Research in English Language Pedagogy
Volume:12 Issue: 1, Winter 2024

The pedagogical roles of teacher educators (TEs) in recruiting and educating future language teachers have recently gained attention among language researchers and scholars. Hence, this study set to investigate the pedagogical roles of Iranian non-native teacher educators (TEs) in educating preservice and in-service EFL teachers from the viewpoint of language institute managers. To this end, following a qualitative survey research design, a total of 30 institute managers were selected via the snowball sampling method and engaged in semi-structured, in-depth interviews. The participants’ responses were voice recorded and then thematic analysis was conducted to extract the main themes and subcomponents. The findings of the study showed that institute managers assigned three main instructional roles to TEs: holding preservice/in-service teacher education courses, revising the assessment system, and designing effective language syllabuses. Accordingly, language institute managers believed that effective TEs should not only be responsible for running teacher education courses but also engage in the evaluation process by checking and revising the testing procedures and designing and developing relevant instructional syllabuses in cooperation with educational managers of the institutes. The pedagogical findings of the study are also discussed.

Previous research indicates that task-based collaborative output activities (TBCOA) and scaffolding techniques (ST) lead to improvements in English as a foreign language (EFL) learners’ writing skill. However, there seems to be a lack of research on the comparative effects of these activities and techniques on EFL learners' writing accuracy and fluency. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the comparative impacts of two types of TBCOA (debating and dictogloss) versus two types of ST (teacher and peer scaffolding) on Iranian intermediate EFL learners' writing accuracy and fluency (A&F). This research followed a quasi-experimental design. A sample of 80 intermediate-level EFL learners, selected through convenience sampling from a Language School in Malayer, constituted the participants of the study. The learners were divided into four groups (each with 20 members). The homogeneity of the participants in terms of writing A&F was checked through a pretest at the outset of the study. Paired-sample t-tests were run to examine the possible significant changes in scores from the pretest to the posttest in each group. Furthermore, the effects of debating vs. dictogloss, teacher scaffolding vs. peer scaffolding, and overall TBCOA vs. overall ST were compared through ANCOVA, with the pretest scores being treated as the covariate. It was found that debating significantly led to more improvement than dictogloss in the learners' writing A&F. Moreover, teacher scaffolding was more effective than peer scaffolding. Regarding overall TBCOA and ST, the latter was significantly more effective. This research provides implications for EFL writing instruction.

The present study sought to investigate the role of assistive technology (AT) in English vocabulary learning by students with visual impairment (VI) in an English as a foreign language (EFL) context. It also endeavored to elicit their attitudes towards AT through a semi-structured interview. To this end, 22 students with VI were divided into an experimental and a control group. Before the experiment, their initial vocabulary knowledge was measured through a pretest. Over five sessions, the experimental group was assigned to learn the target vocabulary items via a screen reader, i.e., non-visual desktop access (NVDA). In the absence of NVDA, the control group was exposed to the same vocabulary items by implicit instruction. Then, both groups received a posttest. The results of an independent samples t-test run on the data obtained from the post-test demonstrated that the experimental group built significantly larger vocabulary items than the control group. Responses given to a semi-structured interview revealed that learners prompted by AT acknowledged that the assistance afforded by NVDA, as a supplementary tool, facilitated learning the target vocabulary items. Based on the findings of the present study the incorporation of AT into the instructional materials of students with VI is recommended.

Teacher resilience and teacher immunity are important qualities which are of high significance in today’s scope of EFL teacher education and teacher psychology. The present study explored whether there are any correlations or associations between teacher resilience, teacher immunity and emotional intelligence among Iranian EFL teachers. So, 90 EFL teachers from different English language institutes in Gorgan, Iran were chosen through convenience sampling procedure. To collect the data, three instruments: Teacher Resilience Questionnaire, Language Teacher Immunity Questionnaire, and Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire were used. The correlation test, Pearson, was run in order to examine the relationship between teacher emotional intelligence and teacher immunity, teacher emotional intelligence and teacher resilience and the relationship between teacher immunity and teacher resilience. The results indicated a significant relationship between Iranian EFL teachers’ emotional intelligence and teacher immunity. In addition, findings revealed a positive relationship between emotional intelligence and teacher resilience too and also a positive and significant relationship between teacher immunity and teacher resilience as well. As pedagogical implications, teachers who suffer from lower resilience and immunity should be informed on various ways of improving them including increasing their practicing on emotional intelligence.

Academic writing is a significant component of all graduate programs, but the majority of students lack basic writing skills. This problem is especially frustrating for M.A. students of TEFL who have to write academic articles in English because it necessitates time-consuming, extracurricular work that can occasionally be infuriating. The present study was carried out in the form of an action research project to explore the impact of process-based teaching of writing on the attitudes of 10 Iranian M. A. candidates of TEFL towards writing academically. The participants were TEFL candidates in Gonbad Kavoos, Iran. A qualitative method employing a collaborative action research model was used to find out how Iranian M. A. students of TEFL viewed the process writing approach. Phases of the course's procedure included receiving and putting into practice the instructor’s feedback on the texts' rationality, content, consistency, tone, and grammar and sending their finished writing assignments by deadlines. Each student had a schedule for in-person discussions about their progress. According to the results, the students believed that the teaching method helped them improve their writing abilities. The implications include creating a forum for oral feedback between teachers and students to supplement written feedback, fostering a sense of responsibility in students by helping them to self-organize, and recognizing that graduate students may require assistance with very fundamental writing abilities and knowledge.

