previous studies have aimed at testing a hypothesis but the present study is data-first research in which researcher tries to form a theory from data rather than the use of data to test a hypothesis. this study aims at exploring teachers perceptions of the strengths and weaknesses of the current syllabus for college preparatory course. eight experienced teachers were selected to collect data du...

1.0 overview it seems that grammar plays a crucial role in the area of second and foreign language learning and widely has been acknowledged in grammar research. in other words, teaching grammar is an issue which has attracted much attention to itself, and a lot of teachers argue about the existence of grammar in language teaching and learning. this issue will remind us a famous sentence f...

nowadays enhancing critical thinking in learners is considered one of the foreign language teachers’ tasks due to its high position in foreign language classrooms. when it comes to selecting materials for language classrooms, there are obviously some criteria that teachers should apply. the present study aimed at a critical thinking based analysis of ten picture story books and ten folktales th...

abstract following innovations in the field of elt, a new topic which has recently attracted a lot of attention is metaphor analysis. although this area of research is still in its infancy in elt, it seems that the idea can shed more light on the puzzle of english language learning and teaching. therefore, the major aim of this study is to analyze language learning and teaching in formal a...

the debate whether esp teachers need to have knowledge of the specialized field they are teaching has been an issue in the literature over the last two decades. the aim of conducting this study was to explore iranian learners’ and instructors’ beliefs and attitudes concerning the role of specialized knowledge in teaching esp classes. a seventeen item questionnaire was administered to 400 esp le...

abstract the present study was conducted to examine the effect of proficiency on students interaction while carrying out the grammar-based task(s) in collaboration. in particular, the study examines whether the level of proficiency affects the learners’ focus of attention to grammatical and lexical features. the study takes a further step and examines whether there is any difference in the use...

as the canon is shaped by white male standards rewriting the canonical works of literature is one of the ways through which postcolonial writers subvert the authority of the masters. writing in the language of the masters the colonized writers use the very suppressive tool in the hands of the masters i.e. their language to question the validity of their norms. regarded by most critics to be the...

abstract tasks nowadays are at the center of attention in sla research. task types is one of the critical issues in this regard, their effectiveness and suitability to any particular context, their characteristics and the result they yield are among some of these issues. on the other hand, discourse markers (dms) have been very much investigated and their effectiveness in conveying the meaning...

testing plays a vital role in any language teaching program. it allows teachers and stakeholders, including program administrators, parents, admissions officers and prospective employers to be assured that the learners are progressing according to an accepted standard (douglas, 2010). the problems currently facing language testers have both practical and theoretical implications but the first i...

learning a second or foreign language requires the manipulation of four main skills, namely, listening, reading, speaking, and writing which lead to effective communication. it is obvious that vocabulary is an indispensible part of any communication, so without a vocabulary, no meaningful communication can take place and meaningful communication relies heavily on vocabulary. one fundamental fac...