EFL learners’ peer negotiated feedback, revision outcomes, and short-term writing development: The effect of patterns of interaction Azar Tajabadi, Moussa Ahmadian, Hamidreza Dowlatabadi, Hooshang Yazdani Language Teaching Research, 2023 Inspired by Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory and Storch’s framework of peer interaction, this study investigated the nature and outcome of peer interaction in EFL (English as a foreign language) learners’ peer review and revision activities. During two 16-week semesters, 32 lower-intermediate learners participated in an Advanced Writing university course. Each of the learners wrote and revised six one-paragraph writing assignments and exchanged peer negotiated feedback in pairs. The qualitative analysis of their recorded dialogues revealed that although the learners were nearly at the same proficiency level, they adopted a variety of patterns of interaction including collaborative, expert/novice, dominant/dominant, and dominant/passive. Collaborative and dominant/passive patterns were the most and the least frequent patterns, respectively. The analysis of feedback types indicated that the collaborative pairs exchanged the highest number of feedback in total and could extend their focus to content and organization of the texts more than the other pairs. The lowest number of feedback was observed in pairs adopting a dominant/passive pattern of interaction. Further analysis showed that while collaborative learners succeeded in revising the majority of their errors correctly and had the greatest short-term writing development, the passive learners failed at both to a large extent. These findings are discussed drawing on relevant theoretical and practical literature, and implications for second language (L2) writing instructors and researchers are suggested.
Nea multimodal discourse analysis of pictures in ELT textbooks: Modes of communication in focus Jordan Journal of Modern Languages and Literatures, 2021 There is a tight nexus between visual literacy and textbook picture representations. This is of paramount importance when textbooks in general and ELT textbooks, in particular, are under question. To conduct a visual and verbal discourse analysis based on modes of communication, ELT textbook pictures were analyzed under the assumption that visual and verbal discourse interacts with reflected modes of communication. To this end, 50 ELT textbook pictures were used as the corpus and analyzed according to KvL's (2006) visual images analytical strategies in multimodal texts and Halliday’s (1985) transitivity system for verbal analysis of textbook pictures. The analysis of multimodal resources revealed that the analyzed visual images were used to represent non-human images; close-up images, frontal images, left-right compositions were the most frequent visual modes in the selected pictures. In the case of verbal mode, the relational main-type and verbal minor-type level with 39% and 2% were the most and least frequent verbal strategies, respectively. The findings might have significant theoretical and pedagogical implications for scholars, L2 teachers, and ELT textbook designers to consider the potential of using multimodal resources for non-pedagogical purposes while integrating textbook visual images and verbal strategies to create meanings. Keywords: Multimodal Discourse Analysis, Transitive System’s Processes, Visual Images Interpretive Strategies, Modes of Communication, ELT Textbooks.
Efficacy of efl teachers’ assessment literacy and professional identity in boosting learners’ autonomy Hooshang Yazdani, Parviz Ghasedi Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2021 This study was set out to investigate the effects of EFL teachers’ assessment literacy and professional identity on learners’ autonomy. Meanwhile, the relationship between teachers’ assessment literacy and professional identity was investigated. Moreover, educators’ perspectives on learner autonomy were studied. To this end, 40 EFL teachers participated in the study through completing assessment literacy scale developed by Mertler (2003) and teacher professional identity questionnaire designed by Beijaard et al. (2000). Besides, 20 EFL teachers were interviewed. Likewise, 110 upper-intermediate EFL learners answered Zhang and Li’s (2004) learner autonomy questionnaire. A mixed method design was used to answer the research questions. The findings revealed that teachers’ assessment literacy was linked to their professional identity. Moreover, assessment literacy and professional identity had fruitful effects on learner autonomy. The findings made it certain that teachers believed in learners’ abilities however they didn’t know how to cultivate autonomous learners.
The relationship between graded and tested achievement: Do gender and proficiency level make a difference? Majid Nowruzi, M. Amerian, H. Yazdani, A. Mohammadi Applied Research on English Language, 2020 Grades represent one of the most common sources of evidence of student achievement in classrooms, though their relationship with test scores has remained understudied, particularly in settings such as in Iran, where English is taught as a foreign language. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between graded and tested achievement with respect to gender and proficiency level differences. Teacher-assigned grades and standardized achievement test scores of 693 Iranian learners of English taught by 15 teachers were examined. Primary analyses focused on the validity of teacher grades and the subsequent Pearson correlation coefficients revealed that grades associated positively with externally-validated test scores obtained from reliable tests, an indication of the validity of teacher grading. Additionally, the results of independent-samples t-tests showed that female students outperformed male students on achievement tests, but with fluctuations across proficiency levels. Higher proficiency levels gave male participants an advantage over female participants in achievement tests. Moreover, male teachers were found to grade female participants more accurately than their female counterparts. Implications are discussed for informing teachers about the validation of their grading practices, as well as for teacher education programs and teachers’ professional development.
Examining the relationship between EFL university students’ goal orientations and self-regulation in writing Husain Abdulhay, Moussa Ahmadian, Hooshang Yazdani, Majid Amerian Journal of Asia Tefl, 2020 The recent trend in foreign language education research is turning toward self-regulated learning and its linkage with goal orientations. Self-regulated learning is the learning propelled by self-induced thoughts, feelings, strategies, and behaviors toward goal attainment (Schunk & Zimmerman, 1998). Goal orientations attempt to identify personal and contextual reasons lying behind an action (Wolters, 2004). This study sought to examine the relationship between goal orientations (mastery-approach, mastery-avoidance, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance goals) and writing self-regulation of Iranian university EFL learners. Survey instrument, designed by Lichtinger, Kaplan, and Gorodetsky (2006), was administered to a sample of 116 sophomore students, attending essay writing courses. Pearson product-moment correlation and regression technique were used for data analysis. The strongest correlation was found between personal performance-approach and performance-avoidance goals. Personal mastery and performance goals and mastery goal structure were associated significantly and positively with self-regulation in writing. Efficacy was significantly related to goal orientation measures. Goal orientations contributed to the prediction of self-regulation in writing. Moreover, performance-approach goal structure was only found to predict positively the writing achievement. Overall, the findings imply that understanding the nature of goal orientations enables writing self-regulation and achievement to be aligned.
EFL learners' Use of L1 in L2 collaborative reading tasks and their attitudes towards it Pertanika Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, 2020
