The current study was conducted to investigate the effect of task-based and topic-based speaking activities on improving the speaking ability among Iranian EFL learners. The study used quasi-experimental design. The subjects consisted of 60 male and female students who were selected from among 90 EFL learners by applying the nelson proficiency…

The purpose of this study was to examine if a relationship existed between metacognitive instruction and students' growth rate for fluency, accuracy, self-correction rates, and comprehension in reading. The research question that guided this study was: To what extent is there a relationship between metacognitive instruction using Reciprocal…

This report offers seven practical evidence-based recommendations--that are relevant to all pupils, but particularly to those struggling with their literacy. To develop the recommendations we reviewed the best available international research and consulted experts to arrive at key principles for effective literacy teaching. This report is part of…

The English language day by day is becoming ever increasingly important in the world. Music in foreign language education can be seen as a helpful method that spontaneously livens the learning atmosphere. In this paper, we are arguing for (the use of) songs that stir and inspire "social change" and that are an "authentic" part…

One concern about teaching online or in large, lecturestyle classes is the inability to see students' reactions to course material. These visual cues give instructors feedback on student comprehension, material clarity, and effective delivery modes. Instructors have to see the results of student assignments and exams or end-of-semester evaluations…

The increased use of videos in mathematics courses means that direct instruction, traditionally part of class lectures, now often occurs outside of the classroom. Although students come to class with some baseline level of understanding, instructors lose opportunities to assess students' understanding of content as it is seen for the first time.…

An essential element in teaching children to effectively comprehend text is the use of teacher-led think-alouds. The overarching objective of this study was to explore how to better prepare early career teachers to conduct think-alouds in their classrooms. Data from 31 teachers consisted of (1) questionnaires, (2) lesson plans, (3) lesson…

This study was conducted to explore teacher candidates' reactions and perceptions regarding their participation in inquiry circles and to discover how the experience influenced their comprehension of an informational text. The 98 teacher candidates involved in this study were enrolled in a children's literature course at a four-year university.…

Medical students often face problems in using and understanding metaphors when communicating with a patient or reading a scientific paper. These figures of speech constitute an interpretative problem and students need key strategies to facilitate metaphor comprehension and disambiguation of meaning. This article examines how medical students'…

This quasi-experimental study examined the effects of a strategy for making text-dependent inferences--with and without embedded self-regulation skills--on the reading comprehension of 24 middle-grade students with disabilities. Classes were randomly assigned to receive the inference intervention only (IO), inference + individual goal setting…

In this digital literacy project, struggling high school readers remixed the "Star Wars" canon through audio storytelling. The "Star Wars" phenomenon motivates adolescents who may be disengaged in the classroom. Students served as actors, Foley artists, and directors in the recording of brief episodes based on the original…

Previous research shows that presenting class material in story formats can improve student learning in lecture classes. This pilot study of eight sociology classes investigates the efficacy of using storytelling as a means to improve student comprehension in online classes. Our findings show that when material is presented in story format rather…

The present study demonstrated that students with mild intellectual disabilities are capable of constructing meaning from written text by guided social interaction. Participants were 40 adolescents in special schools divided into two intervention conditions: reciprocal teaching (RT) and inference teaching (IT). In RT the students practiced four…

This article reports the results of an experimental study on the relative effectiveness of the Paideia Seminar in improving the comprehension of poetry and decreasing reading anxiety. The participants (n = 50) were English as a foreign language (EFL) ninth grade learners enrolled in classrooms at a public school in Lebanon. The study employed a…

The present study tried to investigate one of the options for improving self-directed learning in Iranian EFL learners, i.e., contemplative L2 instruction with a flavor of transformative instruction. Accordingly, it adopted a quasi-experimental design to investigate the influential effects that contemplative teaching would exert on Iranian EFL…