This study aimed to examine the relationships between English as a foreign language (EFL) students' language mindsets (i.e. entity and incremental beliefs about general language intelligence, second language aptitude, and age sensitivity in language learning) and graded performance by considering the mediating roles of their perceived…

Teachers' conceptions of assessment are a significant indicator of teacher assessment literacy. This study contextualized pre-service teachers' conceptions of assessment in Chinese second language education. An exploratory factor analysis generated eight first-order factors and the following confirmatory factor analysis found a hierarchical model,…

Research on pre-task planning to date has mainly focused on task performance. However, the effects of planning are contingent on what learners actually do during planning time. One important factor that may determine the quality and usefulness of planning is whether it is done in the first language (L1) or the second language (L2). This research…

The current assessment in language classrooms prevailingly utilizes the criteria provided by instructors, regarding learners as passive recipients of assessment. The current study drew upon sustainable assessment and the community of practice to highlight the importance of involving learners in co-constructing the assessment criteria and argued…

The present article argues for a conceptual distinction between corrective feedback and mediation that emphasizes the status of the latter not as an instructional practice but as a defining feature of human psychology (Vygotsky, 1987) that has direct implications for how instruction might be approached. Specifically, Sociocultural Theory (SCT)…

Although most second language learning studies involve high-educated participants, addressing low-educated participants seems important as research suggests that education background impacts second language (L2) learning efficiency. A controversial point in the L2 learning literature is the role of corrective feedback (CF). Research on CF in…

This article examines how four second language (L2) teachers' discursive practices changed as they attempted to implement dynamic assessment (DA) in their classrooms. Classroom artifacts, lesson recordings, and reflections from two pre-service teachers and two in-service teachers, both before and after a professional development series on DA, were…

Recent research has shown that beat gestures (hand gestures that co-occur with speech in spontaneous discourse) are temporally integrated with prosodic prominence and that they help word memorization and discourse comprehension. However, little is known about the potential beneficial effects of beat gestures in second language (L2) pronunciation…

In this article I outline how and why I have established a self-assessment system for class participation scores in an English-speaking skills course at a Japanese university. I explain how my experience with one particular student, who personally admitted to having abused the system, led me to realize that elements from Yin and Yang have been…

Dynamic Assessment (DA) derives from Vygotsky's (1987) insight that the use of mediation, attuned to learner needs, enables learners to perform beyond their current level of functioning, thereby providing insights into emerging capabilities. The instructional quality of mediation means that this process simultaneously creates possibilities for…

This article reports the efforts of an elementary school teacher of Spanish as a second language to implement principles of dynamic assessment (DA) in her daily interactions with learners. DA is neither an assessment instrument nor a method of assessing but a framework for conceptualizing teaching and assessment as an integrated activity of…

This article reports on findings from a research project designed to assess undergraduate and graduate students' language-learning needs in the context of a new academic language support center at a Canadian university. A total of 432 students of English as an additional language and 93 instructors responded to the questionnaires, which asked them…

This paper reports on a study that investigated students' learning to self-assess oral performance in English by comparing student assessment with teacher assessment. Twenty-eight Chinese students at a university in southern Taiwan participated in the study. The assessment program involved training, observation, evaluation, discussion, feedback,…

The focus of this paper is on the implementation of Dynamic Assessment (henceforth, DA) in the L2 classroom setting. DA is an approach to assessment and instruction derived from Vygotsky's theory of the Zone of Proximal Development (henceforth, ZPD). In what follows, we will first discuss briefly the concept of the ZPD and its realization in DA…

If it is to be argued that self-access language learning centres (SACs) provide an efficient and effective alternative or complement to more traditionally accepted modes of language learning and teaching, it remains a serious concern that there is no research-based framework specifically developed for their evaluation. It is within the context of…