Two groups of 12-year-old ethnic minority (EM) users of alphasyllabary (66 Tibetan and 45 Yi) were compared with 42 Han Chinese students in comprehending Chinese narrative and expository texts, each with inferential questions requiring short open-ended written answers. Three constructs (verbal working memory, orthographic and sentential…

The current study examines English-speaking learners of Spanish and their pragmatic development of request forms during a six-week immersion program in Madrid, Spain. Elicited production and intuition data were analyzed, focusing on personal deictic orientation, directness evidenced by clause type, and the use of "por favor"…

This paper reports on task interaction, task success and word learning among second language (L2) learners of different levels of word recognition from speech (WRS) proficiency who used a CALL application previously shown to be effective in the development of L2 WRS. Participants (N = 65) were categorised into three levels of L2 WRS proficiency…

Formulaic sequences (FS) are frequently used by native speakers and have been found to help non-native speakers sound more fluent as well. We hypothesized that explicitly teaching FS to classroom ESL learners would increase the use of such language, which could further result in increased second language (L2) fluency. We report on a 5-week study…

The present study investigated linguistic focus of language related episodes (LREs),in Iranian EFL classrooms. Eighteen male participants in the advanced and intermediate levels from Urmia branch of Academic Centre of Education, Culture and Research (ACECR) participated in the study. They were assigned to intermediate and advanced levels with one…

This study aimed to examine the effect of task repetition on foreign language output. Twenty eight Saudi female students in the Preparatory Year (PY) at King Saud university, were randomly selected to conduct an oral information-gap task. The participants were asked to perform the task two times with two-week interval between the two performances.…

The study investigated the acquisition of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) by second language (L2) learners and by heritage speakers of the colloquial varieties of Arabic. The study focused on three questions: (1) whether heritage speakers who enroll in college-level elementary MSA classes have an advantage over their L2 counterparts, (2) whether any…

Research on textual enhancement (TE) has given rise to several factors that may play a role in generating learners' noticing of target forms, one of which pertains to the nature of the target form(s). In particular, results have suggested that learners are more likely to notice more meaning-bearing forms than less meaning-bearing forms.…

Thirty-four children, with autism spectrum disorders, ages 4-14 years, were matched and randomly assigned to one of two conditions for learning a novel juice-making task and producing two novel words about the event. Seventeen sighted children were manually guided to perform the task and tactually prompted during imitated productions of novel…

The current English Language Teaching (ELT) global coursebook market has embraced content and language integrated learning (CLIL) as a weak form of bilingual education and an innovative component to include in General English coursebooks for EFL contexts. In this paper, I investigate how CLIL is included in ELT coursebooks aimed at young learners,…

Whereas studies show that comprehensible output facilitates L2 learning, hypothesis testing has received little attention in Second Language Acquisition (SLA). Following Shehadeh (2003), we focus on hypothesis testing episodes (HTEs) in which learners initiate repair of their own speech in interaction. In the context of a one-way information gap…

This study, based on observation of 90 fifth-grade mathematics classes in Chinese elementary schools, examined how the task features, high cognitive demand, multiple representations, and multiple solution methods may relate to classroom discourse. Results indicate that high cognitive demand tasks were associated with teachers' use higher order…

This paper presents the findings from research on peer assessment practice that was specifically focussed on improving the experience in a tertiary bridging course. The objective of the study was to examine the impact of this assessment approach on student social relationships and the overall assessment experience. The study also examined whether…

The provision of supplemental educational and instructional content in podcast form is becoming increasingly widespread in first language education. However, amongst second language students in Japan the lack of literature illustrates podcast use has been limited. Imitating podcasts, educational and instructional materials in audio form were…

Presented here is a practical tool called the Active Reading Document (ARD) that can give students the necessary incentive to engage with the text/readings. By designing the tool to incrementally develop student understanding of the material through reading using Marzano's Taxonomy as a framework, the ARD offers support through scaffolding as they…