abstract in aggregate, active forms of reactive silica with mineral names are sometimes associated with sand and gravel in concrete mixture. alkali hydroxides originated from alkalis in the cement or other resources form an alkaline silica gel with this reactive silica which becomes swallowed and expanded during time causing damage to concrete. there have been growing researches on alkaline r...

the present study investigated construct equivalence of multiple choice (mc) and constructed response (cr) item types across stem and content equivalent mc and cr items (item type ‘a’), non-stem-equivalent but content equivalent mc and cr items (item type ‘b’), and non-stem and non-content equivalent mc and cr items (item type ‘c’). one hundred seventy english-major undergraduates completed mc ...

this study purported to compare and contrast the use of self-mention and evidentials as two mtadiscourse features in opinion columns of persian and english newspapers. the theoretical basis of this study is the idea that metadiscourse features vary across cultural boundaries. for this purpose, 150 persian and 150 english opinion columns were collected based on three factors of topic, audience a...

regarding the ever evolving and improving world on different aspects of knowledge, the need to a worldwide communication would emerge stronger than ever before which calls for special attention on the judgments and best choices for intermediating between the nations. as the language skills for translation are tested separately from translation skills themselves, to assess translation skills pro...

abstract the variables affecting the nature of reading comprehension can be classified into two general categories: reader’s variables, and text variables (alderson, 2000). despite the wave of research on vocabulary knowledge as reader’s variable, the role of this knowledge in c-test as a text-dependent test and its interaction with lexical cohesion of the test as a text feature has remained a...

there are two major theories of measurement in psychometrics: classical test theory (ctt) and item-response theory (irt). despite its widespread and long use, ctt has a number of shortcomings, which make it problematic to be used for practical and theoretical purposes. irt tries to solve these shortcomings, and provide better and more dependable answers. one of the applications of irt is the as...

learning-oriented assessment seeks to emphasise that a fundamental purpose of assessment should be to promote learning. it mirrors formative assessment and assessment for learning processes. it can be defined as actions undertaken by teachers and / or students, which provide feedback for the improvement of teaching and learning. it also contrasts with equally important measurement-focused appro...

abstract the present study was conducted in order to investigate the impact of an integrated model of form-focused and task-based instruction on iranian efl learners vocabulary learning and retention.it also aimed to detect efl learners attitude towards the implementation of form-focused task-based vocabulary instruction in the classroom. in order to address the purposes of this study, a sampl...

abstract this study evaluated and compared medical terminology and english for the students of medicine (ii) as two representatives of the textbooks available on the iranian market for teaching english to the students of medicine. this research was performed on the basis of a teacher’s and a number of students’ attitudes and the students’ needs analysis for two reasons: first, to investigate...

gol-e-gohar iron ore mine of sirjan in southern part of iran is a large open pit that operates below the groundwater table and during mining operation, dewatering is required to prevent operation processes from flooding. current operation is going on by digging wells in or out of the pit and pumping to prevent flooding. as a result of the former dewatering operation a vast deep cone of depressi...