درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

شواهد بیانگر این می باشد که تغییر پذیری در ارزیابی نگارش دانشجویان فقط نتیجه تفاوت مهارت نوشتاری آنها نیست بلکه عوامل بیرونی خاصی در این امر دخیلند و عوامل مرتبط با مصحح، فعالییت، موقعییت یا تعامل هر یک از اینها میتوانند در تصمیم گیریها و استنباطها در مورد توانایی نگارش فراگیران تاثیر بگذارند. هدف این تحقیق این است که مساله تغییرپذیری را در داوری مصحح به عنوان منبع خطای سنجش در ارزیابی نگارش فراگیران زبان انگلیسی به عنوان زبان خارجه مورد بررسی قرار دهد. به این منظور مقالات 32 دانشجوی ایرانی زبان انگلیسی بوسیله شش مصحح ارزشیابی و نتایج با استفاده از مدل رش و برنامه فست مورد تحلیل قرار گرفتند. یافته ها نشان دادند که تفاوتهای معنی داری در میزان سختگیری مصحح ها وجود دارد و تعامل مصحح با فراگیر باعث ایجاد تورش در ارزشیابی میشود. از آنجایی که ارزیابی مهارت نوشتن امری ذهنی میباشد و بر اساس داوری مصحح می تواند متغیر باشد، بررسی و شناخت عواملی که باعث عینی تر شدن این ارزیابی میشود امری ضروری به شمارمی رود. ذهنی بودن روند ارزیابی مهارت نوشتن تهدیدی برای روایی آزمون است و سبب می شود که نمره فراگیر نشان دهنده مهارت واقعی وی نباشد. این تحقیق نشان می دهد چطور ارزیابی می تواند کارامد و سودمند باشد و چگونه می توان انصاف و صحت عملکرد ذهنی را سنجید.

هدف از انجام این تحقیق بررسی رابطه کاربرد استراتژیهاییادگیری لغات و خودگردانی بین زبان آموزان ایرانیزبان انگلیسی به عنوان زبان خارجی با توجه به جنسیت بود. بدین منظور از تعداد 82 (39 مرد و43 زن) دانشجوی سال دوم و سوم رشته آموزش زبان انگلیسی که حداقل 45 واحد درسی را دردانشگاه آزاد تبریز، ایران گذرانده بودند، خواسته شد تا با پر کردن پرسشنامه خودگردانی و پرسشنامه استراتژیهاییادگیری لغات در این مطالعه شرکت کنند. پس از کنار گذاشتن پرسشنامه های ناقص، 70 پرسشنامه قابل قبول در تحلیل آماری مورد استفاده قرار گرفت. تجزیه و تحلیل همبستگی، رابطه مثبت و معناداری را بین کاربرد استراتژیهای یادگیری لغات زبان آموزان زبان انگلیسی بعنوان زبان خارجی و خودگردانی آنان، هم برای مردان و هم برای زنان نشان داد. این یافته ها میتواند برخی از مضامین آموزشی را برای آموزگاران در بر داشته باشد.

The present study is an attempt to find out whether there is a significant relationship between EFL teachers’ Big Five personality traits and their self-concept. In addition, ittried to examine if there is any significant relationship between teachers' teaching experienceand their self-concept. 112 EFL teachers participated in this study. They were asked to complete NEO Five Factor Inventory and Teacher Self-concept Evaluation Scale. Data were analyzed using Correlation, Multiple Regressions, and ANOVA. Results indicated thatself-concept was significantly correlated with four components of the Big-Five personality traits.It was positively related with ""Neuroticism"", ""Openness to experience"" and ""Conscientiousness"", but negatively related with ""Agreeableness"". It was also revealed that there was not any statistically significant difference among the three groups (low, mid, and high experience EFL teachers) with respect to their self-concept. The overall results of the study were discussed, and the implications for policy and practice were made.

Abstract in every research paper has always been functioning as an attention-grabber which can encourage readers to keep reading the research or to dissuade it. Although abstracts are believed to play an important role in distributing the research findings, few studies have been done to evaluate the rhetorical organization of thesis abstracts, especially in the field of Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). Thus, the purpose of the present study was to analyze the rhetorical moves of the MA thesis abstracts written from 1988 to 2015 in the field of TEFL in Allameh Tabataba’i University (ATU), an Iranian university. To this end, 300 MA thesis abstracts were analyzed based on Hyland’s (2000) rhetorical move framework. To track the rhetorical move trends of the thesis abstracts and for the ease of analysis, they were analyzed in three time intervals. The results revealed that while in the first interval (1988-1997) the most frequent rhetorical moves were the “Purpose”, “Method”, and “Product”, in the other two intervals (1998-2007 and 2008-2015) the “Purpose” was the most used rhetorical move. In addition, the least frequent rhetorical moves were the “Introduction” and “Conclusion” for the three intervals. The findings, on top of these, indicated that the rhetorical move patterns of thesis abstracts moved from Purpose-Method-Product (P-M-Pr) to Introduction-Purpose-Method-Product-Conclusion (I-P-M-Pr-C). That said, it can be concluded that in the examined thesis abstracts, the highest average of information was provided on the “Purpose” of the study, while the other moves, especially the conclusion move, was not deemed important; moreover, an increasing rate of information provision was detected on the “Method” and “Product” moves. This research bears some implications for L2 learners to better know their community of practice and writing instructors to prepare genre-based writing materials.

