حسن سلیمانی

Critical pedagogy as a constituent of a democratic society is crucial to be raised and an educational system as a part of the society needs to get familiar with such a context for nurturing teachers and students with critical thinking as well as providing materials based on critical pedagogy principles. The present study intended to elicit the underlying themes in critical pedagogy and to examine their frequency in Iranian EFL textbooks. Following an exploratory sequential mixed method design, reviewing the literature critically, a host of underlying themes were extracted using content analysis and then six experts in Applied Linguistics were asked to select the more relevant themes in critical pedagogy according to the context of teaching the English language in Iranian high schools. Accordingly, the materials utilized in the present study were senior high school EFL textbooks entitled Vision Series and Vision Series Workbooks to examine the elicited themes. Furthermore, the frequency of critical pedagogy themes in Vision Series and Vision Series workbooks in terms of the level of the textbooks were examined. The results indicated "critical praxis" and "critical thinking" were the most frequently-used themes in Vision Series and Vision Series workbooks respectively and the frequency of critical pedagogy themes in these textbooks revealed no significant differences except in some themes. The findings of this study might have implications for stakeholders, materials developers, teachers, and students.

The empirically-validated link between teachers’ professional role identity and explicit manifestations of teacher efficacy has resulted in a burgeoning literature on educational programs/settings influential in teacher identity formation. In an attempt to expand on this strand of research, the present study explored how taking part in an academic multi-faceted teaching practicum may contribute to professional role identity construction/reconstruction among Iranian EFL student teachers. To this end, 45 third-year undergraduates majoring in teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) were traced throughout a two-year (four-semester) teaching practicum held by Farhangian University, Iran. Based on a concurrent triangulation mixed methods design, the participants’ identity was gauged at five different time points: At the outset of the practicum and after every practicum semester. The quantitative data were gathered through the repetitive administration of a standard Likert-scale questionnaire developed based on Farrell’s (2011) tripartite model of professional role identity. Coincident with the surveying process, the qualitative data were gathered through a semi-structured interview held at the beginning of the practicum and four integrative reports developed by the participants at the end of every practicum semester. Within-group comparison of the survey data in tandem with content analysis of the qualitative data based on the focus framework revealed that the multi-faceted practicum helped the student teachers strike a balance in their identity as a manager and a professional. Additionally, the results called into question the contribution of the practicum to acculturator identity development. The influential role of a multi-faceted practicum in promoting professional role identity among student teachers calls for an investment of cost and time to exploit the full potential of practicums of the same quality.

From an ecolinguistic perspective, affordance and technology might be issues of great concern in recent decades in computer assisted language learning (CALL). The present study was conducted to investigate Iranian novice and experienced EFL teachers’ perspectives on challenges and affordance of mobile assisted language learning (MALL) in an EFL context. To this end, a total of 80 EFL teachers at different universities in Iran were randomly sampled. The data were collected through a validated 4-point Likert-scale questionnaire including two sections, each section of which focused on a particular aspect of MALL, including items evaluating EFL teachers’ attitudes toward the implementation of mobile phones and items exploring EFL teachers’ perspectives on the challenges to the use of MALL instruction. The results revealed that the novice EFL teachers significantly agreed more than experienced teachers with the idea that MALL based instruction should be used in Iranian EFL context. The results also indicated that the experienced EFL teachers significantly “strongly agreed” more than novice teachers concerning the idea that MALL based education created challenges in Iranian EFL. In general, the findings suggest that both novice and experienced teachers had positive attitudes towards MALL instruction. However, there are some challenges which make teaching and learning less efficient and these obstacles need to be tackled by authorities. Implications have also been introduced in the paper.

The present study explored the impact of various techniques of pre-class content delivery in flipped classrooms on Iranian EFL learners’ inferential reading comprehension. In addition, the students’ perceptions toward the flipped learning experience and WhatsApp application as the online platform for the delivery of course contents were rigorously examined. To this end, 72 homogeneous intermediate EFL learners from one language institute in Iran were randomly assigned into four equal groups. The techniques being evaluated in these four flipped classrooms were attending video conferencing meetings, listening to audio podcasts, watching PowerPoint slides, and the combination of all the aforementioned ones, respectively. To elicit the required data, multiple sources of instruments, including Nelson-Denny Reading Test (NDRT), reading comprehension pre-and post-tests and a semi-structured interview were used. The results of descriptive statistics demonstrated that while the participants’ scores of all groups increased in the reading comprehension post-test, blending various techniques of pre-class delivery contributed most in improving the participants’ performance. However, the increase in the final scores of the PowerPoint group was insignificant. The results of one-way ANOVA analysis demonstrated a significant discrepancy among the four groups after the treatment. Post hoc comparisons indicated that the significant difference only occurred between the blended and PowerPoint groups. The results of qualitative data showed that most interviewees favored learning English in a flipped learning environment and they were also satisfied with the quality of pre-class content delivery via WhatsApp. Based on the findings, the study also offers important implications for future research.

