Purpose: Understanding what is known about the language profiles of children with hearing loss (CHL) is vital so that researchers and teachers can identify the specific complex syntactic structures that CHL may struggle to master. An understanding of which aspects of complex syntax pose difficulties for CHL is necessary to inform the kind of…

Writing comprehensibly, dynamically, and persuasively in a foreign language is a significant challenge for learners. Written communication assesses language and writing progress for various summative and developmental goals. Scenario-based assessment (SBA), as one of the methodologies of classroom-based assessment (CBA), aims to elicit both…

This study investigated EFL classroom talk using Halliday and Matthiessen's (2013) meta-functions framework. Four female participants, including two experienced and two inexperienced teachers, taught similar grammar subjects to their intact classes. Classes were video-recorded and transcribed by the researchers. The meta-functions included topical…

Inasmuch as the fact that writing is a cognitively demanding task and as a step toward overcoming some of the barriers English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners face during writing performance, this study attempted to investigate Iranian EFL learners' perceptions toward the most common writing difficulties. To this end, 120 Iranian EFL learners…

Research on corrective feedback (CF) and language teachers' beliefs and practices on the provision of CF has been mainly limited to learners' non-target-like use of grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and spelling (non-formulaic forms). Consequently, learners' non-target-like use of formulaic sequences, that is, collocations, idioms, lexical…

This study aimed at bringing together the notions of language play and focus on form (FonF) through a cross-sectional investigation of playful language-related episodes (PLREs). PLREs, as a remarkably under-explored aspect of second language (L2) learners' focus on form, peer interaction and language play, were analyzed in an Iranian EFL context…

Although researchers in the area of second language acquisition agree on the effectiveness of form-focused instruction, there is little consensus on the appropriate time to direct learners' attention to linguistic items, that is, whether before or after the error occurrence [Nassaji, H. 2010, "The Occurrence and Effectiveness of Spontaneous…

With the increasing attempts to use gender-fair language, different studies have investigated this issue from different viewpoints. To find an epicene pronoun used as a third-person singular, some research has been conducted investigating them in various contexts, yet few studies have focused on cultural differences. Since how to use language…

The study reported in this article examined the impact of task type on the ways in which learners resolve grammatical language-related episodes (LREs) and whether the level of engagement affects subsequent language development. Data were collected over a six-week period. Thirty-two Iranian second language (L2) learners were paired up to complete a…

The present study aimed to examine and validate a rubric for translation quality assessment using Rasch analysis. To this end, the researchers interviewed 20 expert translation instructors to identify the factors they consider important for assessing the quality of students' translation. Based on the specific commonalities found throughout the…

The ability to comprehend and use metaphors in L2 which is referred to as metaphorical competence is an important issue in second language acquisition. Metaphors are so pervasive in our life that we might not realize their presence and simply neglect them even in our first language. Different models of communicative competence have been suggested…

This paper seeks to elaborate on the notion of "grammatical metaphor" intended by M. A. K. Halliday (1983) in his Functional Systemic Linguistics (FSL). "Metaphor" in linguistic parlance is "a process of mapping between two different conceptual domains--the source domain and the target domain". Halliday draws on this…

Since modal auxiliary verbs have been proved to be one of the most troublesome grammatical structures in English, the researchers of this study decided to do an analysis on the ways in which advanced EFL Iranian students use modal auxiliaries focusing specially on nine modals' semantic functions. Consequently, was conducted based on the following…

The aim of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of how prepositions are used. One of the grammatical features of contrastive analysis is preposition. In English there are more prepositions than in Persian. The contrastive analysis of this paper is focused on two English prepositions: "of" and "from." These…

Language play and its effects on second language learning have been addressed by many scholars in recent years with instances of language play being identified both inside and outside the classroom. However, only a few have integrated language play with classroom tasks, and they just sufficed to the qualitative analyses of the learners'…