Considering the significant role of innovated technology in learning processes, the present study focuses on the use of Augmented Reality (AR) in students’ reading skills. Practitioners have started to use AR in different areas of language learning though a few studies examined the use of AR in reading skills. To this end, the present study explored the effect of integrated AR app into learners’ task-based reading instruction (TBRI). Using Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) diagnostic test, 30 homogeneous senior high school students were selected, randomly divided in two groups of 15 each in Hamedan, Iran. Adopting the pre-test-post-test design with a control group, all participants were given a pretest including 5 sections and 30 items. The validity of questions was confirmed by 12 TEFL specialists, and their reliability coefficient was also confirmed using Cronbach's alpha test. During an academic term-long instruction of reading, the experimental group was taught using integrated AR app, iStormAR, into task-based instruction while the control group underwent task-based instruction with no AR app. Following the treatment, both groups took a previously validated post-test including 5 sections and 30 items. After collecting the data, the results were analyzed using analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). The findings emphasized the effectiveness of learning affordances of integrated AR app into TBRI, specifically in finding main idea questions, requiring that syllabus writers, material developers, and teachers consider the prominent potentials of AR technology for the development of students’ English language.

Focusing on metadiscourse markers during EFL writing classes has garnered research attention, yet few studies were conducted on online expository writing. This study explores the effect of metadiscourse markers instruction on expository writing of 80 male and female EFL learners in the school context, selected through convenience sampling and an interview followed with a smaller number of participants. Initially, the eighty participants were assigned to experimental (n=40) and control (n=40) groups after checking homogeneity in terms of English proficiency level. The participants in the experimental group received explicit instruction of markers, whereas the control group received the conventional curriculum-based writing instruction that included similar material/topics, except for the explicit focus on metadiscourse markers, all through a uniform digital platform mandated in the state-run schools. The frequency/use of metadiscourse markers in the writing assignments of the participants per session and the total was noted, and then a corpus of 80 collected essays was analyzed by a trained rater and researcher to both analyze whether metadiscourse markers instruction had any significant effect on expository writings and to determine which metadiscourse markers showed up in the texts written by students more. Finally, a semi-structured interview was conducted with eight EFL instructors to explore their attitudes. Statistical test of Analysis of Covariance showed a significant effect of metadiscourse markers instruction on EFL learners’ expository writing. Another finding was that participants employed interactional metadiscourse markers frequently. Implications for policy-makers, students, and teachers indicate that free access to online writing resources improves learning perceptions/outcomes.

Considering the needs of most English for a Specific Purpose (ESP) learners, speaking proficiency and terminology learning are two challenging objectives of their English learning. This anxiety is boosted when it comes to technical environments because it needs a range of specific vocabulary, resulting in lower scores than expected. Edutainment or the integration of entertainment with education is supposed to be helpful. Regarding a quasi-experimental study, 60 Iranian ESP learners studying nursing were conveniently selected and distributed into experimental (EG) and control (CG) groups. During the intervention phase, participants in the EG were taught the instructional materials based on Edutainment activities ranging from simple crossword puzzles to complex simulative games. Participants in the CG received the same content through mainstream English learning tasks. The instruments included an Oxford Placement Test (OPT), speaking proficiency, and terminology tests. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the outcomes. The results indicated that EG participants significantly outperformed CG regarding speaking proficiency and terminology learning. While Edutainment was significantly effective in enhancing the mentioned domains, it was more beneficial in speaking proficiency compared to terminology learning. The outcome may benefit ESP teachers, learners, and curriculum developers considering the integration of education and entertainment.

Collaborative content learning (CCL) has recently gained prominence in the research literature as a process of learning that contributes to effective learning of the content of the courses in EFL contexts. This quantitative ex-post facto research was conducted among TEFL students at the MA level selected based on purposive and convenience sampling. It was an attempt to investigate the attitudes of TEFL students toward the contribution of CCL to collective efficacy (CE). To this end, sixty male and female participants in the master's program participated in the study. The participants have already been exposed to implementing CCL based on its principles and have been familiar with the underlying assumptions of CCL. Statistical analysis of students' responses to the CE questionnaire revealed that most learners believe that CE in CCL is important in EFL teaching and learning context, and learners have positive attitudes towards working collaboratively on the content. They stated that working collaboratively on the content positively changes their group members' learning and leads to successful learning because it encourages them when a similar group successfully conducts a task. The study's findings suggest the beneficial role of CCL in raising students' awareness of skillful collaboration for maximum learning of the content and for their CE.

The notion of teacher commitment has grabbed much attention in the mainstream, and L2 teacher education as teaching has become more complex by recent sociocultural changes in educational practices. Consequently, several instruments have been developed to operationalize the construct. The instruments developed so far have addressed the construct generically. To be sure, this line of inquiry is still untouched in the ELT profession. The present exploratory mixed methods study attempted to develop a questionnaire to measure English language teachers’ commitment. In doing so, an initial 61-item questionnaire was developed conducting a comprehensive literature review and using interviews with domain experts and English language teachers. Then the trial instrument was administered to a sample of 352 teachers for Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), reducing the instrument to 32 items. The subsequent Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) obtained from another sample of 577 individuals substantiated a seven-factor model as a robust and valid tool for measuring English language teacher commitment. The seven-factor model of teacher commitment included cognitive language teaching ability, language classroom environment, job satisfaction, opportunities for professional development, language teaching planning and support, language teaching self-image and beliefs, and language teaching exhaustion. ELTCQ can be used for measuring English teachers’ commitment. Researchers, administrators, and teacher trainers can use the questionnaire to improve the quality of in-service courses and examine teacher qualities for future professional predictions.