In this article we discuss how the design of a higher education language course can challenge the power of sentimentality in the classroom. In particular, the paper analyses the role of literature in intercultural language education through the lens of affect theory, while focusing on minimizing sentimentality in the classroom, especially when the…

This book demonstrates how resources taken from positive psychology can benefit both teachers and learners. Positive psychology is the empirical study of how people thrive and flourish. This book explores a range of topics, such as affectivity and positive emotions, engagement, enjoyment, empathy, positive institutions, a positive L2 self-system,…

This study reviewed the mobile technology-assisted language learning studies published from 2007 to 2016 in selected journals. Several critical issues were investigated, such as research methods, research issues, language and learner types, and learning outcomes. It was found that English as a foreign/second language was the most common target…

This study investigated English teachers' use of learners' L1 (Arabic) in college classrooms in Kuwait. The purpose of the study was three-fold: (1) to describe the functions for which L1 was employed by the teachers, (2) to explore the affective, sociolinguistic, and psycholinguistic factors that may have led teachers to use L1 in L2 teaching,…

Although Reflective Practice is a popular approach to teacher education, there have been some recent criticisms regarding its effectiveness in students learning. Some researchers have put this down to the fact that the concept has not been operationalised, and it is thus impossible to set up empirical studies. The current study was conducted to…

It is generally recognized that students' feelings about learning affect their ability to learn. One of the three strongest influencing factors on second-language learning is classroom anxiety. This paper focuses on student emotional distress in the English as a second language (ESL) classroom, and suggests that one of the primary causes of this…

Charles A. Curran has developed a radically different type of language learning by dealing with the learners as a group rather than as a class. The social learning relationships of a class differ from a group in the contract, the social milieu, in the relationships between the teacher and students, and among the students themselves. Curran called…

A study analyzed electronic-mail requests from college students (n=34 native speakers of English/NSs, 65 non-native speakers/NNSs) to faculty, randomly gathered over the period of a year. The requests were analyzed for the affective response they produced both on the faculty recipient and on a non-recipient faculty member, and for linguistic forms…