Number 4 Volume 6

Open Access Article

1 - The impacts of Direct and Indirect Observation on EFL Iranian Teachers' Teaching Quality Improvement
Shokofe Rezaie Mohammad Taghi Hasani

The present paper sought to examine the effectiveness of less experienced teachers' participationin experienced teachers' classes on students' achievements in terms of their proficiency levels inboth Elementary and Pre-intermediate levels. This quasi-experimental design More

The present paper sought to examine the effectiveness of less experienced teachers' participationin experienced teachers' classes on students' achievements in terms of their proficiency levels inboth Elementary and Pre-intermediate levels. This quasi-experimental design study was conductedin three Language institutes in Tehran, Iran. Twenty-one EFL teachers were selected asexperienced and less experienced ones. Also 169 female students taking Elementary and Preintermediatecourses formed the participants of this study. The participants assigned intoexperimental and control group. In order to test students' performance in English before thetreatment, a Key English Test (KET) and a Preliminary English Test (PET) were employed tocheck students' English proficiency. There was a statistically significant increase in KETexperimental group' final scores before (M=53.87, SD= 2.822), and after treatment (M=70.81,SD=3.113), p-value=.000 which is < .05. The mean increased with 95% confidence interval from15.81863 to 18.06599. Also there was a statistically significant increase in PET scores before(M=44.36, SD= 2.114), and after treatment (M=59.27, SD=1.835), p-value=.000 which is < .05.The mean increased with 95% confidence interval from 14.233 to 15767. Data analysis andstatistical calculations through T-TEST and one way ANOVA revealed that, although both controland experimental group students' proficiency in English enhanced, there was a significantdifference in experimental group students' final scores before and after treatment and directobservation is beneficial. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

2 - The Effects of Concept Mapping and Critical Thinking Test Strategies on EFL Iranian Learners' Reading Comprehension
Ata Maleki Zeynab Chegini

This research was designed to investigate the effects of critical thinking and concept mappingtest strategies on EFL Iranian learners' reading comprehension in five sessions during near twomonths. Fifty eight male and female students took a pre-test as a language profic More

This research was designed to investigate the effects of critical thinking and concept mappingtest strategies on EFL Iranian learners' reading comprehension in five sessions during near twomonths. Fifty eight male and female students took a pre-test as a language proficiency test first,then they were randomly assigned to two experimental groups and a control group, twentystudents for critical thinking group, nineteen students for concept mapping group and nineteenstudents for control group were selected randomly. During four sessions of the treatment, eachexperimental group worked on four reading passages taken from different journals. Theparticipants in two experimental groups were encouraged to think critically and noticemeaningfully to the arrows showing how concepts are linked in reading passages. Thinkingcritically included evaluation, analysis, and synthesis and reasoning for critical thinking teststrategy, and finding interrelated concept connections by mapping meaningful graphs forconcept mapping test strategy. Along with the experimental groups, the participants in thecontrol group also worked on the same four reading passages, but they were taught scanning,skimming, previewing, predicting, and guessing meaning from the context in order to improvetheir reading comprehension skills. At the end of four sections of treatment, three post testswere performed in one session. Finally One-way ANOVA was used to analyze the results ofthe control and the two experimental groups’ post- tests, and a significant difference wasobserved in the two critical thinking group and control group, but there was not observed anysignificant difference between the concept mapping group and control group. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

3 - The Effect of Working Memory Training on Vocabulary Recall and Retention of Iranian EFL Learners: The Case of Dual N-Back Task
Mojtaba Marashi

This study examined the effect of working memory training on vocabulary recall and retention ofIranian EFL learners using dual N-back task technique. To this end, 50 EFL learners at IslamicAzad University of Shoushtar were randomly assigned to the experimental (n = 25) More

This study examined the effect of working memory training on vocabulary recall and retention ofIranian EFL learners using dual N-back task technique. To this end, 50 EFL learners at IslamicAzad University of Shoushtar were randomly assigned to the experimental (n = 25) and control (n= 25) groups. Before the treatment, a vocabulary test was administered to the participants to assessthe participants’ vocabulary knowledge of the target words. The participants were taught 100English words in 20 sessions. In each session, the experimental group also received dual n-backtask to train the participants’ working memory. At the end and three weeks after the last treatmentsession, the vocabulary test was administered. The obtained data were analyzed through two-wayrepeated measure ANOVA and independent samples t-tests. The results showed that theexperimental group outperformed the control group in target words’ recall and retention.Implications arising from the findings and suggestions for further research are also explained. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

4 - The Effect of Explicit Theme-based Instruction on the Vocabulary Learning Performance of Iranian EFL Learners
Parastoo Alizadeh Oghyanous

Vocabulary has been one of the main components of foreign language learning and still manybelieve that vocabulary knowledge is the most essential part of language ability. The present studyaimed at investigating the effect of explicit instruction through theme-based ins More

Vocabulary has been one of the main components of foreign language learning and still manybelieve that vocabulary knowledge is the most essential part of language ability. The present studyaimed at investigating the effect of explicit instruction through theme-based instruction on thevocabulary learning of EFL learners. The participants of the study included 72 Iranian EFLlearners, half of whom served as the experimental and the other half as the control group.Vocabulary knowledge of the participants was measured using the Vocabulary Level Test byCambridge University before and after the treatment. The results of statistical analysis indicatedthat both explicit instruction through text thematiztion and regular teaching of vocabulary wereeffective on the learning of vocabulary but explicit instruction through text-theme procedure hada significantly better effect compared to regular instruction on the learning of the new vocabularyitems. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