Global EFL coursebooks are used in numerous educational contexts throughout the world based on the assumption that they are the optimal source of English educational input. Their widespread use calls for a systematic analysis of these coursebooks using a framework that can reveal their defining characteristics. One such framework is the knowledge process framework, which is based on the multiliteracies pedagogy. The present study deployed this framework in an attempt to analyze seven widely taught coursebooks in the Iranian context. The findings revealed that knowledge processes of "analyzing functionally" and "applying appropriately" were more frequent in the analyzed coursebooks and the other knowledge processes were present in lower numbers. Based on the findings of the study, EFL teachers in the Iranian context are encouraged to include more activities with the knowledge processes of "analyzing critically" and "applying creatively" to address the absence of these knowledge processes while teaching the global coursebooks.

Situated-learning translation training approach has been proven to be an efficacious translation training approach in cultivating translators' long-life learning, translation competence as well as translator competence. However, previous studies have mainly delved into the effect of simply one single trend of this modern translation training model on student translators' competencies and sub-competencies and have not compared the effects of different situated-learning trends. To fill this gap, this mixed-methods study was set out to explore the comparative effects of cognitive-apprenticeship (CA), simulated project-based (SPB), and integrative (I) training methods on students' legal translation quality (TQ), their critical thinking ability (CTA), as well as employed problem-solving strategies (PSS). To this end, 71 undergraduate translation students were assigned to three experimental groups of CA, SPB, and I. The quantitative phase involved a quasi-experimental, pretest-treatment-posttest design and the qualitative phase was established on the grounded theory method. Data analysis results indicated that CA and I groups outperformed their counterparts in most subscales of TQ and CTA. The results of the thematic analysis of TAP data also showed that the largest variety of linguistic and non-linguistic PSS was respectively used by G3 and G2.

Retention and learning are neurolinguistic and psycholinguistic processes. The brain electrical response to the cognitive processes that happen in the cortices is inescapable. During neuronal activities, created waves can be recorded and displayed by quantitative electroencephalogram (QEEG) in a non-invasive form. Beta waves are created by thinking, learning, computations, reasoning, attention, and problem-solving activities. This study's primary goal is to objectively investigate the variables impacts of multisensory and non-multisensory methods of instruction on vocabulary retention concerning beta and beta1 waves frequency changes. To meet the purpose, some pre-school novice male and female foreign language learners (age: 5-6 years) participated in this study voluntarily and were assigned into two experimental groups: The Multisensory (three girls and four boys) and Non-multisensory (one girl and six boys) teaching groups. The analyses of the collected data on pre- and post-brain QEEG records of beta and beta1/SMR waves' variations indicated no significant difference between the two groups in the brain oscillatory changes. However, the case study analyses specified the supremacy of beta1 frequency ranges in the Multisensory post-records. The comparative findings of pre- and post-Expressive One Word-Picture-Matching Test (EWPMT) showed that the Multisensory group outperformed the Non-multisensory one; besides, a significant positive relationship was found between beta wave frequency changes on Fp1 and mean score of EWPM post-test in the Multisensory group. The study concluded that the multisensory approach could be a promising method to improve retention at the pre-school level.

Exploring various dimensions associated with classroom Willingness to Communicate (WTC) appears to have become a focal issue among researchers. Despite previous studies on WTC, there still exists the paucity of research reflecting actual learners’ WTC behavior via the lens of the Sociocultural Theory (SCT). The present study, therefore, delved into the role task-mediation and teacher scaffolding might play in EFL learners’ WTC, juxtaposing STC, and task-based instruction. Through a multiple case study approach, six types of tasks were applied with 11 Iranian EFL learners over 9 weeks. Relying on triangulation, the authors of the present study collected the data using observation, stimulated recall interviews, and learners’ reflective journals. To treat the data, the qualitative method of analysis was utilized. The results showed that the learners behaved variably in their WTC with respect to the tasks. Furthermore, teacher scaffolding was found to contribute to the learners’ WTC. Mediation via task and teacher scaffolding carry implications for English teachers, which have been discussed at the end of this article.

