The main purpose of the study was to investigate the distinctness and reliability of analytic (or multi-trait) rating dimensions and their relationships to holistic scores and "e-rater"[R] essay feature variables in the context of the TOEFL[R] computer-based test (TOEFL CBT) writing assessment. Data analyzed in the study were holistic…

This study deals with the determinants of prosodic phrasing in French schoolchildren's narratives. Children (aged 7 to 11) told picture stories to a silent same-age peer. The establishment of temporal and/or causal relations between the events was more or less guided by the drawings (ordered vs. arbitrary sequences). The comprehension of the…

A variety of cognitive diagnosis approaches (CDAs) have been used by researchers to extract fine-grained information about the linguistic knowledge states and skill mastery levels of test takers based on their performance on language tests. Although some of these approaches have been in use in the psychometric community for quite some time, many…

Purpose: To clarify the relationship between psychoacoustic capabilities and speech perception in adolescents with severe-to-profound hearing loss (SPHL). Method: Twenty-four adolescents with SPHL and young adults with normal hearing were assessed with psychoacoustic and speech perception tests. The psychoacoustic tests included gap detection…

The study looked at the effects of correction of learners' errors on learning of grammatical features. In particular, the manner of correction (explicit vs. implicit correction) was investigated. The study also focussed on the effectiveness of explicit and implicit correction of developmental early vs. developmental late features. Fifty-six…

To investigate the impact of self-correction method as an alternative to the traditional teacher-correction method, on the one side, and to evaluate the impact of personality traits of Extroversion/Introversion, on the other side, on the writing progress of the pre-intermediate learners three null-hypotheses were proposed. In spite of students…

This paper introduces a corpus-driven measure as a method to assess EFL learners' knowledge of semantic prosody. Semantic prosody here is defined as the tendency of some words to occur in a certain semantic environment. For example, the verb "cause" is associated with unpleasant things--death, problem and the like. Subjects were 60…

The study addresses a problem which is inadequately investigated in second language acquisition research, that is, personality predictors of foreign language aptitude. Specifically, it focuses on the Five Factor model which includes Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism (Costa & McCrae, 1992) as…

This one-year study explores the possibility of integrating critical pedagogy into undergraduate English writing classes in Taiwan. The participants were the students in 2 first-year writing classes taught by the researcher. For these classes, I reinvented Freire's (2000) pedagogy of the oppressed, which emphasizes problem-posing, dialogue, and…

Dynamic Assessment is a new theoretical framework for language assessment, and it is particularly relevant for underrepresented languages and learners. For this study the process is investigated in the context of Yugtun second language learners at a university level. This qualitative teacher action research was a study that involved seven…

Reading skill has taken on an important role in most EFL teaching situations. While linguistic knowledge is only one aspect of this skill, background knowledge including culture can also play an important role (Alptekin, 2006; Johnson, 1981; Pritchard, 1990; Steffensen, Chitra, & Anderson, 1979). This study investigated the effect of cultural…

Background: This article reports a study into the double marking of Liberal Studies in Hong Kong. This is now a compulsory subject in Hong Kong's Years 10-12 curriculum which, when first examined in the new Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education in 2012, will increase its candidature from its current 3,300 to 80,000. Aims: To examine the…

The study reported here investigates the predictive validity of language assessments by "Direct Entry" programs at an Australian University--programs developed on site for Non English Speaking Background international students, principally to provide (i) pre-entry academic and language preparation and (ii) language assessment for…

Discussions of multilingualism in education, as exemplified by the articles in this issue, can be critically reevaluated using perspectives available from poststructuralism. These perspectives focus on the potential ambiguity of language and language practices. This, in turn, encourages us to question simple notions of the relationship of learners…

This article addresses the question of what language proficiency (LP) is, both theoretically and empirically. It does so by making a distinction, on one hand, between "basic" and "higher language cognition" and, on the other hand, between "core" and "peripheral components" of LP. The article furthermore critically examines the notion of "level" in…