Though privileges ascribed to various facets of language learning strategy training have long been espoused with regard to varied language skills and components, the role some individual variables such as emotional intelligence might play in this respect seems to have received very scant attention. The researchers in the current study embarked on a probe into the impact of metacognitive strategy training on Iranian EFL learners' argumentative writing performance, in the light of individuals' emotional intelligence and gender differences. To this end, a total of 69 advanced EFL institute learners were selected as the participants of the research. The experimental group members were, then, treated through the application of O'Malley and Chamot's (1990) CALLA (Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach) for metacognitive writing strategy training. Moreover, Bar-On's (1997a, 1997b) Emotional Quotient Inventory (EQ-i) was administered to learners to gain insight into their emotional intelligence status. The final analysis of data via running t-test and three-way ANOVA revealed significant differences between the performance of control and experimental groups. Additionally, while gender differences were found to produce significant writing performance differences, disparities in learners' emotional intelligence level didn't significantly affect the degree of gains resulting from metacognitive strategy training.

The present study was aimed at examining concerns about the social effects of EFL learning, a challenging area of research which has not been discussed sufficiently. It tried to investigate the relationship between EFL learning and national identity. In addition, attempt was made to find a relationship between language motivation types and national identity. Furthermore, the role of two demographic variables, gender and age was examined. To this end, a sample consisting of 350 undergraduates studying at Allameh Tabataba'i University in Tehran took part in the study. A questionnaire on national identity and another one on language motivation types followed by an interview were the instruments used. The questionnaires had already been developed. However, there were some major modifications for the former which consisted of 30 items measuring national identity for all participants. The latter contained 42 items measuring language motivation types for only EFL learners. The Regression analysis, independent samples t-tests and a one-way ANOVA were run. The results revealed that claims over the harmful social effects of EFL learning were not arguably significant and it was found that among the eight language motivation types, going abroad and social responsibility were correlated with national identity. Furthermore, gender and age indicated significant differences among the participants' tendencies. The findings indicated that the social concerns about EFL learning are too pessimistic. So, materials developers, syllabus designers and teachers might consider the potentiality of some social elementsand demographic variables for the development of EFL learning.

Self-regulation is the ability to regulate one’s cognition, behavior, actions, and motivation strategically and autonomously in order to achieve self-set goals including the learning of academic skills and knowledge. Accordingly, self-regulated learning involves self-generated and systematic thoughts and behaviors with the aim of attaining learning goals. With that in mind, this study aimed to examine the effect of self-regulation instruction to the intermediate EFL readers on their ability to make within-text inferences while reading. Zimmerman’s model of self-regulation with its three cyclic phases of forethought, performance and self-reflection constituted the theoretical basis of this study. Two intact intermediate classes in an English language institute were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. The experimental group was trained in self-regulatory processes which were directed at EFL reading comprehension for ten sessions, while the control group received the routine, traditional reading instruction involving pre-, while-, and post-reading tasks and activities. The results of parametric one-way between-group ANCOVA showed that the experimental group outperformed the control group on the post-test of EFL reading comprehension, particularly in term of within-text inferencing. This finding revealed that self-regulation instruction aimed at EFL reading comprehension significantly contributed to learners’ ability to make correct within-text inferences while reading in English as a foreign language.

During the last decades various researchers noticed that the traditional approaches to teaching had failed to teach learners to their utmost actual ability, therefore they put great efforts into developing post-modernist approaches and techniques such as critical thinking (CT) and cooperative learning (CL) for improving learning.The present study was an attempt to investigate the comparative effect of practicing CL and CT skills on EFL learners’ writing in a process-based approach to writing on EFL learners’ writing. Sixty Iranian female EFL learners at the intermediate level of English proficiency at Kish Language School were selected among a total number of 90 based on their performance on the Preliminary English Test (PET) and randomly assigned into two groups of CL and CT. Then the researchers administered an argumentative paragraph writing test to ensure the homogeneity of the two groups regarding argumentative writing before the treatment. Both groups were taught the same content through process-based approach throughout the 20-session treatment. Finally, the participants took a paragraph writing posttest including three writing prompts in argumentative genre. The mean scores of the two groups on the posttest were compared through an independent samples t-test. The results led to the rejection of the null hypothesis with the conclusion that CT instruction was significantly more effective than CL in improving EFL learners’ argumentative paragraph writing.