It has now become a commonplace to state that foreign language learning should be viewed from an intercultural perspective. Teachers are now required to teach intercultural communicative competence instead of mere communicative competence. It follows that new professional demands are made on teachers. The assumption seems to be that teachers are…

Numerous reports and articles have pointed out the mediocrity of U.S. students' second language skills, implying, for example, that students abroad may perform better because of an established educational framework with an 'early start' and 'well-articulated teaching strategies.' If this were the case, students overseas should demonstrate lower…

This paper reports an experimental investigation of the relative effects of processing instruction, structured input activities and explicit information on the acquisition of gender agreement in Italian adjectives. Subjects were divided into three groups: the first received processing instruction; the second group structured input only; the third…

Awareness of structures may be conscious or unconscious in the expert user of a language: this paper contends that insufficient conscious awareness of a language structure in teachers of English may impair the teaching and learning of that structure, even when considerable classroom time is invested in it. Phrasal verbs are extensively covered in…

One of the characteristics of the well-documented bifurcation in collegiate foreign language (FL) instruction is the difficult transition from lower- to upper-level instruction. Particularly pronounced are the expectations placed on readers at the upper level. No longer engaged in surface readings and sentence-level exercises that stay focused on…

Fu highlights the large percentage of students in our classrooms for whom English is a second language and recommends strategies for helping them to adjust and to succeed in mainstream situations. Advice such as "Just teach from where they are," "Diversify instruction," and "Recognize that oral language development is essential," among others,…

This paper reports on a study that was carried out to determine learners' attitudes to learning grammar through the use of two types of consciousness-raising tasks. A deductive task provided explicit explanations of a grammar structure, while an inductive task required learners to discover the grammar rules for themselves. The study investigated…

This paper describes an action research project undertaken to look into the effectiveness of tasks designed to raise learner awareness of conversational strategies. The goal was to test whether tasks and direct instruction aimed at promoting learner awareness of conversational language at the discourse-level had any impact on the students'…

This article presents an overview of China's major reforms of basic English-language education since the mid-1980s. It begins with a description of English provision at the various levels of the formal education system to provide some background information on the scale and requirements of English-language teaching (ELT). Next, it reviews major…

Intercultural language learning is developing as a key direction in languages education both in Australia and elsewhere. The teaching of culture in language classes is, however, not new to language teaching, and rationales for language teaching have regularly included issues related to cultural understanding (Liddicoat, 2004). However, culture has…

The need for English as a Second Language (ESL) programs is growing in many correctional populations. Little information for correctional educators regarding effective practices for non-native speakers of English is available. Although concerns that exist for the mainstream correctional education population are similar to those for ESL students,…

The purpose of the current study was (a) to assess the effectiveness of the lexical-set (LS) and the semantically-unrelated (SU) vocabulary instruction, separately and relative to each other, and (b) to assess the differential effects of the two methods for students of lower and upper English proficiency levels. Two intact EFL classes were…

This article argues that drama is an under-exploited resource in the foreign language classroom for promoting intercultural competence and developing an awareness of the interpersonal dimension embedded in the language we use. Drama also offers ample opportunities to explore nuances of the foreign culture as well as conflict situations and…

This article considers Modern Languages in the Primary School (MLPS), which have reached a crucial stage in both England and Scotland. It looks at developments in the two countries and considers these against both a historical and European background. The authors, drawing on their practical experience, put forward some of the key points to be…

Due to an increase in enrollment in upper-level Spanish classes that posed staffing problems, the Spanish section of the Department of Modern Foreign Languages and Literatures at the University of Tennessee decided to combine three sections of Spanish 331, "Introduction to Hispanic Culture," into one large lecture course, which was…