There has been a consensus in research and practices that social and cultural aspects of lives contribute to literacy development, particularly in second language learning. The conception of literacy has been shifting from the lens of formal literacy learning in school settings into broader opportunities in sociocultural contexts, and some may…

This article examines current research on the role and importance of lower-level processes in second language (L2) reading. The focus is on word recognition and its subcomponent processes, including various phonological and orthographic processes. Issues related to syntactic and semantic processes and their relationship with word recognition are…

Since Language Learning Strategies (LLSs) have the potential to be "an extremely powerful learning tool" (O'Malley, Chamot, Stewner-Manzanares, Russo & Kupper, 1985a, p.43), the use of LLSs helps the learners retrieve and store material, and facilitate their learning (Grander & Maclntyre, 1992), they are sensitive to the learning context and to…

This study investigated the link between phoneme and onset-rime awareness and reading outcomes in children learning to read in a second language (L2). Closely matched phoneme and onset-rime awareness tasks were administered in English and French in the spring of kindergarten to English-dominant children in French immersion programmes (n=98).…

SRI International's EduSpeak[R] system is a software development toolkit that enables developers of interactive language education software to use state-of-the-art speech recognition and pronunciation scoring technology. Automatic pronunciation scoring allows the computer to provide feedback on the overall quality of pronunciation and to point to…

This study was aimed at investigating the effect of the direct instruction model on intermediate class achievement and attitudes toward English grammar. It was an experimental study and the purpose was to explore the relative effectiveness of instructional methodology (independent variable) on students' achievement and attitude (dependent…

A study investigated the usefulness of dictation for measuring communicative competence and oral proficiency in English as a second language. Two methods of scoring dictation were used: a scale of communicative effectiveness, and the traditional error count. (MSE)

This article investigates the relation between home computer use and performance in English at school. The sample consists of 656 tenth-class students (age 15-16) in upper-secondary schools in Bergen, Norway. Data collection took place in the spring of 2002 and was administrated by the county education office. After correcting for gender, subject…

This study investigated factors affecting second/foreign language (L2) reading comprehension in a hypermedia environment within the theoretical framework of dual coding and cognitive load theories, and interactive models of L2 reading. The independent variables were reading ability, topic interest, prior topical knowledge, and the number of times…