Javad Gholami
Urmia University, English Department, Faculty Member
- Javad Gholami is Associate Professor of Applied Linguistics and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESO... moreJavad Gholami is Associate Professor of Applied Linguistics and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) from Urmia University, Iran. His main publications have been on incidental focus on form, task-based language teaching, teacher education, and convenience editing. He is also interested in the professional development of Iranian EFL teachers through conducting teacher training courses and theme-based workshops.
His updated journal publications are available through the following links:
ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4970-1110
ResearcherID: http://www.researcherid.com/rid/J-1241-2017
ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Javad_Gholami3
Scopus Author ID: 55428053400
https://www.scopus.com/authid/detail.uri?authorId=55428053400edit
For discourse to be comprehensible and cohesive, you have to know who does what to whom when and where. Information about entities, time, space, and actions has to be carefully tracked and managed from one utterance to the next. This is... more
For discourse to be comprehensible and cohesive, you have to know who does what to whom when and where. Information about entities, time, space, and actions has to be carefully tracked and managed from one utterance to the next. This is achieved through a process known as anaphoric linking or reference tracking. The importance of this phenomenon is crucial in listening classes as listening is among those demanding skills in which EFL learners have to cope with vast ranges of linguistic, paralinguistic and even pragmalinguistic features. In this regard, this book describes an innovative approach to teaching listening comprehension through employing typographically highlighted texts followed up by classroom interactions. This is termed as Interactive Input Enhancement, an instructional treatment in which the teacher pushes L2 learners to notice input and/or produce output and provides them with interactional modifications in order to lead them to notice a mismatch between their interlanguage forms and the target language forms. This book will be very useful for language teachers who are looking for novel ideas on demystifying listening comprehension for their learners.
Nowadays, language schools tend to include oral exams as part of their course completion assessment instruments along with their traditional written exams. Language learners experience a lot of anxiety during such exams. This books... more
Nowadays, language schools tend to include oral exams as part of their course completion assessment instruments along with their traditional written exams. Language learners experience a lot of anxiety during such exams. This books describes research on high/low students' oral performance in relation to interviewers' gender and interview topic. It also examines interviewees' beliefs on oral exams as well as addresses the relationship between anxiety, interviewers' gender, interview topic, and interviewees' oral performance. Studying this book can help EFL teachers, oral exam administrators and interviewers to manage exam interviews and choice of topics better and in line with their interviewees' anxiety levels.
In recent years, a large number of empirical studies have been carried out on the type, rate, and effectiveness of planned reactive focus on form (FonF). However, incidental reactive and preemptive FonF in general and their linguistic... more
In recent years, a large number of empirical studies have been carried out on the type, rate, and effectiveness of planned reactive focus on form (FonF). However, incidental reactive and preemptive FonF in general and their linguistic coverage in particular have not enjoyed this much attention. This book explores the frequency of reactive and preemptive incidental FonF, their linguistic coverage, and uptake in a communicatively-oriented EFL Talk Show class, where the primary attention is on negotiation of ideas and meaningful interactions. The book attempts to expand our accounts of FonF by addressing the relationship between preemptive as well as reactive Focus on Form Episodes in terms of their linguistic coverage of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation in an Iranian Talk Show class. It also examines the correspondence between the linguistic coverage of reactive and preemptive FFEs and the rate of uptake following them. Studying this book is highly recommended for language teachers, SLA researchers, and applied linguists as it provides valuable insights on providing earners with opportunities to attend to linguistic forms during meaning-focused activities.
The debate over whether English language teachers should include or exclude students’ native language in their instruction has been a contentious issue for a long time but as of yet the research findings have not been persuasive. The... more
The debate over whether English language teachers should include or exclude students’ native language in their instruction has been a contentious issue for a long time but as of yet the research findings have not been persuasive. The present study investigated the beliefs and instructional practices with respect to the use of L1 by Iranian EFL high school teachers. In general, the findings showed that there existed no correlation between the teachers’ beliefs and their instructional practices. However, this study found that in certain areas of teacher talk, there was a relationship between the stated beliefs and practices. Furthermore, there was a consistency between some micro- and macro- functions of language and the use of L1 by teachers. Reading this book can help non-native English teachers to reflect on their practices and beliefs regarding code-switching and the use of their learners' mother tongue in their English classes.
