The purpose of this study was to explore the reasons for low retention rates among students in the Chinese classes in upper secondary education in the Czech Republic. The principal research question was whether Chinese characters were the main reason why many students decided to stop attending their Chinese classes. Semi-structured interviews with…

Verbal Fluency (VF) task total scores are widely used in language attrition studies, but they do not provide insight into the processes underlying optimal performance. We analyse the efficacy of clustering (subcategories within a category) and switching (shifting between these subcategories) strategies in phonemic (PVF) and semantic (SVF) tasks.…

The idea that reading model essays facilitates better writing is generally accepted in second language writing literature. As such, anthologies of model essays are often selected for inclusion in writing centre self-access library shelves. When selecting these texts, readability is often considered via the application of quantitative readability…

Despite an increasing number of studies that explore language learning beyond the classroom (LBC), research examining LBC activities in relation to in-class learning is very limited. This paper investigates what kinds of LBC activities university students of Chinese and Japanese in Australia engage in and how they connect these activities to…

The first years of teaching are often described as 'emotionally challenging' by English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers in secondary schools in France because their professional identity and skills are still under construction. How, then, can novice teachers (NTs) be supported during this process? The present study focuses on 14 NTs…

The paper discusses the findings regarding future possible selves based on research with Russian-speaking migrant pupils in English state-funded primary schools at Key Stage 2 (7-11 years old). Its aim is to explain the nature and characteristics of ideal selves of primary-level migrant children. The methodology comprises a qualitative…

This qualitative study explored the perceptions of EFL students at a Chinese university regarding collocation learning. The participating students were provided with a collocation instruction and practice component over ten weeks within a regular one-semester EFL course. The participants were 15 Chinese first-year non-English major students. The…

In a context in which opportunities for oral interaction are limited (English as a foreign language courses at a Saudi tertiary institution), we carried out an action research project evaluating the introduction of computer-mediated spoken language tasks with a group of intermediate learners. Although the students were confronted with multiple…

The continued spread of Western ideology, English as a lingua franca, and the myth of the native speaker all play a role in the racialisation of language teaching (Phillipson, R. 1992. "Linguistic Imperialism." Oxford: Oxford University Press; Ramjattan, V. A. 2019. Raciolinguistics and the aesthetic labourer. "Journal of Industrial…

With the rapid implementation of early foreign language programmes in the state of North-Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, first for Grade 3 (ages 8-9 years) in 2003 and then from Grade 1 (ages 6-7 years) in 2008, primary school teachers had to adapt to teaching a foreign language in Grade 1 quickly. Teachers had little experience with language teaching…

The COVID-19 pandemic has precipitated a global shift to a 'new normal' of online and hybrid learning, significantly affecting language education. This study investigates the impact of emergency remote teaching on language learners' anxiety, examining their preferences for teaching modes and the reasons behind them. Diverging from prior research…

This study attempts to synthesise the scholarship on second language (L2) motivation and systematically examines the theoretical approaches, methods, research instruments, and learning contexts found in recent research published between 2010 and 2019. Following a comprehensive survey of six influential, high-impact journals in the field, 100…

Given the significant role vocabulary plays in second language acquisition, how to help learners acquire vocabulary has always been a concern for educators. Despite the general consensus that beliefs influence learners' behaviour, limited research effort has been devoted to the exploration of English as a second language (ESL) learners' beliefs…

Today, higher education (HE) faces new challenges, such as incorporating consideration of diversity and inclusion into its operations. Such challenges, many of which are part of strategic institutional plans, offer teachers an opportunity to introduce new practices in the classroom. In this paper, we look at introducing language students to the…

Text classification and text gradation are important for language teachers. Profiling and readability studies examine textual and linguistic features that determine text difficulty. Arabic, as an under-resourced language, suffers from a lack of such studies which results in material developers and textbook writers relying on their intuitions and…