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Our Languages Clicked: Shakespeare in EFL Classes
This research differs from the literature-based Shakespeare class for EFL students in two main ways. First, the researcher focuses on students’ development of language awareness, culture awareness, text awareness and intertext awareness.
The Benefits and Challenges of Holistic In-house Task-based Language Learning and Assessment
In this paper, insights from the specialized learning and assessment literature are used to outline some important challenges and the proposed solutions in one academic context in which holistic in-house tasks and rating scales that support teaching were designed. The first challenge is to ensure that the design of tasks and rating scales is not just task-based but also construct-based.
Attitudes toward English and English learning at three rural Japanese middle schools: A preliminary survey
This study explores attitudes toward English and English learning at three rural Japanese middle schools. Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research has, over the past few decades, devoted increasing attention to the influence on language learning of learner motivation and attitudes. Theories backed by extensive empirical surveys among language learners have posited that learners‘ attitudes toward second language culture influence their second language achievement. However, many of these surveys have involved learners who are immersed in the ―target language‖ culture or have direct contact with it. In socio-educational contexts where learners‘ exposure to the target language is limited almost exclusively to their classroom experience, attitudes remain comparatively unexamined.
Gesture, Speech, and Graphic Organizers as Semiotic Resources for Summarizing: A Two-Case Analysis of the Genesis of Meaning
By emphasizing the most noticeable part of gestures, the gesture stroke, this study investigated the spontaneous development of sign-systems created by two adult, non-native speakers of English while they summarized academic text for an audience.
Cultural Expectations in Expressing Disagreement: Differences between Japan and the United States
The article identifies problems between Japanese students with intermediate English proficiency and native English speakers in the United States when expressing disagreement. The survey results indicate that common ways by which Japanese students express disagreement are likely to be either misinterpreted or viewed negatively by Americans.
Influences on Japanese Students’ Willingness to Communicate Across Three Different Sized EFL Classes
This study investigated factors which contributed to willingness to communicate (WTC) as it manifested from moment-to-moment in a Japanese EFL classroom for three different sized class types: a one-on-one classroom, a small group classroom, and a large group classroom. A classroom observation scheme, participant interviews (including stimulated recall) and a questionnaire were adopted as methods to examine factors which predict state-like WTC behaviour in each class type. Inter-group analysis between class types revealed that class size was a very strong factor affecting WTC.
Translation Students’ Use of Dictionaries: A Hong Kong Case Study for Chinese to English Translation
The use of the dictionary and translation are both common language experiences. The
dictionary is an indispensable tool to translating. Yet dictionary skills are grossly neglected in translator training, which assumes that students have acquired all the necessary knowledge and skills before training. In order to reveal the situation in Hong Kong, this case study attempts to investigate the dictionary use pattern of 107 translation students from five local universities for Chinese to English translation, and the dictionary consultation process of four respondents.
Lexical Bundles and the Construction of an Academic Voice: A Pedagogical Perspective
Lexical bundles refer to a sequence of three to four words that recur frequently in corpus-based discourse, both written and verbal. The overt instruction of these often overlooked multi-word sequences can address specific difficulties that L2 writers struggle with in establishing a credible English academic voice in their writing and speaking.
Using Partial Dictation of an English Teaching Radio Program to Enhance EFL Learners’ Listening Comprehension
Abstract
This paper reports pervasive decoding/listening problems of word recognition and word segmentation in connected speech at normal speed among Taiwanese university EFL students at the intermediate level. In order to resolve these serious listening problems, an activity of which integrates partial dictation with listening…
A Comparative Study of Korean University Students before and after a Criterion Referenced Test
The study aims to determine the perceptions of first year university students to criterion referenced testing. The students have been tested using norm referenced testing for most of their English language education and this has culminated in The College Scholastic Aptitude Test (CSAT).The poor communication skills of the students has prompted the researcher to question why CLT methodology is not complemented by a communicative test that reflects real life situations practiced in the classroom.
