This paper describes the author's experience with a pilot course of Italian in SL®[superscript 2]. The course is part of a PhD research on "Exploring the potential of virtual worlds to promote Intercultural Awareness in students learning Italian as a Foreign Language." In the paper the author will justify her choice of virtual worlds for…

The present research analyzes instructional strategies used to integrate the learning of content and English as a foreign language in a bilingual physics class at a university in Shanghai, China. It examines how the instructor handles meaning and form of new English science vocabulary in concept-focused physics lectures and the strategies he used…

In this article the author tells the story of her experiences with a high school U.S. literature class composed of English language learners (ELLs). The students were from a variety of nations and cultures, spoke several different languages, and had a wide range of English proficiency levels. During their time together, the author and students…

In this volume a range of authors from different international contexts argue that the notion of communicative competence in English, hitherto largely referenced to metropolitan native-speaker norms, has to be expanded to take account of diverse contexts of use for a variety of purposes. It also discusses the popular belief that language and…

The aim of this study is to optimize CALL environments as a learning tool rather than a gloss, focusing on the learning of polysemous words which refer to spatial relationship between objects. A lot of research has already been conducted to examine the efficacy of visual glosses while reading L2 texts and has reported that visual glosses can be…

This study explores the way in which the European Language Portfolio (ELP) is used for teaching English as a foreign language to young learners with the aim of enhancing their involvement in the language learning process. The data for the study were collected through observations in a fourth-grade and a fifth-grade classroom (students' ages varied…

This study investigated the effects of processing instruction (PI) and structured input (SI) on the acquisition of the subjunctive in adjectival clauses by 92 second-semester distance learners of Spanish. Computerized visual input enhancement (VIE) was combined with PI and SI in an attempt to increase the salience of the targeted grammatical form…

The present study investigated the effect of online peer feedback through blogs on Turkish EFL students' writing performance and their perceptions. Data were collected by using: a) Turkish EFL Students' Background Survey, b) interviews at the beginning and end of the term, c) first and revised drafts, and d) end-of-semester Questionnaire. The…

Pre-service teachers around the world face a unique challenge: bridging the gap between traditional teaching focused on grammar translation and receptive skills, and communicative teaching aimed at well-rounded communication skills. Many new EFL teachers learned English in a traditional context that emphasized memorization and grammar, but after…

This study aims to explore the impact of different captions on second language (L2) learning in a computer-assisted multimedia context. A quasi-experimental design was adopted, and a total of thirty-two eighth graders selected from a junior high school joined the study. They were systematically assigned into four groups based on their proficiency…

This research investigates the extent to which indices of social justice and democratic rights are expressed in Israel in the crucial national English matriculation exam, as perceived by Palestinian Arab high school pupils studying for these exams and their English teachers. The research employed Critical Theory as a paradigm, case study as a…

Oral communication skills are essential for engineers today and, as they are included in accreditation criteria of educational programmes, their teaching and evaluation deserve attention. However, concrete aspects as to what should be taught and evaluated in relation to oral communication skills have not been sufficiently established. In this…

This study was designed to examine the effect of the redundancy principle in a multimedia presentation constructed for foreign language vocabulary learning on undergraduate students' retention. The underlying hypothesis of this study is that when the students are exposed to the material in multiple ways through animation, concurrent narration,…

This article reports on a teacher-talk training course for Japanese primary school teachers, who are preparing to teach "communicative English" for the first time. The article argues that teacher-talk training is important for communicative classes with young students because most of the input and interaction is by default teacher…

Digital storytelling constitutes a pedagogical tool for teachers to work on different linguistic skills while generating students' interest and attention. This study analyses the usefulness of including digital storytelling within a didactic sequence in order to work on linguistic routines such as greetings and leave-takings in English as a…