The metaphors used by teachers to explain the nature of student learning and student difficulty can reveal a great deal about how teachers conceive the teaching and learning process. This is an important area of research as it can shed light on how they see their role in the learning process and how they should intervene to assist students in…

The student body is becoming increasingly diverse in terms of language, nationality and cultural background. This study explores ways in which such linguistic diversity can be harnessed in the language classroom to enhance the language learning process. This paper describes a series of activities which were designed and implemented in four higher…