The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of two types of corrective feedback on EFL learners' writing skill. Thirty five advanced learners in three groups participated in this study. Structures of written texts were taught in all three classes during fourteen sessions of treatment; and each session, a related topic was given and the…

Globalisation and international mobility in the 21st century has led to the internationalisation of the English language (Crystal, 2003). Research regarding linguistic gains at university levels is however extremely scarce. This study aims to address this gap of knowledge and provide some answers as to how much linguistic gain can be expected…

This article argues that the instructional scaffolding metaphor may be reconceived as distributed scaffolding when multiple means of influence are provided in a service-learning setting. In the service-learning course described here, the professor's role is largely as designer of activity settings for preservice teacher candidates, through…

Computer aided assessment systems enable the collection of exact time and date information on students' activity on a course. These activity patterns reflect students' study habits and these study habits further predict students' likelihood to pass or fail a course. By identifying such patterns, those who design the courses can enforce positive…

This study presents strategies for teaching highland Afro-Ecuadorian culture and for broaching the topic of race and racism through the documentary film "Más allá del fútbol." Produced in 2008 by the author, this film explores "afrochoteño" identity and culture as well as the issues of race and racism in Ecuador through a…

This article isolates and observes the impact of peer readership on low-stakes reflective writing assignments in two large Introduction to Sociology classes. Through a comparative content analysis of over 2,000 private reflective journal entries and semipublic reflective blog posts, I find that both practices produce distinct forms of reflection.…

This study aimed to investigate problems facing Palestinian Arab students from Israel who are majoring in teaching English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in developing well-written paragraphs in English. They usually transfer the stylistic features of their first language, Arabic to the target language, English. For example, they tend to write long…

As a teacher of struggling and resistant readers in high school, I searched for instructional practices that provided relevance, motivation, and engagement for my students as well as presented opportunities to become more aware of their challenges and priorities outside of school. Technology needed to be a part of the project to allow students…

This paper showcases how one teacher preparation program embedded action research within the Response to Intervention (RtI) model. This integration helped preservice teachers gain a deeper knowledge of RtI key concepts and pedagogical decision making for meeting diverse students' needs. Examples from a course assignment are provided to demonstrate…

The author of this article questions what has been gained from Berrett's exploration of the connections between competency development and individual required courses. She concludes from this analysis that students' competency development is a responsibility that cuts across many courses and many levels of expected student proficiency. To put it…

Computer technology and the Internet now make plagiarism an easier enterprise. As a result, faculty must be more diligent in their efforts to mitigate the practice of academic integrity, and institutions of higher education must provide the leadership and support to ensure the context for it. This study explored the use of a plagiarism detection…

When faculty study samples of student work, assignment prompts typically become part of the review. Two experienced learning community faculty from Skagit Valley College examined their students' work with three questions in mind: whether the work was grounded in disciplinary insights; whether the work leveraged disciplinary knowledge to develop…

This study investigated the engagement with writing of reluctant writers in the contexts of home and school. A structured and semi-structured survey method was used to capture responses from 106 reluctant writers in 9 primary schools (age range 6--9 year olds) in the UK. Findings show that although these students were deemed to be reluctant…

We have incorporated an active-learning assignment, Reading Papers Using Key Sentences, in an upper-level Introduction to Chemical Research course. Although key sentences are typically used to help authors write with clarity and organization, we have found that this assignment helps students improve upon and practice reading journal articles for…

The West Virginia Department of Education's auto grading initiative dates back to 2004--a time when school districts were making their first forays into automation. The Charleston based WVDE had instituted a statewide writing assessment in 1984 for students in fourth, seventh, and 10th grades and was looking to expand that program without having…