scholarly journals Using Drama and Drama Techniques to Teach English Conversations to English as A Foreign Language Learners

Author(s):  
Saman Masoumi-Moghaddam

The present study aimed to examine the ways in which drama and drama techniques and practices, as implemented in the English language classes and combined with pedagogical practices to teach and learn English conversation, can create the appropriate conditions that promote learning environments conducive for learning English conversations. The participants of this study were thirty undergraduate male and female students who had studied English at the secondary and high school levels at the public schools in Ardebil. They were classified into two groups including Control and Experimental groups. The two groups were administered a Test-Retest evaluation to measure the targeted language skills that was to be taught to them. In order to collect the necessary data, two modern plays were taught and rehearsed in classroom context and then a retest were administered after the practice of these two modern dramatic discourse in the classroom. The different data-collecting techniques were used for the current research were participant observation (direct and indirect), and interviews. After analysing the data the results showed that there was no significant improvement in English competence of the Control group but the Experimental group revealed a tremendous achievement in their abilities in English conversations through the use of dramatic discourse.

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 92-101
Author(s):  
Saman M. Moghadam ◽  
Reza Ghafarsamar

The present study aimed to examine the ways in which drama and drama techniques and practices, as implemented in the English language classes and combined with pedagogical practices to teach and learn English conversation, can create the appropriate conditions that promote learning environments conducive for learning English conversations. The participants of this study were thirty undergraduate male and female students who had studied English at the secondary and high school levels at the public schools in Ardebil. They were classified into two groups including Control and Experimental groups. The two groups were administered a Test-Retest evaluation to measure the targeted language skills that was to be taught to them. In order to collect the necessary data, two modern plays were taught and rehearsed in classroom context and then a retest were administered after the practice of these two modern dramatic discourse in the classroom. The different data-collecting techniques were used for the current research were participant observation (direct and indirect), and interviews. After analysing the data the results showed that there was no significant improvement in English competence of the Control group but the Experimental group revealed a tremendous achievement in their abilities in English conversations through the use of dramatic discourse.


2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (7) ◽  
pp. 936-968 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kendall King ◽  
Martha Bigelow

U.S. public schools are required to establish policies ensuring that English language learners have equal access to “meaningful education.” This demands that districts put into place mechanisms to determine student eligibility for specialized English language services. For the most states, this federal requirement is fulfilled through the local administration of the WIDA–Access Placement Test (W-APT), arguably the most widely used, yet under-studied, English language assessment in the country. Through intensive participant observation at one, urban new student intake center, and detailed qualitative, discursive analysis of test administration and interaction, we demonstrate how the W-APT works as a high-stakes assessment, screener, and sorter, and how test takers and test administrators locally negotiate this test and enact this federal and state policy. Our analysis indicates that the W-APT is problematic in several respects, most importantly because the test does not differentiate adequately across students with widely different literacy skills and formal schooling experiences.


2017 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhou Wen ◽  
Deng Jun

AbstractThe present study investigated the effects of explicit metapragmatic instruction on foreign language learners’ performance of compliment responses (CRs). Eighty-two non-English major students participated in this study. They were randomly assigned to two groups, an experimental group that received explicit metapragmatic instruction on compliment responses and a control group that did not. A pretest-posttest research design was adopted. The data were collected through a written discourse completion task (WDCT) with six scenarios concerning the topics of appearance, performance, and personality. The results revealed that learners who received explicit instruction dramatically decreased their use of Accept strategy and increased Combination (CB) strategy at the macro level; more specifically, a decrease in Appreciation and an increase in Accept + Accept at the micro level. The learners of the control group made little progress in their performance. The study sheds light on pragmatics learning in an EFL setting and provides implications for pragmatics pedagogy.


ASHA Leader ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 9 (17) ◽  
pp. 8-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Celeste Roseberry-McKibbin ◽  
Laureen O’Hanlon ◽  
Alejandro Brice

2014 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sasan Baleghizadeh ◽  
Atieh Masoun

This study investigated the continuous influence of self-assessment on EFL (English as a foreign language) learners’ self-efficacy. The participants, divided into an experimental and a control group, were 57 Iranian EFL learners in an English-language institute. The participants’ self-efficacy was measured through a questionnaire that was the same for both groups. Additionally, the participants in the experimental group completed a biweekly self-assessment questionnaire throughout the semester. The obtained data were analyzed through an Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). The findings showed that the students’ self-efficacy improved significantly in the experimental group. This suggests that applying self-assessment on a formative basis in an EFL setting leads to increased self-effi- cacy. This study thus highlights the pedagogical implications of self-assessment in EFL classrooms.Cette étude a porté sur l’influence continue de l’auto-évaluation sur l’auto-effi- cacité des apprenants en ALE. Les participants, 57 Iraniens étudiant l’ALE dans un institut de langue anglaise, ont été répartis parmi un groupe expérimental et un groupe témoin. Le même questionnaire a été administré aux deux groupes et a servi d’outil pour mesurer l’auto-efficacité des apprenants. Les membres du groupe expérimental ont en plus complété un questionnaire d’autoévaluation chaque deux semaines au cours du semestre. Les données ont été traitées par une analyse de covariance (ANCOVA). Les résultats indiquent que l’auto-efficacité des élèves s’est améliorée de façon significative dans le groupe expérimental, ce qui porte à croire que la mise en pratique d’une auto-évaluation formative dans les cours d’ALE entraine une amélioration de l’auto-efficacité. Cette étude fait donc ressortir les incidences pédagogiques de l’auto-évaluation dans les cours d’ALE.