5 - Study of Vinay and Darbelnet’s Seven Translation Strategies in Four Translations of Divorce Surah of Quran
Zeinab Asadi Sadeghi Azar

This research study aimed to show what strategies the translators used in their translations ofDivorce Surah of the Holy Quran. The model adopted by the researcher is based on Vinay andDarbelnet’s (1958) and Munday’s (2008) concept of cohesion. To this end, More

This research study aimed to show what strategies the translators used in their translations ofDivorce Surah of the Holy Quran. The model adopted by the researcher is based on Vinay andDarbelnet’s (1958) and Munday’s (2008) concept of cohesion. To this end, two Persian translationsby Elahi Ghomshei (2015) and Foladvand (2014) and two English translations by A. J. Arberry(2007) and Yusuf Ali (1934) were selected. Target texts were compared and contrasted against thesource text and each other according to the defined translation units. Concerning ‘loyalty’, findingsof the study showed that, Foladvand was the most loyal among the four translators with the highestfrequency of literal translation. While, Elahi Ghomshei’s translation was the least loyal with thehighest frequency of lexical expansion and syntactic amplification and the lowest number ofinstances of literal translation among the four translators. This study, first of all, makes use ofVinay and Darbelnet’s (1958) taxonomy of translation shifts. Moreover, Munday’s (2008) conceptof cohesion is used. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

6 - Groping Feedback Types on Interactional Patterns via Storytelling among EFL Iranian Young learners
marjan vosoughee mahshid Hosseini

In this study, storytelling was surveyed with regard to the impact that it might haveon student-teacher interactional patterns. For this aim, the researchers utilized anintact class with ten young students in a language institute in a north eastern part ofthe country. F More

In this study, storytelling was surveyed with regard to the impact that it might haveon student-teacher interactional patterns. For this aim, the researchers utilized anintact class with ten young students in a language institute in a north eastern part ofthe country. Four sessions of the class were transcribed after a full observationalprotocol. Two groups of Interactional patterns on student-led and teacher-ledfeedback types were codified via MAXQDA software after conducting thoroughcontent analyses over student-teacher and student-student interactions. Findingsrevealed that among teacher-led interaction feedbacks involving clarificationrequest, comprehension check, confirmation check, seeking students’ feedback onthe story, self-repetition and recast, comprehension check was the most frequentfeedback type detected. Additional feedbacks that were found within theconversational pattern were students-led which consisted of peer correction, firstlanguage uses, response to teacher's question, students' enthusiasm for the story,JOURNAL OF TEACHING ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES, Vol. 6, NO. 4, Spring 2018112seeking the info. on the lesson practicum, students' sympathy with the storycharacters, socialization with the teacher, seeking the grammatical aspects,clarification seeking of the story plot, seeking the meaning of unfamiliar words,clarification requests, students’ socialization with the teacher, initiation forstorytelling, students’ concerns, students’ complaints, students’ appraise of the story,students’ predictions and socialization with the teachers’ method. Among thestudent-led feedback types, students’ appraise of the stories and seeking the meaningof unfamiliar words denoted that through focus on meaning, they might have mostprobably been much engaged in the meaning of the stories. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

7 - Enhancing EFL Learners’ Self Efficacy Beliefs through Raising Metacognitive Awareness
Saeed Safdari Shahryar Farzi

This study aimed at investigating the possibility of improving EFL learners’ self-efficacy by implementing a metacognitive strategies instruction program. The participants were 53 female EFL learners who were divided into two experimental and control groups. The e More

This study aimed at investigating the possibility of improving EFL learners’ self-efficacy by implementing a metacognitive strategies instruction program. The participants were 53 female EFL learners who were divided into two experimental and control groups. The experimental group received an eight-week treatment on metacognitive strategies through descriptions, modeling, and practice. At the beginning and at the end of the program a self-report questionnaire has been used to measure the Participants’ self-efficacy belief and metacognitive strategies awareness. The results revealed that the experimental group participants outdid the control group learners. Their self-efficacy belief improved considerably and they became more confident in their ability to cope with L2 learning tasks and activities. The findings bear significant meaning regarding the importance of both metacognitive strategies and self-efficacy. It was suggested that building deeper awareness of the metacognitive strategies can be a powerful tool to develop self-efficacious learners who are more confident and reassured about their own capabilities in dealing with the complicated tasks and activities of learning a foreign language. Manuscript profile

Open Access Article

8 - The effect of teaching the etymology of words to learn and reinforce vocabulary by Iranian children
Ramin Rahmany Houtan Golzarnia

This study was an attempt to investigate the effect of teaching morphemes on young EFLlearners. To this end, 23 young EFL learners in two different classes who studied at intermediatelevel were selected to participate in the present study. The participants were divided More

This study was an attempt to investigate the effect of teaching morphemes on young EFLlearners. To this end, 23 young EFL learners in two different classes who studied at intermediatelevel were selected to participate in the present study. The participants were divided into twogroups. One of the groups was treated as experimental and the other one was considered as thecontrol group. Furthermore, the pre-test of word parts was administered to both groups. Theresearcher chose 27 prefixes, suffixes, and roots and taught the selected morphemes to theexperimental group in 9 sessions. At last, the researcher administered post-test to both groups. Theresults showed that experimental group outperformed the control group regarding their knowledgeof word parts. It should be noted that the present study has some implications for teachers, materialdevelopers, and EFL learners. Manuscript profile

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