scholarly journals Making Asian Learners Talk: Encouraging Willingness to Communicate

RELC Journal ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 47 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vatsana Vongsila ◽  
Hayo Reinders

Developing English for communicative purposes is a key objective of language classes in many parts of the world. As a logical prerequisite to communication practice, learners need to have Willingness to Communicate (WTC) before they will engage in L2 interaction (Macintyre et al., 1998). Teachers can play an important role in helping learners to develop WTC (Dörnyei, 2007), however, since research into this topic is relatively recent, not much is known about how teachers go about this process. For this reason, the present study investigated teachers’ perceptions of their role in fostering WTC through interviews and questionnaires and compared these with observations of their classroom practices. The research was conducted in New Zealand ESOL class that focused predominantly on communicative skills, catering mostly to Asian learners. The results showed that teachers believed they play a key role in helping learners to develop WTC and identified a range of strategies they used in class. Classroom observations confirmed the use of some strategies although no explicit encouragement of language practice outside the classroom was made. This paper identifies some possible reasons for this mismatch and concludes with practical recommendations for ESOL teachers who wish to support learners’ WTC.

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Widya Agustini

This study aimed at describing teachers' perceptions on the concept, implementation, and impact of constructivism values in public primary schools in Badung Regency; how the teachers practice and implement constructivism values in the classroom; and finding out the relation of teachers' perceptions about constructivism values and its practices in the classroom. This study was designed in the form of a mixed methods with the embedded design in which the quantitative data were more dominant than the qualitative data so that the data were described descriptively and quantitatively. The subjects of this study were three English teachers with the same qualifications of educational background (English Education) from three different public primary schools in Badung Regency. The data related to teachers’ perceptions were collected through questionnaire administration, the classroom practices and implementation were collected through classroom observations, and supported with interviews. After the data were collected, the data were analyzed quantitatively to analyze the results of the questionnaire, and qualitatively by using interactive analysis model to analyze the results of classroom observations and interviews. The results of the study indicated that: first, the teachers had strong perceptions on the concept, implementation, and impact of constructivism values; second, the frequency of occurrences on the practices of constructivism values in the classroom was categorized as low frequency which indicated that the teachers rarely practiced constructivism values in the classroom; third, since the teachers had strong perceptions on constructivism values but the frequency of the practices was categorized as low frequency. It could be concluded that the teachers tend to be inconsistent between their perceptions on constructivism values with its practices in the classroom


Author(s):  
Peter Hoar

Kia ora and welcome to the second issue of BackStory. The members of the Backstory Editorial Team were gratified by the encouraging response to the first issue of the journal. We hope that our currentreaders enjoy our new issue and that it will bring others to share our interest in and enjoyment of the surprisingly varied backstories of New Zealand’s art, media, and design history. This issue takes in a wide variety of topics. Imogen Van Pierce explores the controversy around the Hundertwasser Art Centre and Wairau Māori Art Gallery to be developed in Whangarei. This project has generated debate about the role of the arts and civic architecture at both the local and national levels. This is about how much New Zealanders are prepared to invest in the arts. The value of the artist in New Zealand is also examined by Mark Stocker in his article about the sculptor Margaret Butler and the local reception of her work during the late 1930s. The cultural cringe has a long genealogy. New Zealand has been photographed since the 1840s. Alan Cocker analyses the many roles that photography played in the development of local tourism during the nineteenth century. These images challenged notions of the ‘real’ and the ‘artificial’ and how new technologies mediated the world of lived experience. Recorded sound was another such technology that changed how humans experienced the world. The rise of recorded sound from the 1890s affected lives in many ways and Lewis Tennant’s contribution captures a significant tipping point in this medium’s history in New Zealand as the transition from analogue to digital sound transformed social, commercial and acoustic worlds. The New Zealand Woman’s Weekly celebrates its 85th anniversary this year but when it was launched in 1932 it seemed tohave very little chance of success. Its rival, the Mirror, had dominated the local market since its launch in 1922. Gavin Ellis investigates the Depression-era context of the Woman’s Weekly and how its founders identified a gap in the market that the Mirror was failing to fill. The work of the photographer Marti Friedlander (1908-2016) is familiar to most New Zealanders. Friedlander’s 50 year career and huge range of subjects defy easy summary. She captured New Zealanders, their lives, and their surroundings across all social and cultural borders. In the journal’s profile commentary Linda Yang celebrates Freidlander’s remarkable life and work. Linda also discusses some recent images by Friedlander and connects these with themes present in the photographer’s work from the 1960s and 1970s. The Backstory editors hope that our readers enjoy this stimulating and varied collection of work that illuminate some not so well known aspects of New Zealand’s art, media, and design history. There are many such stories yet to be told and we look forward to bringing them to you.


Author(s):  
Patricia O'Brien

This is a biography of Ta’isi O. F. Nelson, the Sāmoan nationalist leader who fought New Zealand, the British Empire and the League of Nations between the world wars. It is a richly layered history that weaves a personal and Pacific history with one that illuminates the global crisis of empire after World War One. Ta’isi’s story weaves Sweden with deep histories of Sāmoa that in the late nineteenth century became deeply inflected with colonial machinations of Germany, Britain, New Zealand and the U. S.. After Sāmoa was made a mandate of the League of Nations in 1921, the workings and aspirations of that newly minted form of world government came to bear on the island nation and Ta’isi and his fellow Sāmoan tested the League’s powers through their relentless non-violent campaign for justice. Ta’isi was Sāmoa’s leading businessman who was blamed for the on-going agitation in Sāmoa; for his trouble he was subjected to two periods of exile, humiliation and a concerted campaign intent on his financial ruin. Using many new sources, this book tells Ta’isi’s untold story, providing fresh and intriguing new aspects to the global story of indigenous resistance in the twentieth century.


Author(s):  
Naresh Vaid

Anthropology is a dynamic discipline that has a cut-out task to provide solutions to the challenges faced by the world societies. While contribution of Anthropology is recognized in most parts of the world, India, particularly after the mid-1980s, has shown its reluctance to respond to various problems and, subsequently, ignored by planners, policymakers, administrators, and even other sister disciplines. Anthropologists have the vast knowledge of human societies, methodology, experience, and communicative skills to provide solutions to those problems. Therefore, there is an urgent need to revive the zeal of anthropologists to respond to all sorts of problems being faced by India and take the lead in providing solutions to those problems. Otherwise, anthropology may be marginalized further, and it may be suicidal for the discipline as also for its practitioners.


1992 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 218
Author(s):  
Cecil J. Houston ◽  
Donald Harman Akenson ◽  
Richard Kearney ◽  
Patrick O'Farrell
Keyword(s):  

2015 ◽  
Vol 178 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 190-200 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.A. Ohneiser ◽  
S.F. Hills ◽  
N.J. Cave ◽  
D. Passmore ◽  
M. Dunowska

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