2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 253-280
Author(s):  
Maria Luisa Parra

The purpose of this article is to describe the methodology and pedagogical practices of an advanced language course, Spanish and the Community,that addresses the strengths and needs of both Spanish heritage language learners and foreign language learners in classrooms that contain both populations, i.e., in mixed classrooms. Focused on the Latino experience in the United States, the course’s main goals are to advance translingual competence, transcultural critical thinking, and social consciousness in both groups of students. Three effective and interrelated pedagogical approaches are proposed: (a) community service as a vehicle for social engagement with the Latino community; (b) the multiliteracies approach (New London Group,1996), with emphasis on work with art; and (c) border and critical pedagogy drawn from several authors in the heritage language field (Aparicio, 1997; Correa, 2011; Ducar, 2008; Irwin, 1996; Leeman, 2005; Leeman &Rabin, 2001; Martínez &Schwartz, 2012) and from Henry Giroux and Paulo Freire’s work. The effectiveness of this combined approach is demonstrated in students’ final art projects, in which they: (a) critically reflect on key issues related to the Latino community; (b) integrate knowledge about the Latino experience with their own personal story; (c) become aware of their relationship to the Latino community; and (d) express their ideas about their creative artifact in elaborated written texts in Spanish (the project’s written component).


2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenna Shim

AbstractUsing the concept of racial microaggressions as an analytical tool, this study reports on white monolingual pre-service teachers’ self-identified linguistic microaggressions by exploring their attitudinal and affective responses to those who speak languages other than English. The assumption is that teachers’ pedagogical practices and their relationship with students are not contained within classrooms but are rather intertwined with their lives outside the classroom and their thinking in everyday context. The themes identified by analyzing the self-identified linguistic microaggressions of the participating pre-service teachers are (1) Self-consciousness/discomfort, worry, fear, anxiety, and frustration; (2) Judgments: (un)intelligence, (dis)likability, and (un)trustworthiness; (3) (In)appropriateness and English dominance; and (4) Stereotypes. This study also reports the findings pertaining to the participants’ reflections on the factors that contribute to difficulties they face when attempting to engage in self-identifying linguistic microaggressions. The common challenges among these monolingual pre-service teachers are: (1) Identification and commitment are not enough; (2) Am I a bad person? and (3) Unconscious dispositions. The significance of this study stems from its exploration of the white pre-service teachers’ self-identification of microaggressions as opposed to those identified by the victims of microaggressions. By using the concept of microaggressions as the main analytical tool, the study reveals that the dominant members who are microaggressive toward language subordinate group members must understand, recognize, and acknowledge their microaggressions if they are to more productively support English language learners (ELLs) succeed socially and academically. The study offers implications for educators working with ELLs as well as for the field of teacher education.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nawal Fadhil Abbas ◽  
Lina Laith Younus ◽  
Huda Hadi Khalil

Interlanguage fossilization is a crucial dilemma that foreign language learners may fall in. The problem of the present study is shown clearly in the answers of Iraqi students of Master of Arts in the College of Education for Women University of Baghdad. In spite of all the previous years of studying English language, some still have the problem of fossilized active and passive simple present tense. The present study aims at shedding light on the reasons behind the Iraqi students’ problem. An error analysis is applied to critically examine the students’ answers in their final course exam of two courses namely; pragmatics and discourse analysis. Depending on Selinker’s model (1972) of error analysis, students errors are all traced back to the language transfer of their native language. Among the results of analysis the researchers have arrived at a suitable solution for the current problem embodied by Sharwood’s Consciousness-Raising Approach (1981). It is recommended as a psycholinguistic model for defossilization. It is very suitable for mentally matured learners and help to solve the dilemma.


Author(s):  
Akharraz Mohamad ◽  

The existing research studies have revealed that project-based learning (PjBL) has significantly helped foreign language learners enhance their cultural understanding as a result of completing their projects (e.g., Bouchouk, 2017; Hsu, 2014; Kim, 2019; Liu et al., 2006; Ngo, 2014). While these studies have congruently proved the utility of PjBL in enhancing students’ cultural awareness, none of them has measured the effect of PjBL together with a comparative and contrastive approach on students’ understanding of their home cultures. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of comparing students’ home cultures with the English cultures through PjBL on students’ understanding of their own cultures in terms of cultural products, cultural practices, and cultural perspectives. Two similar intact groups were randomly assigned to control and treatment groups. The two groups were pretested, administered two different treatments for 24 weeks, and post-tested to assess their differences. The independent sample t-tests results exhibited that the experimental group substantially deepened their understanding of their home cultures as a result of comparing them with the English cultures through PjBL. The study also revealed that while the control group significantly improved their cultural products, those in the experimental group greatly enhanced their knowledge of cultural practices and perspectives.


2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 18
Author(s):  
Mariusz Kruk

<p>The paper discusses the results of a study which explored advanced learners of English engagement with their mobile devices to develop learning experiences that meet their needs and goals as foreign language learners. The data were collected from 20 students by means of a semi-structured interview. The gathered data were subjected to qualitative and quantitative analysis. The results of the study demonstrated that, on the one hand, some subjects manifested heightened awareness relating to the advantageous role of mobile devices in their learning endeavors, their ability to reach for suitable tools and retrieve necessary information so as to achieve their goals, meet their needs and adjust their learning of English to their personal learning styles, and on the other, a rather intuitive and/or ad hoc use of their mobile devices in the classroom.</p>


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