Existing initiatives purporting to promote teacher research are often found to be inadequate to encourage EFL teachers to engage in research due to the fact that they impose a top down, expert model approach to research engagement. This study reports on a pioneering programme at Sultan Qaboos University Language Centre in the Sultanate of Oman…

This research investigates non-native English teachers' engagement with the native speaker model, i.e. whether they agree/disagree with measuring English teaching and learning performance against native speaker standards. More importantly, it aims to unearth the impact of teacher education on teachers' attitudes and beliefs about…

This article describes how semi-communicative bilingual drills were implemented in a four-month course in pedagogical English for a group of ten Polish adult learners. When the course was over, the learners were asked to evaluate the procedure by filling in a questionnaire. The learners expressed overwhelming approval for bilingual drills in terms…

Developing English for communicative purposes is a key objective of language classes in many parts of the world. As a logical prerequisite to communication practice, learners need to have Willingness to Communicate (WTC) before they will engage in L2 interaction (Macintyre et al., 1998). Teachers can play an important role in helping learners to…

This study investigates the perceptions of stakeholders on the impact of a high-stakes assessment of English language teachers' proficiency--the minimum language standards Language Proficiency Assessment for Teachers (English) [LPATE], which was introduced in 2000. Given that the test has now been in place for 17 years, the study investigates the…

The transformation of higher education has been a pressing concern for policy makers and practitioners. This article provides examples of the transformative potential of assessments designed within the framework of a multi-literacies and heteroglossic pedagogy in an Applied English Language course at a South African university. These assessments,…

The field of English Language Teaching (ELT) has long sought to identify traits of good language learners, in an effort to teach these traits to less successful language learners (Rubin, 1975). Emotional Intelligence has recently come to the forefront of research on language learning and teaching, and is now increasingly recognized as an important…

Writing is one of the most challenging skills for many EFL learners to master. It is also considered to be the most difficult to teach. To motivate students to write more without burdening teachers with additional rating work, college English teachers at a university in China introduced a journal project. Peer learners were paired anonymously and…

Secondary schools in Australia have long benefited from state policies aiming to increase the academic success of English language learners (ELLs). Complementary pre-service and in-service teacher education programmes have been implemented to raise the expertise of subject teachers who teach ELL students. However, subject teachers may not be…