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Alternative assessment approaches received considerable attention soon after a discontent with traditional, one-shot testing. These approaches, however, have been used only to improve learners’ linguistic ability despite communicative models of language which pointed that knowledge of language also involves pragmatic ability (Bachman, 1990; Bachman & Palmer, 1996). The present study tries to explore the effect of two alternative assessment approaches (self-assessment and conference) on students’ production of four speech acts (apology, complaint, request, and refusal) plus politeness markers. A sample of 64 EFL students participated in this study. Metapragmatic explanations were given to three groups of university students studying English as a foreign language. The two treatment groups received instruction through self-assessment and conference and a comparison group was exposed to the conventional one-shot testing. The results of the One-Way ANOVA conducted after the treatment revealed an outperformance of alternative assessment approaches to the conventional one in the production of the four speech acts and politeness markers in WDCTs. A qualitative analysis of students’ self-ratings in the self-assessment group revealed that they focused more on linguistic criteria during the initial sessions and on pragmatic ones by the end of the treatment. It can be concluded that alternative assessment approaches are beneficial to students’ production of speech acts and politeness markers. In the end, the applicability and the positive effect of alternative approaches in pragmatic assessment are emphasized.

This study aimed to explore the relationships between foreign language learners’ self-identity changes, motivation types, and Foreign Language proficiency associated with learning English in private language schools in Iranian context. Based on a stratified sampling, 204 English as a foreign language learners from three language schools in Tehran were selected to participate in the study. The instruments were a 30-item Likert-scale questionnaire on motivation types in seven categories: intrinsic interest, immediate achievement, learning situation, going aboard, social responsibility, individual development, and information medium; a 24-item Likert-scale questionnaire on self-identity changes in six categories: self-confidence change, additive change, subtractive change, productive change, split change, and zero change. Results revealed that self-confidence change was the prominent change common among foreign language learners. Canonical correlation analysis revealed that motivation types and self-identity changes were related through three pairs of canonical variables: intrinsic orientations related with personal identity changes, instrumental orientations related with cultural changes, and instrumental orientations related learners’ self-confidence change. Theoretical and pedagogical implications for foreign language learning and teaching are also discussed.

ELT has recently witnessed a shift away from a method-bound orientation and toward a post-methodic view of teaching English. Consequently, the focus of some second language teacher education programs has shifted toward sociopolitical aspects of ELT (Miller, 2004) and its contributions to reinforcement or transformation of the status quo (Kumaravadivelu, 2003a). Yet, in many countries, including Iran, ELT teacher education has maintained a relatively method-bound focus on technical dimensions of teaching English and has avoided adopting a critical and sociopolitical approach to ELT. In order to investigate the ways in which teacher education as currently practiced facilitates or stifles implementation of postmethod in ELT, the present study explored English teachers’ perceptions of the dominant approaches to teacher education in ELT centers in Iran and their ideological and pedagogical bases. To this end, 23 language teachers were interviewed about the logistics, content, and procedures of the teacher education programs they had attended. The analysis of the interviews, as directed by grounded theory, yielded three themes, namely no/little teacher learners’ involvement in course design and implementation, dominance of a transmission model, and dominance of a linguistic and technical focus

مطالعه ی حاضر به بررسی تاثیر جنسیت براستفاده از مغلطه های بی قاعده بحث و استدلال در نوشته های (مقالات) استدلالی انگلیسی زبان آموزان ایرانی در سطح پیشرفته توانایی زبان انگلیسی می پردازد. مجموعه متون مورد بررسی این مطالعه شامل 120 نوشته ی زبان آموزان دختروپسر بود. سن و رشته ی دانشگاهی زبان آموزان دیگرمتغیرهای مستقل تحقیق بودند. نه نوع مهم مغلطه های بی قاعده در متون بررسی شدند و فراوانی های به دست آمده ازطریق تست آماری مانوا تحلیل شدند. به طورکلی برای مغلطه های بی قاعده ، نتایج تست های آماری مالتی وریت برای همه ی متغیرهای مستقل و تعامل آنها تفاوت معناداری را نشان نداد ولی سه مورد تفاوت مجزا مشاهده شد. در پایان تحقیق ، نتایج مطالعه در مقایسه با پژوهش های قبلی بررسی شده است و دستاوردهایی پیشنهاد شده است.