Foreign language peace of mind: a positive emotion drawn from the Chinese EFL learning context

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Zhou ◽  
Jean-Marc Dewaele ◽  
Katja Lochtman ◽  
Yiheng Xi
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Positive Emotion ◽  
Discriminant Validity ◽  
Measurement Scale ◽  
Cultural Tradition ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Peace Of Mind ◽  
Chinese Learners

Abstract This study presents a new positive emotion construct, 外语平和心态 (waiyu pinghe xintai) or Foreign Language Peace of Mind (FLPOM), drawn from the Chinese cultural tradition. It is a low-arousal positive (LAP) emotional state (e.g., calmness, peacefulness) and a state of internal harmony. Three sub-studies were conducted. In Study 1, a measurement scale of FLPOM was developed and validated. In Study 2, the FLPOM scale was administered to Chinese English as a Foreign Language learners along the Chinese Foreign Language Enjoyment (FLE) scale which can potentially reflect slightly more high-arousal positive (HAP) states (e.g., joy, enthusiasm) to test the discriminability of FLPOM from FLE. Study 3 examined the extents to which FLPOM and FLE predict Chinese learners’ language proficiency. Correlation and discriminant validity analysis confirmed that FLPOM and FLE were related but discriminable emotion constructs. Stepwise regression analyses revealed that FLPOM was a stronger predictor of Chinese learners’ self-perceived FL proficiency than FLE. Possible implications on FL teaching and learning in the Chinese context were provided.

scholarly journals A Positive Psychology Perspective on Positive Emotion and Foreign Language Enjoyment Among Chinese as a Second Language Learners Attending Virtual Online Classes in the Emergency Remote Teaching Context Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic

2022 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qing Wang ◽  
Yuhong Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Online Learning ◽  
Second Language ◽  
Positive Psychology ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Positive Emotion ◽  
Chinese Language ◽  
Language Achievement ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Psychology Perspective

This study adopted a positive psychology perspective to investigate positive emotion and foreign language enjoyment among Chinese as a second language (CSL) learners in an emergency remote teaching (ERT) context amid the COVID-19 pandemic. A set of 90 preparatory Chinese language students (40 males and 50 females) was assessed for their level of foreign language enjoyment using the Foreign Language Enjoyment Scale (FLES). Participles' scores on self-perceived language achievement and actual test scores were adopted as the measurement of their Chinese language proficiency. The results revealed that: (1) CSL learners experienced high level of FL enjoyment in an online learning context, (2) no significant correlation was found between FLE and leaners' actual language achievement nor between FLE and their self-perceived achievement, (3) female learners showed higher FLE than male learners and gender was found to have a significant effect on FLE-Private, (4) participants' geological location, i.e., whether in China or at home countries, significantly influenced their FLE, (5) participants' regional group was not a significant predictor of FLE, and (6) teacher-related variables and learner self-perceptions of achievement were strong predictors of FLE among CSL learners. The findings highlight the importance of teacher's role in an online learning environment and suggest that FLE may not boost performance in the short term for language beginners but is still conducive in the long run. Implications for both teachers and learners, and suggestions for future researches are provided.

scholarly journals English foreign language teaching anxiety of Indonesian pre-service teachers of undergraduate internship program

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 222
Author(s):  
Huyi Intan Sari ◽  
Choiril Anwar
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Time Management ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
English Language ◽  
Language Teaching ◽  
Language Education ◽  
Teaching Experience ◽  
Negative Evaluation ◽  
Teaching Anxiety

Anxiety is a topic mostly investigated in the field of foreign language education. Unfortunately, the main focus of the studies on the aforementioned topic has primarily been provided in relation to anxiety suffered by students not teachers. Anxiety in speaking English while teaching has been proven to be a separate obstacle to the success of the language teaching and learning. This still happens to teachers who even have years of teaching experience. This study aims to investigate the English language teaching anxiety as experienced by the pre-service teacher at the department. The FLTA questionnaire consisting of 27 out of 45 items was adopted to collect data. Since this study was carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic, the questionnaire was distributed to the participants via email. The analysis was then made by implementing the qualitative descriptive approach and simple quantification to support the description. The results show that there were five factors of anxiety occur during the program. They were teaching inexperience, self-perception of language proficiency, fear of negative evaluation, lack of student�s interest, and difficulty with time management. These findings are expected to become a reference for the efforts of developing an internship preparation program.

