This study investigates the problems of EFL/ESL university students' unwillingness to speak and take part in class discussions. Saudi students find it inappropriate to speak in class because of their fear to be seen as verbally challenging their teachers' views openly and publicly. Even when they do, they speak a little. This leads to frustration…

Teaching English at the primary school level is a challenge in countries such as Colombia where children study this language for only one hour a week in most institutions, and in the best of cases for 3 hours a week. Most of the public schools do not have enough and/or adequate English materials at their disposal for students to work with;…

The construct of anxiety has been captivating the interest of SLA [second-language acquisition] researchers for a long time. Numerous observations show that most individuals experience anxiety when learning a foreign language (FL) and using it, both in classroom and real-life contexts, though to a different extent. An analysis of studies conducted…

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of two task types on foreign language written production. Particularly it addressed the issue of how three aspects of language production (i.e. fluency, complexity, and accuracy) vary among two different task types (i.e. argumentative writing task and instruction writing task). One hundred sixty…

World language educators face many challenges progressing into the 21st century. This research describes the practices of world language educators and presents a rich description of what constitutes an engaging 21st century world language classroom. The use of the target language as a crucial component in the world language classroom as well as…

This paper presents APPRAISALWeb, a 2-year Research & Development project jointly funded by the "Universidad Politecnica de Valencia" and the regional government of Valencia (Spain), and developed by the CAMILLE Research Group at that university. In general terms, the project aims to suggest a comprehensive methodology for the…

Researches in language anxiety have focused on the level of language anxiety so far. This study instead, hypothesizes that the interpretation of anxiety and the recognition of failure have an impact on learning and investigates how language anxiety and intrinsic motivation affect the use of learning strategies through the recognition of failure.…

The present research aimed at four points: First, Identifying the most appropriate standards of EFL Saudi teachers' performance in the light of quality standards. Second, designing an objective and comprehensive evaluation rubric based on quality standards to evaluate EFL Saudi intermediate teachers' performance. Third, determining to what extent…

This versatile handbook is for middle school and high school educators who need to differentiate literacy instruction for adolescent ELL students at various stages of literacy competency. Adapted from the highly successful "Differentiated Literacy Strategies for Student Growth & Achievement in Grades 7-12", the authors use brain-based strategies…

Purpose: This study was conducted to determine if phonological production proficiency in bilingual Spanish-English preschoolers could be predicted by their language environment, language ability, and phonological production proficiency in their other language. Method: Participants were 199 Latino children and their families. Children ranged in age…

In the field of secondary-level English as a Second Language (ESL), the ESL teacher (ESLT) works together with the Content-area teacher (CAT), building-level administrator and ESL coordinator to meet the learning needs of English Language Learners (ELLs). This ESL network depends on the collegial relationships of those comprising it. With this in…

This study investigated the perception of Canadian French word-final vowels by English-dominant and French-dominant bilinguals living in Montreal. In a modified identification task, listeners selected the response that rhymed with the target word, embedded in a carrier sentence. Minimal sets of real and nonsense target words were used, contrasting…

This dissertation investigated 1) American L2 learners' perceptual ability to accurately identify Japanese pitch accent, and 2) learners' realization of Japanese pitch accent. This study was conducted to determine whether these abilities could be improved through training. Study 1 tested the ability to identify the accent location (pitch fall)…

In the highest of need for a transformative new pedagogy with adolescent English Language Learners, I designed and conducted this qualitative case study to answer the questions on the in-depth meaning of innovative teaching practices in new times. Grounded in the sociocultural perspectives, and in accordance with the qualitative case study…

Past research has uncovered ways to improve communicative competence, including task-based learner-learner interaction (e.g., R. Ellis, 2003) and task planning (e.g., Mochizuki and Ortega, 2008). Teacher-guided planning particularly increases the benefits of learner-learner interaction (Foster and Skehan, 1999). One component of communicative…