The practice of the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) has been known to be troublesome to teachers. (Webb & Tierney, 2020). The authors argue that a mentoring approach based on threshold concepts in SoTL has the potential to lead to more confident conceptual border crossing by new entrants to the SoTL of English communication. A…

The developing structure of Omani higher education sector depends upon a culturally diverse group of international academics who outnumber their Omani colleagues. This creates a unique group composition that is inconsistent with the largely Omanising workplace context. Drawing on data gathered from a case study, this paper explores the reasons and…

To examine the utility of spoken dialog systems (SDSs) for learning and low-stakes assessment, we administered the same role-play task in two different modalities to a group of 47 tertiary-level learners of English. Each participant completed the task in an SDS setting with a fully automated agent and engaged in the same task with a human…

The overarching objective of the World Language Professional Life Survey (WLPLS) was to determine the K-20 World Language (WL) profession's familiarity with both the "World Readiness Standards for Learning Languages" (5 Cs) and with the Can-Do Statements (Can-Dos). The survey strove to identify how both sets of principles might…

This research is about the underlying process language learners rely on to be able to engage effectively in unscripted conversations without premeditation, or "improvisation." To engage in improvisation in another language, one needs to recognize those elements of the evolving cultural context that are significant at the moment. By…

Given the significant global influence of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Teaching, Learning, and Assessment (CEFR) on English language education, this study deals with aligning a university's academic reading tests to the CEFR. It aimed at validating the test construct of the academic reading tests in relation to the…

This paper contributes to the growing scholarship on internationalization of higher education, particularly in non-Western contexts. Literature in non-Western contexts highlights tensions around adopting approaches seen as 'global standard' where these reflect inequalities of power and prestige, shaped by coloniality. Drawing on conclusions from a…

The prominent increase in English medium instruction (EMI) in higher education has triggered the need for investigating EMI in practice in various contexts. Studies focusing on linguistic attitudes of EMI practitioners and learners are beginning to emerge but there are few studies exploring language-related issues in EMI practice. In response to…

The past two decades have witnessed growing interest in Higher Education (HE) achievement standards. Globally, the English Language Teaching (ELT) sector provides students with Direct Entry (DE) English language program (ELP) pathways to university study. It has typically relied on commercially available English language tests to ensure…

This article reports a study about how the discourse of standard English exercises disciplinary power in five international scholarships programs. This research interest arises from problematizing the discourse of standard English present in the requisite of proficiency certification through so-called valid tests. Adapting Fairclough's critical…

Under the background of new liberal arts, the era of "great foreign languages" requires college English teaching in local applied colleges and universities to break through the barriers of result-centred traditional teaching and bravely shoulder the important task of "moral and political education". In order to guide teachers…

This regional dossier aims to provide a concise, description and basic statistics about minority language education in a specific region of Europe. Latgalian is a Baltic regional language originating in the region of Latgale (Latgalian: Latgola) in Eastern Latvia. It is mostly spoken in Latgale, but also in families and small communities of people…

International education constitutes a key industry in Australia and international students represent a third of university students at Australian universities. This paper examines the media representation of international students in terms of their English language proficiency. The study applies Critical Discourse Analysis to the multimodal data…

The inclusion of intercultural communication and intercultural competence in English language education in Chinese Higher Education is now firmly established in the 'National Standards' (2020). In a post-project reflection, we explore the opportunities and challenges in co-constructing an interpretive (non-essentialist) approach to…

Despite the increasing number of U.S. born Latinos, placing heritage and native speakers in the Spanish curriculum is still a challenge (MacGregor-Mendoza & Moreno, 2020). The present article: (1) addresses the unique needs of heritage speakers in the Spanish curriculum; (2) problematizes traditional grammar-based placement exams; and (3)…