Variable future-time reference in French: A comparison of learners in a study-abroad and a foreign-language context

2016 ◽  
Vol 61 (3) ◽  
pp. 259-285 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aarnes Gudmestad ◽  
Amanda Edmonds
Keyword(s):  
Study Abroad ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Developmental Trajectories ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Future Time ◽  
Foreign Language Learners ◽  
Language Proficiency Test

AbstractThis study seeks to advance understanding of second-language (L2) acquisition of future-time reference in French, by comparing the developmental trajectories of learners living in and away from the target-language setting. Study-abroad learners in France (n= 45), foreign-language learners living in the US (n= 37), and native speakers of Hexagonal French (n= 30) participated in this study. They completed a written-contextualized task, a language-proficiency test and a background questionnaire. For each written-contextualized-task item, participants selected from among three responses that differed with respect to the form (inflectional future, periphrastic future, present). Items were designed to test for the influence of three factors on the form selected: presence/absence of a lexical temporal indicator, temporal distance, and (un)certainty. Additionally, two extra-linguistic factors were examined: learning context and proficiency level. The analyses of frequency and the multinomial logistic regressions suggest that, despite developmental similarities between learning contexts, acquisitional paths of study-abroad and foreign-language learners were not identical.

scholarly journals Questioning in English as a Foreign Language University Classes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Van Anh Phan
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
English Language ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Communicative Interaction ◽  
Learning And Teaching ◽  
Teachers And Students ◽  
Efl Classrooms

<p>Vietnam has experienced many changes in education and in teaching and learning English as a foreign language since 1986 (Hoang, 2010). There are ongoing concerns about how to best develop English proficiency in EFL classes, especially how to promote students’ English communicative competency in this context. Questioning is an essential tool to help EFL teachers fulfil instructional goals (Boyd, 2015). Questioning particularly plays an important role in creating interactions to promote student’s English language proficiency in EFL classroom (Tuan & Nhu, 2010). Therefore, my study investigated how teachers and students perceived and used questioning to promote English teaching and learning in tertiary EFL classrooms in Vietnam. This also shed light on the implementation of communicative language teaching (CLT) in Vietnam. My study uses a sociocultural lens, with a qualitative multiple case design (Creswell, 2015; Johnson & Christensen, 2014). The two cases investigate questioning in classes where English was taught as a non-major subject, and questioning in classes where English was taught as a major. Data were triangulated through semi-structured and stimulated recall interviews with eight teachers, focus groups with eight groups of students, and observations of eight EFL classes. Thematic analysis was conducted to analyse data to find out the themes, the “important idea that occurs multiple times” in the data (Johnson & Christensen, 2014, p. 600) Three themes about questioning arose from studying these Vietnamese EFL classes. Firstly, questioning involved communicative interaction, which created opportunities for participants to communicate in the target language. This interaction also empowered students to engage in the lesson. Secondly, using questioning teachers orchestrated learning, diagnosed learning needs, and facilitated classroom relationships. The third theme, “My home, my rules” indicates that questioning was contextually situated. Questioning within these EFL classrooms in Vietnam reflected cultural features, such as the traditional roles of teacher and student, the concern for face or status, and the use of Vietnamese in English classes.  My data show that both teachers and students can use questioning to promote language learning through critical thinking and collaborative learning. These are central interactive and communicative skills in tertiary EFL teaching and learning in Vietnam. The effectiveness of questioning in my study depended on teachers’ skills. It was a commonly used technique to develop English language learning.  This study proposes an adapted model of learning and teaching to capture EFL learning. The model captures how teachers apply CLT and teach English for different purposes. It also emphasises the contextual features influencing questioning and therefore teaching and learning the target language. In this model, questioning is at the centre, promoting learning relationships among the teacher and students. The study contributes to an understanding of using questioning to promote language learning in EFL classroom in an Asian context, and may be relevant to CLT application for language learning classrooms in a wider international context.</p>

scholarly journals Interculturalidade, representação e identidade em contextos de aprendizagem de língua estrangeira via teletandem

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 18-33
Author(s):  
Adriana Celia Alves
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
English Learners ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Foreign Language Learners ◽  
Dynamic Relations ◽  
Interactional Process

