Mediate Learning Experience (MLE) posits that the quality and amount of mediated learning interactions undergone by a learner affects both his cognitive and psychological development and his functioning as an autonomous and independent learner. This study attempts to implement MLE theory in pedagogy by designing an MLE-based grammar lesson plan in respect of present continuous through operationalizing and activating MLE parameters in a grammar class. Through the application of MLE in pedagogy, not only do the teachers take on new roles like mediating lifelong learning and mentoring fellow teachers but also the learners experience innovative functions such as developing heuristics for solving problems and autonomous learning and thinking essential to the late modern knowledge-based era. Through the application of MLE in pedagogy, not only do the teachers take on new roles like mediating lifelong learning and mentoring fellow teachers but also the learners experience innovative functions such as developing heuristics for solving problems and autonomous learning and thinking essential to the late modern knowledge-based era. پرونده مقاله

This article tries to delineate different aspects of Mediated Learning Experience (MLE) in detail: MLE as a model of learning in psychology, MLE as a dynamic assessment methodology, and MLE as a basis for designing a course. This article tries to delineate different aspects of Mediated Learning Experience (MLE) in detail: MLE as a model of learning in psychology, MLE as a dynamic assessment methodology, and MLE as a basis for designing a course. MLE, well-known as Feuerstein's theory, is presented as a model of learning in psychology for enhancing cognitive functioning and problem-solving skills in children with cognitive challenges. Some other studies and scholars such as Poehner (2008) consider MLE as a dynamic assessment methodology because in dynamic assessment, assistance emerges from the interaction between the mediator and the learner. The other studies look at MLE as a holistic and integrative approach which is able to prepare a course. Definition of MLE principles and a meticulous and elaborate analysis of the first five MLE principles in different studies, entitled as MLE Taxonomy, are presented in a table at the end of the article. پرونده مقاله

The present quasi-experimental study with a non-equivalent control group pretest-posttest design investigated the effects of metacognitive awareness on developing Iranian EFL learners’ assessment ability. Forty-one male and female upper-intermediate level learners in two intact classes from an English language school in the Tehran province were selected based on convenience sampling. The classes were randomly assigned to the Cognitive-Based Assessment Instruction Group (CAIG) the and Metacognitive-Based Assessment Instruction Group (MAIG). A general proficiency test administered before the treatment verified the participants’ homogeneity. The Metacognitive Awareness Writing Questionnaire and Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire were also administered before and after the study to measure participants’ metacognitive awareness level and self-regulation. The MAIG used metacognitive strategies such as planning, monitoring, and revising to assess English essays. The CAIG performed assessments based on cognitive strategies and a Writing Rubric. The participants’ improvement in assessment was measured every other session during the treatment. After the treatment, the participants took two writing posttests (rehearsed and unrehearsed writing topics). Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) results showed that the MAIG outperformed the CAIG in both posttests, and raising metacognitive awareness could significantly enhance the participants’ assessment ability. The Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance (RM-ANOVA) and Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) revealed that the MAIG participants’ performances were significantly better than the CAIG on seven writing assessments. The MAIG’s self-regulation was also significantly higher. This study has implications for materials developers, EFL teachers, and syllabus designers to focus on raising metacognitive awareness in writing assessment. پرونده مقاله

Mediated Learning Experience (MLE) Theory holds the idea that a crucial factor in the development of a person’s cognitive functioning and enabling him to function as an autonomous learner is the amount and quality of mediated learning interactions he has received. Given this, the paramount focus of this study was to implement MLE through mediational behaviors regarding developing EFL learners’ metacognitive strategy use (MSU) and grammar knowledge. To this end, a grammar test and the Persian version of the Metacognitive Strategies Questionnaire by Item Types were administered to 60 Iranian elementary EFL learners who were selected through convenience sampling and assigned to experimental and control groups at the pretest and posttest. Quantitative analysis of the data revealed that an MLE-based grammar course done through mediational behaviors improved not only the learners’ use of metacognitive strategies as a total but also the learners’ use of planning strategies and their grammar knowledge as well, it did not improve their use of goal-setting and assessment strategies, instead. The results can bear some lucrative insights for various practitioners ranging from teachers and teacher trainers to syllabus designers and stakeholders. پرونده مقاله

