Age is one of the important factors affecting individual differences in second language acquisition. The development of cognitive ability also has certain influence on second language acquisition, depending on whether this influence is positive or negative. This paper discusses the educational significance of the age factor in English teaching…

This academic article provides the essential steps for designing an effective English questionnaire in social science research, with a focus on ensuring clarity, cultural sensitivity and ethical integrity. Developed from key insights from related studies, it outlines potential practice in questionnaire design, item development and the importance…

Online ethnography is a research approach that adapts traditional ethnographic methods for studying communities that exist online. This case study reports on an online ethnography of Webheads in Action (WiA), an online community of English language teachers, founded in 2002. In this online ethnographic research, I examined how the Webheads…

This case study examines the key steps and challenges that were involved in a mixed methods research project relating to Japanese first-year medical students' English academic vocabulary learning. Conducting mixed methods research can be both conceptually and administratively challenging under any circumstances. However, this study was especially…

This paper employs a Critical Cultural Political Economy of Education perspective to examine how, why, and to what effect the English proficiency rankings of a for-profit edu-business acquire the authority often granted to international large-scale assessments. Analysing the EF English Proficiency Index in the context of Ecuador illustrates how…