This study investigated the predictions of two approaches to second language acquisition. According to the usage-based approach, learner knowledge results from the strengths and weaknesses of input-driven statistical learning. According to the learner-varieties approach, pragmatic communication principles and language-internal constraints play…

Regarding the English language skills, speaking seems to be the most crucial skill in terms of communication or interaction in daily lives (Ur, 1996). This present study aimed to investigate factors enhancing English speaking ability, also the most influential factor affecting speaking ability. The participants were 5 high school students who had…

The purpose of the present study was to compare the effects of input flooding and input elaboration on the learning of non-congruent collocations by Iranian English as a foreign language (EFL) learners. The participants of the study included 60 EFL learners at the intermediate level of language proficiency who were divided into two equal groups.…

For many preschoolers in Turkish kindergartens, English instruction starts in the third year of their lives when they have barely begun to articulate their thoughts in their own mother tongue, Turkish. Parents have a dual role as models and decision makers in their children's foreign language education. As the fifteen participant parents of this…

Implementing a play-based curriculum presents challenges for pre-service and in-service teachers given the current climate of standards and didactic pedagogies. This study highlights the value of playful learning and its rightful place in early childhood classrooms for children of all ages. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the…

This study of second language idiom acquisition investigates the interaction of two factors, the L1 effect and the effect of supportive context in the L2 input, when both are available to learners. An experiment consisting of a pretest, a computer-assisted instructional treatment session and a posttest employed three idiom types that differed in…

While there is increasing evidence that learners pick up new words while viewing video with captions (i.e. L2 subtitles), little is known about the role of instructional interventions prior to viewing. This study uses eye-movement registration to investigate the effect of pre-learning vocabulary before watching a captioned video. Thirty…

Because a large number of Chinese characters are commonly used in both Japanese and Chinese, Chinese-speaking learners of Japanese as a second language (JSL) find it more challenging to learn Japanese functional expressions than to learn other Japanese vocabulary. To address this challenge, we have developed "Jastudy," a…

The need for integrating collocations into English language syllabuses in order to enhance EFL/ESL learners' language accuracy and fluency has been emphasized by a great number of researchers and scholars. Given this, finding viable collocation teaching methods has become the focal center of some specialists' interest. This has led into the…

Discourse markers (DMs) are significant for fluent speech. Furthermore, they are essential elements of language for conversation organisation, reciprocal relation of interlocutors, productive speaking and comprehension. Although they have critical functions for pragmatic development, they are neglected in language teaching either because of the…

Although millions of EFL learners benefit from watching subtitled/captioned movies and TV shows in non-instructional settings, one almost untouched area is the development of strategies in benefiting from film scripts and their translated versions as well as audio language-subtitle combinations. This paper reports research subsequent to the…

This study investigates English language anxiety and stress among Saudi students in the First Year in College of Sciences and Arts in Dharan Aljanoub who study an English intensive course. It demonstrates the major causes of language anxiety and stress in English class. The study is based on descriptive analytical approach. The researchers used a…

We tested four predictions based on the assumption that optional infinitives can be attributed to properties of the input whereby children inappropriately extract non-finite subject-verb sequences (e.g. "the girl run") from larger input utterances (e.g. "Does the girl run?" "Let's watch the girl run"). Thirty children…

This quasi-experimental study examined an eighteen-month professional development project focused on improving instructional practices for emerging bilingual and multilingual English learners (ELs). The study is grounded in sociocultural and interactive learning theories related to teaching ELs. Professional development activities included seven…

Studies into the use of Twitter for language learning have mostly been small-scale evaluations undertaken by teachers researching the effectiveness of their own initiatives to use it with their students. To date, there has not been a large quantitative study of how language learners use Twitter autonomously. This paper reports on a large-scale…