Since requesting happens in a circumstance of imbalance, the speaker ought to continuously respect the principles of politeness without consideration to the question of their request. This study investigated the effect of strategy training of speech acts of asking and statements of regret on developing Iranian EFL learners’ pragmatic performance and critical thinking. According to the nature of the treatment, it was decided to select the participants who had not had enough language exposure at the language institute before the study. For this, before conducting an Oxford English Test (OPT), it was expected to select those whose scores would fall between one standard deviation (+1SD) above the mean and one standard deviation (-1SD) below the mean as the cut-off criterion. Finally, 80 out of 114 Iranian EFL male and female learners from six language classes in intermediate level of proficiency were chosen. Next, they were divided randomly into two experimental and control groups (20 males and 20 females, for each group). A mixed-method design was utilized; the qualitative data collected via interview was used to triangulate the quantitative data collected. The data were investigated by two skilled raters, specified in applied linguistics to recognize the effectiveness of strategy training of request and apology speech acts. The data were keyed into the SPSS. 22. The finding showed that there was an important positive consequence of strategy training of speech act of request on developing Iranian EFL learners’ pragmatic performance. A meaningful relationship was found between critical thinking and pragmatic performance. پرونده مقاله

The present study aimed at investigating Iranian TEFL teachers’ perspective toward the relationship between SLA research and ELT. The sample of this study consisted of 80 female and male TEFL teachers at different institutes and schools in the city of Tehran. The main instrument was a question- naire designed by Nassaji (2012). It enabled researcher to collect both qualitative and quantitative data. The findings of this study reveal information on different areas like teachers’ familiarity with SLA research, the reason for lack of interest, and the main source they appeal to get the required in- formation for their professional development. The findings indicate that the pedagogical ambience is far from ideal as far as teachers’ involvement with SAL research is concerned. The pedagogical im- plication is that to improve the quality of EFL teaching and learning we are bound to bridge the gap between EFL Teachers and SLA Research. پرونده مقاله

This study aimedat investigating the difference between male and female Iranian Upper-Intermediate EFL learners in terms of critical thinking, meta-cognitive awareness listening strategies, and selection of meta- cognitive listening strategies. To this end, one hundred and fifty language learners (including males and females with average age of 26.5) were selected through homogenised process to take part in this study. As a further step, the participants answered CTQ and MALQ questionnaires, which were 5-point Likert-type questionnaires. The results showed that there was no significant difference between males and females critical ability but there that was a significant difference between them in awareness and selection of meta-cognitive listening strategies. In other words, women were more aware than men in meta-cognitive listening strategies. Also a significant difference was found only in ‘planning’ and ‘directed attention’ but not in ‘problem solving’, ‘meta translation’, and ‘person knowledge’ between the male and the female Iranian Upper-Intermediate EFL learners. The results have some implications. پرونده مقاله

The present research aimed at investigating the deformation of political news headlines translation between English and Persian News Agencies based on Berman`s deformative system. For this purpose, 100 news headlines in English were selected from BBC, Reuters, Associated Press, France, France 24, Financial Times, Business Times, New York Times, Politico, Guardian, CNN, Bloomberg, Middle East Eye, Euronews and Foreign Policy. The translations of the same news were selected from prominent Persian news agencies such as Fars, ISNA, IRNA, ILNA, Tasnim, Tabnak and Ghatreh. The headlines were selected from the 2015 archives of these news agencies. They were extracted, tabulated and compared to their Persian equivalents. The comparison was performed based on the 12 deformative forces of Berman’s (2000) model. Subsequently, in order to have a comprehensive view, a Chi-square test was run to see whether the frequencies of deformative strategies used were statistically meaningful. The results revealed that news headlines do undergo deformation in translation. Rationalization, expansion, destruction of linguistic patterning, qualitative impoverishment and quantitative impoverishment turned out to be the most dominant deformative forces. The frequencies of the rest of the tendencies were statistically significant. The study has implications for translators, researchers and translator trainers. پرونده مقاله

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of morphology instruction through semantic mapping on vocabulary learning of Iranian intermediate EFL learners. To do so, 50 out of 70 students were se-lected from one English language institute by administrating a PET test. Then, they were assigned into two groups randomly as experimental and control groups. A pretest (teacher made) was administered to both groups for ensuring their level of vocabulary knowledge. After ten sessions of treatment only for the experimental group, a teacher made posttest was given to both groups. To analyze the data, in-dependent samples t-test and paired samples t-test were conducted .The results revealed that there was a statistically significant difference between two groups but no significant difference was found be-tween the female and the male participants. پرونده مقاله

