In addressing vocabulary explanations in language classroom settings, a growing number of studies have examined the different ways teachers respond to the vocabulary explanation requests made by students in second language (L2) classrooms. Relatively lacking is an investigation into the nature of vocabulary explanation requests made by students in…

As working life across the world is increasingly multilingual, multicultural and multidisciplinary, higher education language teaching is faced with a challenge of how to prepare students for it. Many universities have recently developed multilingual pedagogies but central to their success is learners' perceptions of these practices. To fill this…

In China, code-switching (CS) is frequently used in English as a foreign language (EFL) classrooms. However, the functions of CS in Chinese secondary schools remain unclear. Moreover, student perceptions have rarely been considered in previous studies. This paper therefore sets out to examine why English teachers code-switch in EFL classrooms. In…

Second language trainee teachers need to use effective classroom language, or 'teacher talk', otherwise opportunities for second language learning can be reduced. However, trainees are often not aware of how their teacher talk influences opportunities for language development in the classroom. This study explores teacher talk data collected from…

This article adopts the methods of conversation analysis to track the details of three English as a foreign language novice teachers' language alternation practices in a Vietnamese tertiary context. The analyses focused on teacher instruction-giving in the pre-entry and main instructional phases of lessons. Findings show that language alternation…

This article uses a conversation analysis methodology to examine how lexical Focus on Form is interactionally accomplished in teachers' vocabulary explanations in secondary Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) classrooms. Recent conversation-analytic work has focused on the interactional organisation of vocabulary explanations in…

Bilingual programmes in which an L2 is used as the medium of instruction are becoming popular in different parts of the world, and content and language integrated learning (CLIL) is one variant of such programmes. Recent research on CLIL has gradually shifted from product-oriented (i.e. evaluating the effectiveness of CLIL in terms of language and…

This paper presents some of the preliminary findings of a study into modern languages (ML) learning in five Scottish secondary schools. Five ML teachers were observed and audio-recorded over a period of several weeks while teaching their third-year classes (pupils aged 14-15 years). All the teachers used the target language extensively in their…