A Look into the Association between Life-Wise Syllabus and Teacher Success: A Quantitative Study in an EFL Context
Subject Areas : آموزش زبان انگلیسیحمید خسروانی فرد 1 * , رضا پیشقدم 2 , آذر حسینی فاطمی 3
1 - English Department of the Ferdowsi University of Mashhad
2 - English Department of the Ferdowsi University of Mashhad
3 - English Department of the Ferdowsi University of Mashhad
Keywords: Life-responsive language teaching belief, Life syllabus, Teacher success,
Abstract :
The current study aimed at investigating the relationship between life-wise syllabus- as a new type of syllabus which emerged as the result of recent developments in applied ELT and corresponding to the "education for life"- and teacher success in an EFL context. Life-wise syllabus introduced by Pishghadam in 2011 directed English teachers’ attention to give priority to life issues rather than language in class. These new concepts encourage curriculum development based on life and all of its manifestations which is the core principle of humanistic education. Then teaching should not only comprise mathematics, chemistry, or literature, but also emotions, relationships, attitudes, thinking styles, feelings, and states of mind. Due to the recent emergence of this syllabus and the dearth of research over its effectiveness, this research study was carried out to shed more light on the issue. To this end, 200 teachers- 100 from private sector and 100 from public sector- and their 1771 students were chosen as the participants of the research study from Mashhad and Ghaen cities. In this study, the teachers were given "Life-Responsive Language Teaching beliefs Questionnaire" (hereafter LRLTB), and their students were given the "Characteristics of Successful EFL Teachers Questionnaire" (hereafter CSET). The results of the correlational study indicated that the main variables and also their subscales were highly correlated. The comparison between male and female teachers regarding correlation between variables did not show any significant difference. But the comparison between private and public school teachers in terms of the relationship between the variables displayed that they were more strongly correlated for the latter.
References
Allen, P, & Widdowson, H.G. (1974).Teaching the communicative use of English.International Review of Applied Linguistics XII/1.
Askehave, I., & Swales, J. (2001). Genre identification and communicative purpose: a problem and a possible solution. Applied Linguistics, 22(2), 195-212.
Askehave, I. (1998). A Functional Interpretation of Company Brochures - from context to text.PhD thesis.The Aarhus School of Business.
Barber, C.L. (1962). Some measurable characteristics of modern scientific prose. In C.L. Barber, F. Behre, U. Ohlander, Y. Olsson, S. Stubelius, J. Soderlind& P. Zandvoort(Eds.). Contributions to English syntax and phonology (pp.21-44).Goteborg, Sweden Almquist and Wiksel.
Bazerman, C. (1997). The life of genre, the life in the classroom.In W. Bishop & H. Ostrum(Eds.), Genre and writing (pp. 19-26). Portsmouth, NH: Boyntom/Cook Berkenkotterand Huckin’s(1993)
Becher, T. (1989).Academic tribes and territories: intellectual inquiry and the cultures of disciplines. Milton Keynes: Society for Research in Higher Education and Open University Press.
Berkenkotter, C., &Huckin, T. (1993).Rethinking genre from a sociocognitive perspective.Written Communication, 10, 475–509.
Bex, T. (1996). Variety in written English. London: Rutledge.
Bhatia, V. (1993).Analyzing genre: language use in professional settings.London: Longman.
Bhatia (2001) Bhatia, V. (2001).Analyzing genre: some conceptual issues. In M. Hewings (Ed.) Academic writing in context (pp. 79-92). The University of Birmingham: University Press.
Bhatia, V. (2004). Worlds of written discourse: a genre-based view. London: Continuum.
Brette, P. (1994). A genre analysis of the result sections of sociology articles, English for Specific Purposes, 13(1), 47-56.
Bruce, I. (2009). Result sections in sociology and organic chemistry articles. English for Specific Purposes, 28, 105-124.
Chiu, R. (1972). Measuring register characteristics: a prerequisite for preparing advanced level TESOL programs. TESOL Quarterly, 6(2), 129- 141.
