درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Despite being trained in pre-service teacher education programs, most EFL teachers are underprepared when faced with language assessment-related activities. Part of the problem emanates from the fact that Language Assessment Literacy (LAL) as a construct has not been well defined by experts. The purpose of this study was to pinpoint the components of LAL in the Iranian EFL context using an adapted version of Fulchers' (2012) LAL survey with two types of constructed and closed response items. The participants were 280 English language teachers from seventeen different provinces in Iran. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses and cross validation were used to define LAL as a construct. Furthermore, qualitative data analysis procedures were employed to analyze the data obtained from constructed response items. The results indicate that LAL in the Iranian context is comprised of four factors, namely: test design and development, large-scale standardized testing and classroom assessment, beyond-the-test aspects (which mainly includes social and ethical aspects of language testing/assessment), and reliability and validity. Furthermore, the results show that the EFL teachers in this study believe that besides the theoretical issues of assessment, they should also receive hands-on skills-based instruction in language assessment. These results can have direct implications for future teacher education programs with the aim of enhancing EFL teachers' LAL.

Many studies have been conducted on the ways of promoting willingness to communicate in learners in EFL/ESL contexts. While different scholars have undertaken studies on many of these variables, few of these studies have aimed at EFL university students in Iran. This study reports on the role of international posture and perceived communication behavior on Iranian EFL learners’ communication in English. The participants who accepted to attend the survey completed questionnaires on WTC, international posture and perceived communication behaviors. The results driven based on this research indicated that Iranian English BA students are generally tended to speak in English. The participants' willingness to communicate in English was found to have a significant relationship with their perceived communication behaviors and international posture. The findings of this study will be beneficial for various policy makers and practitioners, including those dealing with curriculum development and teacher education to focus more on the elements influencing communication in English. Many studies have been conducted on the ways of promoting willingness to communicate in learners in EFL/ESL contexts. While different scholars have undertaken studies on many of these variables, few of these studies have aimed at EFL university students in Iran. This study reports on the role of international posture and perceived communication behavior on Iranian EFL learners’ communication in English. The participants who accepted to attend the survey completed questionnaires on WTC, international posture and perceived communication behaviors. The results driven based on this research indicated that Iranian English BA students are generally tended to speak in English. The participants' willingness to communicate in English was found to have a significant relationship with their perceived communication behaviors and international posture. The findings of this study will be beneficial for various policy makers and practitioners, including those dealing with curriculum development and teacher education to focus more on the elements influencing communication in English.

This qualitative study aimed to develop a model of classroom management strategy for Iranian English as a foreign language learners. To tap into this matter, some face to face and focus group interviews as well as real observations were performed. Twenty-six students including various proficiency levels from four different provinces participated in the face to face and focus group interviews. Also, 10 observations of the real classes wherein teachers were teaching conversation courses were made. Transcribing and codifying the data according to Corbin and Strauss's (2014) systematic steps of open, axial and selective coding, the findings revealed a model of classroom management strategy encompassing three main themes (management, quality of life and classroom practices), nine categories and 39 subcategories. The findings suggest EFL teachers notonly should pay attention to classroom practices, but they should also work onbuilding up rapport and encouraging their students in order to achieve a class in which students are wholeheartedly willing to learn the language.

This paper attempts to investigate and compare the conceptual metaphors of FEAR in Persian and English. FEAR is one of the basic emotions, conceptualization of which shows both similarities and variations in different languages. Investigating features of conceptualization is an essential part of the semantics of emotions. The cross-linguistic analysis of the concept of FEAR is based on the Conceptual Metaphor Theory put forward by Lakoff (1987) and the extensions of this theory provided by Kövecses (2002). We have attempted to compare and contrast FEAR metaphors and elaborate on some cultural and language-specific aspects in the two languages. We adopted a corpus-based method to gather the metaphorical expressions and then to extract the name of the mappings. We compared and contrasted these name of the mappings, and identified the commonalities and differences. Certain source domain concepts such as human, motion verbs, animals, and colors were explained in detail.

Japanese exhibits a large degree of flexibility in terms of word order. Thus, not only SOV but also OSV (scrambling) and SVO (postposing) are grammatical. In terms of discourse function, there are some similarities between scrambling and (non-pause type) postposing. According to Author (2017) and Shimojo (2005), scrambled objects and postposed elements are anaphorically salient but cataphorically non-salient. Yet, Shimojo (2005: 202) observed no example with a postposed object. In order to explain this tendency, I propose that scrambling is not as costly as postposing due to the following two reasons. First, scrambling follows given-new-ordering whereas postposing does not. Second, rightward movements are more costly than leftward movements in Japanese (Fukui: 1993). Therefore, postposing is expected to be selected when scrambling cannot be chosen. As scrambling can be used for the object but not for the subject in SOV, postposing is dominantly utilized for subjects.