Textbooks play a crucial role in language teaching particularly in EFL classrooms where they provide the primary form of linguistic input. EFL textbooks are expected to develop EFL students' linguistic and pragmatic competences.... more
Textbooks play a crucial role in language teaching particularly in EFL classrooms where they provide the primary form of linguistic input. EFL textbooks are expected to develop EFL students' linguistic and pragmatic competences. Pragmatics, claimed by some to be the fifth skill in language learning, needs to be incorporated as an integral component of EFL textbooks. However, there is little knowledge on how well pragmatic aspects of language are taken into consideration in developing EFL textbooks in general and Iranian high school English books in particular. This book addressing this gap in the literature attempts to explore pragmatic knowledge incorporation into English books in Iranian public education system. EFL teachers and researchers whose professional and academic interest lie in English teaching in public schools will benefit from studying this book.
Preemptive focus on form (FonF) is perhaps the youngest branch in the field of incidental focus on form, and as such, it remains an under-researched area in the field. While examining the rate and characteristics of learner- and... more
Preemptive focus on form (FonF) is perhaps the youngest branch in the field of incidental focus on form, and as such, it remains an under-researched area in the field. While examining the rate and characteristics of learner- and teacher-initiated preemptive FonF, this book also explores the rate and attributes of uptake which is considered to be the best measure to gauge the effectiveness of focus on form instruction. Therefore, this book investigates what is (not) meant and (not) measured by uptake. While eliminating the shortcomings of previous empirical studies on FonF, the authors describe their research involving an elicitation instrument, namely "uptake sheet" and how to employ it to get a more accountable picture on uptake. Studying this book will help SLA researchers and language teachers enrich their vision on the nature and rate of uptake and would pave the way for further research on exploring multiple instances of uptake not accounted so far in the literature.
Speaking as a challenging language skill demands more attention from teachers in the classroom settings which are considered as the preliminary contexts for real language use. Modified output as a linguistic element which results from... more
Speaking as a challenging language skill demands more attention from teachers in the classroom settings which are considered as the preliminary contexts for real language use. Modified output as a linguistic element which results from negative feedback in response to incomprehensible messages sent by one of the interlocutors involved in a conversation is investigated with regard to the effect of the speakers' gender and the types of tasks, in which they are involved, on production of modified output and provision of modification devices. Studying this book will help SLA researchers and teachers to enrich their vision on the importance of dyadic task-based interaction which enhances the available opportunities for oral language production in the context of teacher-fronted language classrooms.
In the leaner-centered curriculum, learners are viewed as the center of the learning-teaching process. Therefore, the choices of what and how to teach are more than ever needed to be made with reference to learners and their expectations.... more
In the leaner-centered curriculum, learners are viewed as the center of the learning-teaching process. Therefore, the choices of what and how to teach are more than ever needed to be made with reference to learners and their expectations. This book addresses EFL learners' voices in English classes and the extent of their teachers' awareness and accommodation of those voices. Moreover, it examines whether language learning preferences of EFL learners differ across gender and proficiency. The research findings in this respect contribute to the present body of knowledge advocating a learning-centered approach to materials, syllabus design, and language teaching. This book provides some indications of a learner pathway towards more interactive student-centered activities as they move up through the language levels. Studying this book is expected to raise teachers' awareness of their learners' expectations and wants and through reflecting on their own classes, they can see the rate of correspondence between their beliefs and practices with those of their learners.
In our modern technological world, Computer-Assisted Language learning (CALL) is a new realm towards learning a language in general, and learning L2 vocabulary in particular. This book investigates the effects of multimedia annotations,... more
In our modern technological world, Computer-Assisted Language learning (CALL) is a new realm towards learning a language in general, and learning L2 vocabulary in particular. This book investigates the effects of multimedia annotations, namely still picture, dynamic picture, and written annotations on L2 vocabulary learning and then compares their effectiveness on Iranian EFL learners' vocabulary learning. It is recommended that multimedia annotations be used as a supplementary tool in order to increase and improve ESL/EFL learners' lexical knowledge and in turn their reading comprehension ability. This book promotes teaching vocabulary through using a variety of modalities and can be very useful to EFL/ESL teachers in making them familiar with multimedia annotations as a vocabulary teaching strategy.