Christie, F.,& Martin, J.R. (eds) (1997). Genre in institutions: social processes in the workplace and school. New York: Continuum.
Devitt, A.J. (1997). Genre as a language standard.In W. Bishop & H. Ostrum (Eds.), Genre and writing (pp. 45-55). Portsmouth/NH: Boynton/Cook.
Dudley-Evans T.,& St John, M.J. (1998). Developments in English for specific purposes: a multi-disciplinary approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Dudley-Evans, T. (1994). Genre analysis: an approach for text analysis for ESP. In M. Coulthard (Ed.) Advances in written text analysis (pp. 219-228). London and New York: Routledge.
Flowerdew, J. (2002). Ethnographically inspired approaches to the study of academic discourse. In J. Flowerdew (Ed.) Academic discourse( pp. 235-254) . Longman.
Freedman, A., & Medway, P. (1994b).Locating genre studies: antecedents and prospects.In A. Freedman & Medway, P. (Eds) Genre and new rhetoric(pp.1-22).London: Taylor and Francis.
Freedman, A, & Adam, C. (2000). Write where you are: Situating learning to write in university and workplace settings. In P. Dias and A. Pare (eds), Transitions: writing in academic and workplace settings. Creskill, NJ: Hampton Press.
Graves, H. et al. (2013). Mathematics is the method: Exploring the macro-organizational structure of research articles in mathematics. Discourse Studies, 15(4), 421–438.
Gustafson, M. (1975).Some syntactic properties of English law language.Department of English, University of Turku, Turku.
Holmes, R. (1997) Genre analysis and social sciences: an investigation of the structure of research article discussion sections in three disciplines. English for Specific Purposes,16(4), 321-337
Hopkins, A., & Dudley-Evans, T. (1988).A genre-based investigation of the discussio sections in articles and dissertations.English for Specific Purposes,7, 113-121.
Hutchinson, T.,& Waters, A. (1987).English for specific purposes: a learning-centered approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hyland, K. (2006). English for academic purposes: an advanced resource book. London and New York: Rutledge.
Kanoksilapatham, B. (2005). Rhetorical structure of biochemistry research articles.English for Specific Purposes, 24, 269-292.
Lim, J. (2006). Method sections of management research articles: A pedagogically motivated qualitative study. English for Specific Purposes, 25(3), 282-309.
Martin, J. R. (1992). English text: system and structure. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Miller, C. (1984). Genre as social action.Quarterly Journal of Speech, 70, 157-78.
Nwogu, K. N. (1997). The medical research paper: structure and functions. English for Specific Purposes, 16(2), 119-138.
Orlikowsk, & Yates (1994).Orlikowski, W. J. and Yates, J. 1994. "Genre Repertoire: Examining the Structuring of Communicative Practices in Organizations." Administrative Science Quarterly, 39, 541-574.
Posteguillo, S. (1999).The schematic structure of computer science research articles.English for Specific Purposes, 18(2), 139-160.
Samraj, B. (2002). Introductions in research articles: variations across disciplines, English for Specific Purposes, 21(1),1–17.
Schiffrin, D. (1994). Approaches to discourse.Oxford and Cambridge: Blackwell.
Selinker, L. Lackstrom, J.,& Trimble, L. (1973).Technical rhetorical principles and grammatical choices.TESOL Quarterly, 7(2), 127-136.
Swales, J. M. (1981).Aspects of article introductions. Birmingham, England: Universidad de Aston.
Swales, J. (1990).Genre analysis: English in academic and research setting. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Swales, J. M. (2004).Research genres.Explorations and applications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
White, R. (1974).The concept of register and TESL.TESOL Quarterly, 8(4), 401-416.
Williams, I. (1999). Results sections of medical research articles: Analysis of rhetorical categories for pedagogical purposes. English for Specific Purposes, 18(4), 347-366.
Yang, R., & Allison, D. (2003). Research articles in applied linguistics: Moving from results to conclusions. English for Specific Purposes, 22, 365-385.