The marriage between technology and teaching in educational milieus in recent years has been a major concern among educational researchers in general and applied linguists in particular as far as augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) are concerned. Augmented reality after virtual reality received much attention over the last decades in mobile assisted language learning context. AR mixes virtual world onto real environment, VR delve the participants in to the virtual world. To examine the effect of AR and VR on abstract writing of EFL students, 12 intermediate proficiency pairs (high and low proficiency) participated based on their scores on TOEFL and a hypothetical abstract writing task. The participants were required to write an abstract according to the sub-moves of Hyland's (2000) move analysis provided through three mobile applications including AR-, VR HeadSet virtual reality-, and paper-based scaffoldings for four weeks in a collaborative context. In evaluating the groups' abstract writing scores before and after the treatment, no significant differences were found among the three groups. However, the AR group revealed better mean average results (M = 33) compared to the other VR (M = 24) and paper-based groups (M = 29). Besides, the low intermediate proficiency subjects in the AR group received higher scores (M = 40) compared to heir higher counterpart (M = 37). Results imply that the integration of real and unreal worlds might be a good asset in teaching the genre of abstracts to EFL learners in general and low intermediate proficiency learners in particular.

The present study intended, firstly, to investigate the effect of web-integrated instruction on self-regulated learning ability in EFL writing, and secondly, to compare and contrast the effects of paper-based feedback and web-assisted feedback on the self-regulated learning ability. To this end, a quasi-experimental design was applied for both cases. In line with the first objective, an experimental group for implementing a web-integrated instruction as treatment, and a control group with a non-web-integrated instruction were formed. Each of the mentioned groups included an average of 15 Iranian EFL students who were pre-post tested through the Academic Self-Regulated Learning Scale (ASRLS) questionnaire. In the next phase of the study, two experimental groups for the paper-based and web-assisted feedback types and a control group with no feedback were randomly taken into account. The results of the Mann-Whitney U Test indicated a statistically significant difference between the self-regulatory ability in writing tasks of the web-integrated and non-web-integrated instruction groups. The participants in the experimental group who were taught through web-integrated instruction outperformed those in the non-web-integrated group in developing their self-regulatory strategies. Moreover, comparing the self-regulatory ability of paper-based feedback, web-assisted feedback, and no feedback groups through the application of the Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test revealed that there was not a statistically significant difference between them, and with respect to the type of feedback the groups received, no group outperformed another in developing their self-regulatory strategies. As a result, it might be concluded that web-integrated writing instruction might have a significant influence on the self-regulatory ability while feedback type does not.

By the spread and ownership of English in the new globalized arena, and by the great realization of World Englishes towards this miscellaneous geographical diffusion of English and local settings, a wide range of studies has been conducted to explore these new different varieties of English. Therefore, in today’s world, by huge communication and telecommunication infrastructures among global context, English as an International Language (EIL) has emerged its definition for the reason of international communication. In this scene, the great deal of western norms in contact with different local and cultural contexts, the term glocalization has emerged to compose globally appropriate norms by locally and culturally accepted settings. This paper introduces how these new challenging glocalized norms were maintained by western globalized forms in (ELT) pedagogy. As a result, it was the reason that in implication of glocalization in (ELT), by awareness of local needs and culturally acceptable norms, curriculum and syllabus designers have considered a new framework for developing their appropriate syllabi in terms of functional principles.

This study compares lexical retrieval amongst monolinguals and intermediate bilinguals and advanced bilinguals. It also investigates the possible effects of their language learning strategies on their respective lexical retrieval advantage. The study used a mixed methods design and the groups consisted of 20 Persian near-monolinguals, 20 Persian-English intermediate level bilinguals, and 20 Persian-English high-proficiency bilinguals. Auditory and visual lexical Memory Span Tasks were utilized to evaluate the lexical retrieval of all the language groups. The way that bilinguals used their L2 on a daily basis was examined using semi-structured interviews. It was suggested that the knowledge of two languages will not necessarily result in lexical retrieval advantages in bilinguals when compared to monolinguals. However, it was found that the specific language learning strategies used by the bilinguals could potentially influence their lexical retrieval advantages. Furthermore, when comparing lexical retrieval in different language proficiency groups, the method using which bilinguals manage their two languages as well as the environment they are located in should be taken into consideration.