With the advent of communicative language teaching, meaning-oriented and task-based language teaching gained a lot of ground at the expense of deemphasizing the explicit and focused attention to grammar and other formal aspects of... more
With the advent of communicative language teaching, meaning-oriented and task-based language teaching gained a lot of ground at the expense of deemphasizing the explicit and focused attention to grammar and other formal aspects of language. However, in recent years, there have been numerous calls for integrating communicative language teaching with focus on form instruction. This book explores various aspects of focus on form in general and incidental focus on form in particular. It investigates how teachers in a real EFL context draw attention to form temporarily and incidentally within meaning oriented classes without disrupting the natural flow of communication. Moreover, it provides a critical analysis and modified definition of uptake commonly used to assess the effectiveness of focus on form instruction. Graduate students and researchers in ELT, applied linguistics, classroom conversation analysis and respective fields in linguistics as well as ESL/EFL teachers will find this book highly useful in seeing how a compromise can be made between analytic and synthetic approaches to Second Language Acquisition.
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Previous studies on lexical focus on form (FonF) have mostly centred on FonF in reading with a few pre-selected lexical items. This study investigated the contribution of oral incidental FonF to developing learners’ lexical knowledge in a... more
Previous studies on lexical focus on form (FonF) have mostly centred on FonF in reading with a few pre-selected lexical items. This study investigated the contribution of oral incidental FonF to developing learners’ lexical knowledge in a free discussion EFL class. Incidental FonF was provided to 15 upper-intermediate learners who participated in 10 sessions of a meaning-oriented class. To gauge the retention rate of the lexical focus on form episodes (FFEs), two individualized multiple-choice achievement tests based on the lexical FFEs the learners reported to have no previous knowledge of in their uptake sheets were administered every five sessions, and two delayed posttests were given five weeks following each immediate posttest. Moreover, the participants were asked to compose two prompt-based writings on topics selected out of the covered themes in the posttests. Thematically relevant lexical FFEs extracted from each learner’s uptake sheets made up the tailored prompts per lear...
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Previous studies on lexical focus on form (FonF) have mostly centred on FonF in reading with a few pre-selected lexical items. This study investigated the contribution of oral incidental FonF to developing learners’ lexical knowledge in a... more
Previous studies on lexical focus on form (FonF) have mostly centred on FonF in reading with a few pre-selected lexical items. This study investigated the contribution of oral incidental FonF to developing learners’ lexical knowledge in a free discussion EFL class. Incidental FonF was provided to 15 upper-intermediate learners who participated in 10 sessions of a meaning-oriented class. To gauge the retention rate of the lexical focus on form episodes (FFEs), two individualized multiple-choice achievement tests based on the lexical FFEs the learners reported to have no previous knowledge of in their uptake sheets were administered every five sessions, and two delayed posttests were given five weeks following each immediate posttest. Moreover, the participants were asked to compose two prompt-based writings on topics selected out of the covered themes in the posttests. Thematically relevant lexical FFEs extracted from each learner’s uptake sheets made up the tailored prompts per lear...
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English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners may not appreciate writing and even perform poorly in writing tasks partly due to what feelings they harbor toward such tasks. This study explored the relative effects of three degrees of... more
English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners may not appreciate writing and even perform poorly in writing tasks partly due to what feelings they harbor toward such tasks. This study explored the relative effects of three degrees of writing task complexity based on resource directing dimensions of complexity on EFL learners' task motivation. Participants were 64 intermediate EFL learners at a language school in Baneh, Kurdistan, Iran, and were randomly assigned to one of the three groups: low complexity group, medium complexity group, and high complexity group. After completing the tasks, they filled in a task motivation questionnaire. The results showed that perceived relevance as a dimension of task motivation was higher in medium complexity group. With respect to emotional state as another dimension of task motivation, medium complexity task motivated participants more than low and high complexity tasks, because the participants showed a positive emotional state after doing i...
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English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners may not appreciate writing and even perform poorly in writing tasks partly due to what feelings they harbor toward such tasks. This study explored the relative effects of three degrees of... more
English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners may not appreciate writing and even perform poorly in writing tasks partly due to what feelings they harbor toward such tasks. This study explored the relative effects of three degrees of writing task complexity based on resource directing dimensions of complexity on EFL learners' task motivation. Participants were 64 intermediate EFL learners at a language school in Baneh, Kurdistan, Iran, and were randomly assigned to one of the three groups: low complexity group, medium complexity group, and high complexity group. After completing the tasks, they filled in a task motivation questionnaire. The results showed that perceived relevance as a dimension of task motivation was higher in medium complexity group. With respect to emotional state as another dimension of task motivation, medium complexity task motivated participants more than low and high complexity tasks, because the participants showed a positive emotional state after doing i...
