In an increasingly interconnected world, understanding how language shapes communication culture among students is paramount. This study aimed to investigate the formation of communication culture through language use in various socio-cultural contexts among Kazakh and Kyrgyz university students. The research employed a survey methodology to…

This paper aims to contribute to the growing literature on how prospective foreign language teachers can learn to be successful telecollaborators. We investigate Polish and German TEFL students' perceptions of how they develop the competences, attitudes, and beliefs described by O'Dowd (2015) through experiential learning in a virtual exchange.…

This volume contains selected papers submitted to the 20th Jubilee Annual International Conference of the Bulgarian Comparative Education Society (BCES), conducted virtually in June 2022. The 20th BCES Conference theme is "Towards the Next Epoch of Education." The theme is focused on problems, discussions, changes, solutions, and…

Preparing school administrators to promote effective instruction of English language learners (ELLs) is an important dimension of today's educational leadership programs, requiring innovative program activities. This study explores school leadership candidates' use of an observation tool targeted to ELL instruction that incorporated guided video…

For the forty-third time, the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) is sponsoring the publication of these Proceedings. Papers published in this volume were presented online during the annual AECT Convention. Volume 1 contains 37 papers dealing primarily with research and development topics. Papers dealing with the…

This article reports on an online collaborative project between English language teachers pursuing a degree in TESL/TESOL from three universities in Malaysia--Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). A total of 142 teachers were involved in the study and about three to eight…

The purpose of this study is to highlight the possibilities and challenges that underlie efforts to integrate blogs into teacher-education programs in Taiwan higher education. The participants were 12 pre-service teachers undertaking Master's level study in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. The outcomes of the blogging project were…

Despite nonnative English-speaking teachers' (NNESTs) professional qualifications and increasing contributions to research in TESOL, the native speaker (NS) myth (Phillipson, 1992) continues to undermine these teachers' sense of professional legitimacy and pedagogical efficacy. Thus, due in great part to the notion of an idealized NS teacher of…

Within teacher education programs, the use of discussion forums offers potential for creating learning communities whereby participants can negotiate meaning and engage in knowledge construction (Lock, 2006; Murphy, 2000). To this end, the present article draws on the findings of a larger research project which focused on a discussion forum…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the potential use of Second Life (Linden Labs, 2004) and Skype (Skype Limited, 2009) as simulated virtual professional development tools for pre-service teachers seeking endorsement in teaching English as a Second Official Language (ESOL). Second Life is an avatar-based Internet program that allows…

Teacher leadership is "hard." Many of the reasons are obvious: Teaching is a highly labor-intensive profession to begin with, leaving little downtime for work with other adults. School schedules are notoriously stingy with space for adult collaboration. Teachers are rarely paid to exercise leadership; when they are, they are never paid…

Continuing professional development as it is pursued through the interacting paradigms of reflective practice and action research can be facilitated through the disciplined use of non-judgemental discourse. A framework for such purposeful interaction, "cooperative development", has been established for face-to-face use among TESOL professionals…

Describes the aims of an evolving teaching resources database, TeleTeach, which is part of a computer-based teacher support network called TeleNex. The article discusses how TeleTeach's unique features may contribute toward building an electronic community of reflective teachers, suggesting that teaching materials are potentially complementary to…

Reports on a study of the characteristics of interactions in the computer conferences on "TeleNex", a computer network for the professional development of English as Second Language (ESL) teachers in Hong Kong. A framework of message analysis is described and results of a user questionnaire are discussed. (Author/LRW)

Chapters in this volume include the following: "Innovations in TESOL Teacher Education: A Quiet Revolution" (Karen E. Johnson); "Building Bridges among University, School, and Community" (Donald F. Hones); "Sustainable Strategies for Professional Development in Education Reform" (Nancy Clair, Carolyn Temple Adger); "Developing Professionals:…