Abstract The present study begins by sketching "Chaos/Complexity Theory" (C/CT) and its applica-tion to the nature of language and language acquisition. Then, the theory of "Universal Grammar" (UG) is explicated with an eye to C/CT. Firstly, it is revealed that CCT may or may not be allied with a theory of language acquisition that takes UG as the initial state of language acquisition for granted. To compound the problem, even those C/CT theorists who adhere to UG conceptualize it differently from Chomsky to meet the conditions set forth in C/CT, and dismiss the idea of studying language acquisition without leaving room for inves-tigating language use. Secondly, it is argued that unlike Chomsky’s postulation of UG and generative grammar as mutational, C/CT theorists conceive of them as evolutionary phenom-ena. Thirdly, it is discussed that while advocates of UG, as a biologically predetermined state of the mind, believe that it has no analogue in other systems, C/CT proponents postulate their all-embracing theory as underlying all kinds of complex nonlinear systems operating in the world, of which language is only a case. پرونده مقاله

This study tried to examine the effect of using scaffolded differentiation strategies on reading comprehension and vocabulary improvement of intermediate students. The effect of using scaffolded differentiation strategies on the reading strategy use of the intermediate students was also checked. The researcher selected 40 EFL learners with intermediate levels. They were mixed learners from the institutes in Tehran. Nelson proficiency test, screening test, diagnostic test, progress monitoring test, outcome test, and a close-ended questionnaire were used in the study. For the quantitative part, the selected students were randomly divided into four groups. Two were experimental groups and the rest were control ones. Each group consisted of 10 students. There were 15 sessions for the treatment. In the Experimental group the instructor used scaffolded differentiating strategies for improving the reading comprehension of the students and in the control group the teachers used ordinary methods. A test that subdivides the broad area into specific skills, in this case, inferential comprehension and receptive vocabulary was administered before and after the intervention. The questions were constructed in the related course of study. The result of the post-test showed that ‘Inferential reading’ and ‘Receptive vocabulary’ of the experimental group were noticeably greater than those of the control one. Data for the qualitative part was collected through the reading strategy inventory of MARSI (Mokhtari & Reichard, 2002). The reading strategy inventory was administered to 20 participants before the instruction and the instruction started, and after the instruction it was administered again. It consisted of 30 items that measured three factors: Global Reading Strategies (13 items), Problem-Solving Strategies (8 items), and Support Reading Strategies (9 items). The result of the posttest showed that the mean scores for the two subscales of ‘Global’ and ‘Supportive’ in the experimental group were noticeably greater than the mean scores in the control group but not for the other subscales of ‘Problem-solving’. پرونده مقاله

This study investigates the effect of strategy training on EFL learners’ attitudes regarding the concept and applicability of critical thinking in an educational context. To achieve this goal,80 EFL learners were selected using convenience sampling and homogenized based on the Oxford Placement Test.They completed a questionnaire adapted from Stupple et al.(2017) to assess their attitudes toward critical thinking,which served as the pre-test. Subsequently,the participants were divided into experimental and control groups.The experimental group underwent strategy training over10 sessions,during which various strategies were explained, and participants practiced using them to solve problems and exchange feedback.Additionally,they discussed the applicability and challenges associated with critical thinking in an educational context.The control group received mainstream instruction.After the treatment,both groups completed the same critical thinking questionnaire as the posttest.Furthermore,qualitative interviews were conducted with participants from the experimental group to gain an in-depth understanding. The data analysis revealed significant changes in the attitudes of the experimental group.Overall,this study follows a quasi-experimental explanatory sequential mixed-method design “In nature,the data analysis showed that,in general,the attitudes of the experimental group had changed significantly in the post-test compared to the control group.However,there was no significant difference in the attitude of the experimental and control groups regarding the applicability of strategy training for improving critical thinking and their ability to deploy critical thinking effectively.The results of the interviews and the comment section showed that teachers’ theoretical knowledge and willingness,EFL learners’ preparedness, and educational factors play important roles in the successful implementation of strategy training for developing critical thinking among EFL learners.” پرونده مقاله