Attributions for Success and Failure: Gender and Language Proficiency Differences among Iranian EFL Learners

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 518 ◽  
Author(s):  
Afsane Mohammadi ◽  
Masoud Sharififar

The study examined the attributions of Iranian English language learners for their successes and failure s in learning English as foreign language and to determine the relationship between learners' gender and attributions. Moreover, the relationship between their proficiency level and attributions was investigated. To this end, the Attribution Theory for Foreign Language Learners Questionnaire (ATFLL) was administered to 200 English language students studying in different private language institutes of Kerman and Mashhad, Iran. A theoretical framework adopted from Weiner (1986) was applied to categorize students' responses based on attributions (ability, effort, task difficulty and luck).  To analyze the data, SPSS 22.0 was employed. The results of the study indicated that learners attributed their success and failure to both internal and external factors but giving more priority to external factors. Furthermore, it was revealed that there were significant relationships between learner's gender, proficiency level and attributions.

2022 ◽  
pp. 96-113
Author(s):  
Zeynep Çetin Köroğlu ◽  
Özlem Utku Bilici

Foreign language speaking skills as productive skills are considered one of the concrete shreds of evidence for language proficiency. For this reason, teaching and measuring foreign language speaking skills ability has great importance for all levels of education. Especially with the developing technology, there are various educational tools for teaching and measuring speaking skills in a foreign language. In the present study, the application of Flipgrid will be introduced and examined as one of these tools, and accordingly, a lesson plan will be prepared showing how the tool can be used in foreign language classes. It is thought that the current study will contribute to teachers' professional developments who are working in the field of foreign language education, to teacher educators, and to students who learn English as a foreign language.


2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 166
Author(s):  
Maryam Farnia ◽  
Atena Farhangi ◽  
Masoud Saeedi

As an instance of foreign language comprehension, L2 humor perception is proved to be challenging for the foreign language learners. However, the body of literature is heavier on the side of humor production than humor perception. The current study explores the extent to which Iranian English as foreign language (EFL) learners perceive different types of English humor in comparison with the English native speakers. The participants were 153 Iranian EFL learners at intermediate level of language proficiency who were randomly selected from English language learners from several English language institutes in Shiraz, Iran, and 30 American English native speakers who voluntarily participated in this study. A questionnaire consisting of six contextualized jokes of three major types of universal, cultural and linguistic (with morphological, phonological, lexical and syntactic subcategories)was developed based on Schmitz's classification of verbal humor to obtain the quantitative data. Moreover, a semi-structured interview was conducted to elicit the perception of those participants who did not find the jokes humorous. The results showed that the majority of Iranian EFL participants did not realize the humor in the jokes. Also, the findings revealed that generally speaking, Iranian EFL learners' perception of humor is significantly lower in all types of jokes examined. The best perceived type of humor was found to be the linguistic humor of morphological type for the Iranian EFL learners and the lexical type for English native speakers. It was also discovered that the phonological humor was the least perceived type of humor for both Iranian EFL learners and English native speakers.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 30
Author(s):  
Imam Khasbani ◽  
Didin Nuruddin Hidayat

Motivation has been long believed to be an essential contributor to students’ success in learning English. Many studies (e.g., Gbollie & Keamu, 2017; Wang, 2008; Zhang & Xiao, 2006) have been dedicated to investigating the relationship between motivation and success in learning English. While these studies have contributed to shedding light on the importance of motivation on students’ achievement in learning English, insufficient research has been conducted to address the concept of motivation itself, how the concept has evolved since the first time it was developed, and to what extent motivation affects both teachers and students’ performances at school. Owing to this fact, the present article seeks to discuss the notion and conceptualization of motivation by following several steps. First, the present paper took on arguments from prominent figures on the field of motivation to explore the essence of motivation and why it is essential for English as second or foreign language (ESL/EFL) learning. The conversation then built on the current theoretical framework of types and factors influencing student and teacher motivation. Following that, a plethora of discussions on the possible ways to increase student and teacher enthusiasm and motivation inside EFL classrooms were elaborated.


2011 ◽  
Vol 16 (7) ◽  
pp. 388-391
Author(s):  
Conrado L. Gómez ◽  
Terri L. Kurz

English language learners (ELLs) at the preproduction phase, or initial phase, of language proficiency have limited oral English language skills; however, they do not lack cognitive abilities (de Jong and Harper 2005). On the contrary, most ELLs possess previous language and academic experiences. They can understand and articulate through nonverbal means (such as by drawing pictures) much more than they can demonstrate through speaking. Because many teachers may not fully understand the relationship between cognitive ability and language proficiency, they fail to challenge ELLs with higher-level activities (de Jong and Derrick-Mescua 2003).


2022 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-39
Author(s):  
Nazmiye Yemez ◽  
Kenan Dikilitaş

Bilingualism has long been within the scope of creativity studies that investigate creativity and problem solving. This study aims to explore the possible effect of bilingualism on the verbal creativity of English language learners. Participants from a bilingual and an English as foreign language teaching program within the same school were selected as an experimental and a control group respectively to compare verbal creativity. A series of creative English writing tasks designed by the authors were assigned to a total of 86 third grade (aged 7–8) students. Both the English as foreign language group (N = 42) and the bilingual group (N = 44) were subject to assessment and evaluation in terms of verbal creativity. The two cohorts completed the same creative writing tasks that were then assessed by a board of five English teachers from the same school who were trained by the authors to assess verbal creativity using a Student Product Assessment Form. An independent samples Student’s t-test was conducted and descriptive statistics of both cohorts for 9 of the assessment form were analyzed. The results showed that the students on the bilingual program outperformed those on the English as foreign language program in terms of verbal creativity. The study offers implications for English language teaching in primary schools with reference to developing creative verbal language skills at early ages.


Author(s):  
Ali Akbar Khansir ◽  
Afsaneh Salehabadi

As the topic suggests, the research paper presents Study of Consonant Pronunciations Errors Committed by EFL Learners. Error analysis always tries to resolve language learners’ problems in acquiring second or foreign language setting. Learning to English pronunciation is perhaps as important as learning listening skill, speaking, and spelling. Errors in English pronunciation create several problems for English language learners in their works. In other words, most of the English language errors of pronunciation are due to the lack of knowledge of language learners. However, all the students in our sample are of age group (16-25) at Bushehr language institute and they are all Iranian nationals. In addition, all of them were female learners. An English pronunciation (consonant) test was used to get information about the knowledge of the learners in English pronunciation. Findings of this article indicated that the first and second hypotheses of this article were accepted, but the third hypothesis was rejected. However, the findings of this paper showed that the Iranian EFL students have problem to pronounce English sounds correctly.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 105-115
Author(s):  
Suprihadi Suprihadi ◽  
Muh. Syafei

The dual-role of the students of English Education Department Teacher Training and Education Faculty Muria Kudus University as both English language learners and language users gets them to be autonomous, effective, efficient, and strategic readers. The objective of this research is to investigate the relationship between quality of the reading strategy and academic achievement of the students. The subjects of this research were 104 students of EED UMK comprising of all semesters taken randomly. The instrument used was closed-ended questionnaire. The result of this research reveals that there is no relationship between quality of the reading strategy and academic achievement, meaning that the quality of reading strategy does not influence the academic achievement of the students. Implikasions and recommendations for the institution and for further research were proposed.


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