RESUMO: Este trabalho teve como objetivo analisar as representações que emergiram das interações de teletandementre os aprendizes de línguas estrangeiras quanto aos aspectos histórico-políticos de seus países. Discutem-se as negociações dessas representações no processo interacional em diálogo com o outro interagente. Os dados analisados foram extraídos das interações em português, realizadas entre estudantes de graduação norte-americanos, aprendizes de português e estudantes de graduação brasileiros, aprendizes de língua inglesa. Apoia-se nas discussões de Bronckart (2012) sobre representação, de sujeito na pós-modernidade,de Hall (2002), e no conceito de cultura conforme proposto por Welsch (1999), sendo ela transcultural, um processo híbrido e heterogêneo fundado em relações dinâmicas entre culturas. Por meio de uma análise interpretativa qualitativa, foi observado que o contexto de aprendizagem de teletandem constituiu importante locus para o contato intercultural. Assim, verificou-se que as representações foram enunciadas a partir de posições político-ideológicas e contextuais. Desse modo, é importante uma discussão reflexiva dessas representações, para que elas não se tornem um conhecimento fossilizado. Entende-se, também, que as identidades dos participantes se constroem em processos dinâmicos e são caracterizadas pela fluidez e heterogeneidade. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: ensino-aprendizagem de língua estrangeira; teletandem; interculturalidade; representações.   ABSTRACT: The main objective of this work is aimed to analyze the representations that emerged from the teletandem interactions among foreign language learners, regarding the historical-political aspects of their countries, discussing the negotiations of these representations in the interactional process in dialogue with the other interacting agent. The data analyzed were extracted from the interactions in Portuguese, carried out among North American undergraduates, Portuguese learners and Brazilian undergraduate students, English learners. It is based on Bronckart's (2012) discussion of representation, subject in the postmodernity of Hall (2002) and in the concept of culture as proposed by Welsch (1999), cross-cultural, hybrid and heterogeneous process based on dynamic relations among cultures. Through a qualitative interpretative analysis, it was observed that the teletandem learning context constituted an important locus for intercultural contact. Therefore, it was verified that the representations were enunciated from political-ideological and contextual positions, thus, a reflexive discussion of these representations is important, in order that not to become a fossilized knowledge. Finally, the identities of the participants are also built in dynamic processes and are characterized by fluidity and heterogeneity. KEYWORDS: teaching and learning a foreign language; teletandem; interculturalism; representations.

scholarly journals A Corpus-based Study of Shields in Conversations of Chinese EFL Learners

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 828
Author(s):  
Hongying Liu
Keyword(s):  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Engineering Majors ◽  
Efl Learners ◽  
Spoken English ◽  
Fuzzy Language ◽  
Chinese Learners ◽  
Efl Students

As an important part of the fuzzy language, hedges have become a common linguistic phenomenon and frequently applied in daily spoken language. In this study, the authors investigated the shields-using frequency of Chinese EFL learners from the Multi-modal Spoken English Corpus of Chinese Learners-Science & Engineering Majors (MSECCL-SEM). In this study, the classification of Prince et al. (1982) will be adopted. Six shields that are frequently used in spoken English have been searched, namely, “I think”, “in my opinion”, “maybe”, “according to”, “as we (all) know”, “it is said that”. Data are analyzed by the application of Wordsmith 6.0 and SPSS 25.0. Through this study, we attempt to explore the characteristics of shields in spoken English of EFL learners, especially the differences in terms of gender, various language proficiency and two different kinds of shields. Through this research, the authors hope to guide second language teaching and learning by finding out the use of shields in EFL students' daily spoken language and analyzing its potential causes.

scholarly journals Kebolehbacaan Buku Teks Maharat Al-Qira’ah Berasaskan Ujian Kloz Dalam Kalangan Pelajar Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia

2017 ◽  
Vol 21 ◽  
pp. 61-73
Author(s):  
Aisyah Sjahrony ◽  
Maimun Aqsha Lubis Abdin Lubis
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Descriptive Analysis ◽  
Arabic Language ◽  
Average Score ◽  
Islamic Studies ◽  
Factors Associated ◽  
Low Level ◽  
National University