Although L2 researchers agree that written corrective feedback (WCF) improves L2 learners' grammatical accuracy, few systematic studies have investigated the effect of computer-mediated feedback on improving L2 learners' grammatical accuracy. This study was an attempt to investigate the comparative effects of two types of WCF (asynchronous computer-mediated and conventional paper-and-pen metalinguistic feedback on intermediate L2 learners' use of verb tense. The participants were 49 L2 learners chosen via convenience sampling whose ages ranged from 18-25. They were in 3 intact settings in Simin Institute in Tehran. They were assigned into 3 groups: 2 experimental and 1 control. To measure the participants' knowledge of verb tense before treatment, a pretest was administered. In the next step, the experimental groups received metalinguistic feedback in separate settings whereas the control group did not receive any treatment. Finally, a posttest was used to measure the participants' knowledge of verb tense after the treatment. Though the ANOVA findings suggested that both types of WCF resulted in the improvement of the participants' verb tense accuracy, the effect of computer-mediated asynchronous feedback on the use of verb tense was more profound. In a conclusion, WCF had a significant effect on the verb tense accuracy of intermediate L2 learners.

This investigation examined the mixed effects of visual input enhancement, explicit instruction, pushed output, and corrective feedback on noticing and intake of English conjunctive adverbs. Participants included 83 intermediate EFL students enrolled in a grammar and writing course. They were assigned to a control group (n = 22), explicit instruction pushed output explicit corrective feedback group (n = 25), visual input enhancement pushed output implicit corrective feedback group (n = 17), and visual input enhancement enriched input group (n = 19). Design was a pretest, immediate posttest, and delayed posttest type. To assess the participants’ intake of the targeted structures, 3 tests were developed. One-way ANOVA and a series of post-hoc Scheffe tests were performed on the results. Taken together, the results indicated that all the combined procedures had both positive and lasting effects on the noticing and subsequent intake of the discourse markers (conjunctive adverbs) at issue. Results, further, revealed that the effects of the mixed procedures on the rate and durability of intake of the targeted forms was differential.

Distance education pedagogy to be successful requires teachers with different levels of computer, information, and multimedia literacy. Teacher's computer literacy has caught considerable attention due to the great opportunities provided by modern technology for promoting language education. The present study explored computer, information, and multimedia literacy of 255 Iranian EFL teachers. To collect data, we developed and validated Computer, Information, and Multimedia Literacy Questionnaire for EFL Teachers (CIM-LQ for EFL Teachers), a five-point Likert scale questionnaire containing three sections to examine the participant's responses. The obtained data were analyzed using SPSS software version 20. The findings revealed that the level of EFL teacher's multimedia and information literacy ranged from low to moderate which necessitates improving teacher's training courses and preparing them for implementing technologies in real language teaching contexts. The findings have implications for both teacher education programs including both pre-service and in-service teacher training courses and EFL teacher's practice.

A long-standing debate among the vocabulary researchers is the depth of processing to learn vocabulary. This paper is a quantitative research which considers a revision in the “involvement load hypothesis” proposed by Laufer and Hulstijn in 2001. It investigates the role of proficiency and evaluation in this hypothesis in order to better reveal its potential contribution to vocabulary learning. It was based on task-induced involvementthat comparesdifferent tasks in incidental vocabulary acquisition in EFL context. The participants were 66 learners fromtwo different English institutes who were classified into two major high and low proficient groups based on Nelson Proficiency Test. The participants in each group were randomly assigned to three tasks prepared to compare“moderate”, “strong”, and “no evaluation” in involvement load hypothesis.The “strong evaluation”subgroup (making original sentences) in low proficiency supported Laufer and Hulstijn’s hypothesis and yielded better retention of the target words. The study suggests that the level of proficiency and evaluation in task induced involvementneeds reconsideration. The results have implications for language teachers, materials developers, and syllabus designers.

Drawing upon sociocultural theory of Vygotsky, the current study aims to investigate the effect of dyadic interaction in mixed and matched level proficiency pairings on comprehension and production of request and apology speech acts. The participants were 125 EFL learners who were randomly assigned to control and experimental (interaction) groups. Based on their scores in the pretest including a pragmatic listening test and an Oral Discourse Completion Test (ODCT), those in the experimental groups were assigned to the mixed (H-L) and matched level (H-H and L-L) dyads. Both the control and experimental groups received metapragmatic instruction on speech acts; however, the experimental groups were engaged in collaborative problem-solving tasks on speech acts for nine sessions. Following the treatment, the posttest was administered, the results of which revealed the outperformance of the interaction groups compared with the control group. Moreover, mixed level dyads were found to outperform their matched level counterparts in both measures of comprehension and production of speech acts. The findings have pedagogical implications for L2 teachers and practitioners on how to best pair learners in collaborative activities.