر اساس مدل رندر تحلیل شده است. بر اساس تحلیل محتوای مصاحبه ها، سه موضوع مختلف استخراج شد. اولین موضوع مشاهده شده، چالش های مربوط به موسسه، شامل اهداف تجویزشده ، مواد و روش های ارزیابی می باشد. دومین موضوع، چالش های مربوط به فراگیر می باشد که از هفت زیرمجموعه تشکیل شده است. سومین موضوع به دست آمده، چالش های مربوط به معلم می باشد که از چهار زیرمجموعه تشکیل شده است. این یافته ها می تواند توسط معلمان، تربیت کنندگان معلمان و همچنین زبان آموزان استفاده شود. می توان نتیجه گرفت که معلمان زبان انگلیسی باید آموزش لازم دراستقلال یادگیرنده را از طریق دوره های آموزشی قبل از خدمت و ضمن خدمت ببینند.

Language and culture are now deemed to be co-constitutive; hence English language teaching (ELT) textbooks should incorporate cultural aspects and promote intercultural competence. However, careful decisions should be made as regards to the cultural content of materials and the ways in which culture is represented. This study was an attempt to deconstruct the patterns of cultural representation and intercultural interactions in Interchange textbooks, an ELT textbook series taught to English as a foreign language (EFL) learners in Iran. Using content analysis of texts and images and with the focus on nationality, gender and race, it examined how different cultures were reflected in Interchange 1, Interchange 2, Interchange 3, and whether cultural bias or inequality was present. The quantitative and qualitative data analysis revealed that the white male group was dominant in all three textbooks. And, to use Kachru’s (1985) terms, inner, outer and expanding circle nationalities were represented in the textbooks, with the expanding circle constituting the major nationality, but American culture of inner circle was predominant. Additionally, the interactions were mainly limited to superficial aspects of the target culture although these textbooks sought to show various intercultural interactions. Dominance of male and white characters and the US culture indicated inequality in race and gender, and the superficial treatment of culture in the textbooks. Less attention to the hybrid culture and deeper level of intercultural aspects, i.e. critical reflections, in the textbooks suggests that the materials be supplemented by EFL teachers’ constructive discussion of the cultures that interact.

این تحقیق تلاشی در فعال کردن دانش لغوی غیرفعال از طریق توجه دهی و بررسی تأثیر جمله نویسی به عنوان فعالیت پس توجه دهنده بر تقویت تأثیر توجه دهی است. چهل و دو دانشجوی زبان انگلیسی سطح متوسط به بالای بزرگسال خانم، در دو گروه هم سطح از یک دانشگاه سراسری انتخاب شدند. آنها در تحقیقی شرکت کردند که در آن توجه به کلماتی که تولید آنها به آسانی فهمیدن آنها نبود، از طریق علامت زدن آن کلمات در یک متن خواندن انجام شد. سپس، شرکت کنندگان در یک فرآیند ٤ هفتگی جمله نویسی متراکم/ پراکنده شرکت کردند؛ شرکت کنندگان یک گروه هر هفته در طول ٤ روز پی در پی در هر روز، یک جمله با یکی از ١٦ لغت توجه شده نوشتند و گروه دیگر این فرآیند را یک بار در هفته تجربه کردند، به گونه ای که آنها بدون هیچ وقفه زمانی، ٤ جمله با ٤ کلمه توجه شده نوشتند. نتایج نشان داد که ارائه فعالیت پس توجه دهنده بر ارتقاء دانش لغوی تولیدی هر دو گروه به طور معناداری تأثیرگذار است. تعامل بین عامل زمان و روش های یادگیری معنادار بود. همچنین، نتایج عملکرد گروه پراکنده بهتر از گروه متراکم بود، ولی این تفوق معنادار نبود.

This study compared the effects of two types of form-focused tasks on proceduralization and transfer of linguistics knowledge in case of English modals. All participants of the study attended pretests, posttests and delayed posttests. The procedural comprehension and production knowledge were measured through the groups’ performance on a timed dual task test that resembled the context of practice. The transfer of knowledge was measured by evaluating the performance of participants on a timed dual task test in a context dissimilar from or reverse to the practice context. Three intact classes of intermediate EFL learners were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. The output group (n= 27) received explicit grammar instruction and a combination of three output practice, while the input group (n=25) received explicit instruction and a combination of three input practice. Identical texts were exposed to the control group (n=25) through listening and reading tasks. The texts were followed by some questions irrelevant to English modals. On the procedural knowledge posttests, the experimental groups outperformed the control group. The participants were able to transfer the knowledge to dissimilar contexts. The results may help language teachers design more effective activities for the learners considering the institutional constraints