Textbooks are one of the reference materials in the teaching of Arabic in Malaysia. In line with the current development, the Arabic language has become an important foreign language after English. Arabic language achievement of students in the country is still at a low level. Among the factors associated with the weakness issues of Arabic language proficiency among students is the suitability of the language level in the textbooks. The objective of this study was to determine the level of readability of a textbook, Maharat al-Qira’ah at the Faculty of Islamic Studies, National University of Malaysia. The respondents comprised of 162 students. Data was collected through cloze tests and questionnaires and later analyzed using descriptive analysis. The average score for cloze test of textbook Maharat al-Qira’ah is defined by 65%, which translates that the level still remain at a low level and not appropriate for the purposes of teaching and learning. Therefore, the authorities should take into account the level of readability before any textbook is used as the learning resource so that it corresponds to the students’ level of language skills.   Abstrak Buku teks merupakan salah satu bahan rujukan utama dalam proses pengajaran dan pembelajaran bahasa Arab di Malaysia. Seiring dengan perkembangan semasa, bahasa Arab telah menjadi bahasa asing yang penting selepas bahasa Inggeris. Pencapaian bahasa Arab pelajar di negara ini masih di tahap lemah. Antara faktor dikaitkan dengan isu kelemahan bahasa Arab dalam kalangan pelajar adalah aras bahasa buku teks yang kurang sesuai dengan mereka. Oleh itu kajian ini bertujuan menentukan tahap kebolehbacaan buku teks Maharat al-Qira’ah yang dijadikan buku teks di Fakulti Pengajian Islam, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). Buku teks ini digunakan oleh pelajar Ijazah Sarjana Muda bagi subjek kemahiran bahasa Arab di universiti tersebut. Dalam mengukur tahap kebolehbacaan ujian Kloz dijalankan dalam kalangan pelajar dan melihat perbezaan skor ujian Kloz yang diperoleh dari aspek jantina pelajar, teksteks bacaan yang diuji dan pencapaian pelajar dalam peperiksaan akhir semester. Bagi mencapai objektif tersebut, satu tinjauan berupa ujian melalui satu set ujian Kloz telah dijalankan ke atas 162 orang pelajar. Data kajian dianalisis secara kuantitatif dekskriptif. Hasil ujian yang dijalankan mendapati skor purata ujian Kloz bagi buku teks Maharat al-Qira’ah adalah sebanyak 65% yang ditafsirkan masih berada pada tahap rendah, iaitu kurang sesuai untuk tujuan pengajaran dan pembelajaran di kelas. Oleh itu pihak yang berwajib seharusnya mengambil kira tahap kebolehbacaan teks yang disediakan sebelum dijadikan bahan pembelajaran pelajar agar sesuai dengan tahap kemahiran bahasa pelajar tersebut.

U.S. Language-in-Education Policy: Issues in Schooling of Language Minorities

1981 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 144-160
Author(s):  
Reynaldo F. Macías
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Language Contact ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Language Instruction ◽  
Foreign Language Instruction ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Black Vernacular ◽  
Language Minorities

A large literature exists on educational technology (instructional methods, materials, and facilities) and language minorities. Language policies--which guide the objectives and use of this technology--are explicit in some areas, like bilinguage policy. There are educational juris-dictions with responsibilities over teaching and learning. Foreign language policies are advocated more than officially recognized, yet the issue is very visible. The role of billingual education in generating language issues for discussion, debate, and policy making can be seen in its impact on other language related areas, such as foreign language instruction, desegregation policies, civil right, promotion of new innovative educational technologies (e.g., language proficiency assessment), TESOL, special education, inter-governmental relations (with Indian peoples, Puerto Rico, and the territories), and, indirectly, as it relates to instruction of Black vernacular English speakers, and instruction of the deaf. It is the (re-)opening of these language issues as they affect a cross section of the U.S. citizenry that is little recognized and, yet, profoundly important. Language permeates social relations, and so is the object of informal, if not formal, policies and norms most notably where there are groups in language contact, but also when language variation is a basis for social differentiation. That many of the works identified here do not deal with these relationships and differentions as they reflect the distribution of power on our society only idicates the youth of a slowly maturing educational language policy, planning, and politics literature.

scholarly journals Tertiary level proficiency in ESP: Employer survey analysis

CASALC Review ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 5
Author(s):  
Jana Jašková ◽  
Dagmar Šťastná
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Language Skills ◽  
English For Specific Purposes ◽  
University Graduates ◽  
Survey Analysis ◽  
Engineering Information ◽  
The Common ◽  
Technology And Economy

One of the most topical issues in the field of teaching and learning English for Specific Purposes is the question whether tertiary students are able to succeed in mastering English as a foreign language effectively and subsequently to be competitive in the multicultural corporate sphere. The paper presents a study aimed at large employers and their requirements on university graduates’ language skills. The research was conducted in November 2018 within 12th JobChallenge Fair in Brno, Czech Republic, where large companies and businesses targeted students as their prospective employees. Following theoretical groundwork, a questionnaire was designed and distributed to representatives of 36 companies operating in engineering, information technology and economy. The aim of the survey was to identify the required language proficiency according to the Common European Framework of References for Languages as a model for describing knowledge levels. Findings show that most of the employers prefer graduates in junior positions with B2 level of English, specifically of both English for General Purposes and English for Specific Purposes. In addition, the analysis reveals a great demand for productive skills such as active participating in meetings, telephoning, business correspondence or presentation skills whereas receptive skills are considered to be less important.

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