This article investigates the tendency of those who explore the topic of "electronic literacies" to downplay the fundamental nature and importance of the perceptual habits associated with print literacy, and highlights the opposite tendency of reading and writing specialists to decontextualize the acquisition of these fundamental skills…

In this article, I use a literature review to examine the nature of reading comprehension in adult literacy practice. I suggest that we need to better understand learners' sociocultural profiles and that we need to be clearer about commonly used vocabulary terms (such as background knowledge). I also suggest that we pay more attention to how…

This article reports on a study of second language (L2) French learners' self-generated use of gesture to think through and resolve a metalinguistic awareness-raising task during small-group work with an expert mediator. Although the use of gesture in L2 communication and pedagogy has recently received increasing attention, little research has…

Our objective is to provide two multidimensional models (i.e., contextual-interaction and Ethnic Educator) including sociopolitical, socioeconomic, sociocultural, and sociohistorical factors explaining underachievement in Latinos. First, we critically discuss single-factor theories (i.e., deficit, resistance, social reproduction, cultural…

The most problematic issues that characterize western society is the crisis of the subject and the difficulties of interpersonal relationships, leading to situations of deep distress and increasing the fragility of human beings. This behavior of the contemporary man also depends on flexibility rules in all areas of society and particularly inside…

Although some earlier studies reported female and child superiority in learning a second language (L2), current research has been inconclusive as to whether, and why, this might be the case. Using a socio-cultural paradigm, this study addresses how motivation, gender and age relate to the attainment of a native-like accent for young Kurdish…

Within this study, we examine the nexus of immigrant parents' language attitudes and motivations towards a lesser-spoken, endangered language and the revitalization efforts in the Basque Country, Spain. Attitudes and motivations are conceptualized as multileveled, relational, and dynamically constructed within their immediate and broader…

This research tends to ascertain several traditional and socio-cultural barriers to English language learning in Saudi Arabia and to explore more ways than before for making teaching and learning more effective. The findings of four quantitative and qualitative surveys conducted in this regard reveal a unique traditional and socio-cultural milieu,…

Guided by sociocultural theory and the theory of multiliteracies, learning is perceived as a shifting participation in practices, which is mediated by multiple physical and symbolic tools. Drawing on the situated multiliteracies approach, which integrates these two theories, the purpose of this ethnographic research is to examine the participation…

The current phenomenological case study, based in part on Vygotsky's sociocultural theory, set out to examine the lived experiences of individuals sharing and mediating meaningful communication with individuals who have Down syndrome. To accomplish this, the researcher interviewed several categories of caregivers who regularly interact with…

What are the features of the school environment that make students' of color incorporation greater at some schools than at others? Prudence L. Carter seeks to answer this basic but bedeviling question through a rich comparative analysis of the organizational and group dynamics in eight schools located within four cities in the United States and…

This study utilized qualitative single-case study design to provide rich description and offer new understandings within a socio-cultural theoretical frame about how adult and higher education learners perceive and are motivated to participate in study abroad programs. Three faculty-led study abroad courses at a Hispanic serving institution in the…

The present study focuses on the way novice teachers, who are part of a one-year postgraduate diploma in post-primary teaching, have opted to negotiate their status as school teachers. In particular, it asks why novice teachers prefer to hide as they scramble to learn how to teach. On the basis of three separate interviews spaced out though the…

Grounded in Vygotskyan sociocultural theory, this qualitative, classroom-based investigation incorporates an open-ended task framework. Open tasks in the present study were defined as ones designed to take shape in the second language classroom as teacher and adult learners jointly worked through exploratory problems. One central feature of open…

Young children are surrounded by environmental print on a daily basis. Through their visual exploration of environmental print, coupled with sociocultural experiences, children gain valuable semantic and symbolic knowledge as they make sense of their world. The aim of this review is to examine the question of whether environmental print has value…