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In this article, we have tried to reconstruct some of the implications of socio-cultural approach for language education, with a view to the theory of discourse ethics. Our main concept is based on the idea that although socio-cultural... more
In this article, we have tried to reconstruct some of the implications of socio-cultural approach for language education, with a view to the theory of discourse ethics. Our main concept is based on the idea that although socio-cultural approach has had many advantages for the field of language education, it has not been able to give a proper moral aspect to language education due to the lack of normative resources for explaining how to reach mutual understanding and agreements in linguistic interactions. It is emphasized that this deficit can be amended by the theory of discourse ethics. After all, the implications of this normative socio-cultural approach are explored in the areas of language-educational research, teaching and evaluation. The moral aspects of these three areas are highlighted.
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In this article, we have tried to reconstruct some of the implications of socio-cultural approach for language education, with a view to the theory of discourse ethics. Our main concept is based on the idea that although socio-cultural... more
In this article, we have tried to reconstruct some of the implications of socio-cultural approach for language education, with a view to the theory of discourse ethics. Our main concept is based on the idea that although socio-cultural approach has had many advantages for the field of language education, it has not been able to give a proper moral aspect to language education due to the lack of normative resources for explaining how to reach mutual understanding and agreements in linguistic interactions. It is emphasized that this deficit can be amended by the theory of discourse ethics. After all, the implications of this normative socio-cultural approach are explored in the areas of language-educational research, teaching and evaluation. The moral aspects of these three areas are highlighted.
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The aim of this study was to evaluate the suitability of the textbooks "World English 1", as a book written by native speakers of English, and "ILI 1", as a book written by non native speakers of English for elementary... more
The aim of this study was to evaluate the suitability of the textbooks "World English 1", as a book written by native speakers of English, and "ILI 1", as a book written by non native speakers of English for elementary level students based on two criteria (illustrations, and physical make-up) adopted from Doaud & CelceMurcia’s (1979) checklist in a comparative way. The study was conducted at Atlas Language Institute in Urmia and Iran language Institute (ILI) in Urmia. The participants of the study were 120 and 100 students (50 in each institute) and 20 teachers (10 in each institute). Then, the obtained data were analyzed by calculating the level of meaningfulness, mean score, and T value by using SPSS software. The results of the study revealed that illustrations and physical make-up which students rated them as having almost equal suitability were not rated as the same by teachers; since teachers, resorting their experiences and profession, believe that native ...
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The aim of this study was to evaluate the suitability of the textbooks "World English 1", as a book written by native speakers of English, and "ILI 1", as a book written by non native speakers of English for elementary... more
The aim of this study was to evaluate the suitability of the textbooks "World English 1", as a book written by native speakers of English, and "ILI 1", as a book written by non native speakers of English for elementary level students based on two criteria (illustrations, and physical make-up) adopted from Doaud & CelceMurcia’s (1979) checklist in a comparative way. The study was conducted at Atlas Language Institute in Urmia and Iran language Institute (ILI) in Urmia. The participants of the study were 120 and 100 students (50 in each institute) and 20 teachers (10 in each institute). Then, the obtained data were analyzed by calculating the level of meaningfulness, mean score, and T value by using SPSS software. The results of the study revealed that illustrations and physical make-up which students rated them as having almost equal suitability were not rated as the same by teachers; since teachers, resorting their experiences and profession, believe that native ...
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The present study investigated the effectiveness of integrated form-focused instruction (FFI) vs. isolated FFI on certain target structures, namely passives and condition type two. Three experienced female teachers taught 60 EFL learners... more
The present study investigated the effectiveness of integrated form-focused instruction (FFI) vs. isolated FFI on certain target structures, namely passives and condition type two. Three experienced female teachers taught 60 EFL learners in two experimental groups receiving isolated and integrated FFI treatment packages and in one control group for 12 sessions. The treatment in the integrated group included the use of videos, games, free discussions, essay writing, and readings with follow-up questions. After homogenizing the participants through a proficiency test, all of them were briefed on the concept of integrated and isolated FFIs and experienced this type of instruction through some concrete tasks on one grammatical structure. Similarly, the teachers were briefed on these two types of FFIs and practiced micro-teaching of one grammatical structure. Parallel preand post-tests in the form of recognition and production types were administered to all three groups in order to measu...
Research Interests: Psychology, Teaching and Learning, Teaching English as a Second Language, Teacher Education, Iraqi History, and 10 moreLearning and Teaching, Iranian Archaeology, Iranian Studies, History of Iran, Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language (TAFL), Teaching English As A Foreign Language, English language teaching, English Language Teaching, teaching English language and translation studies, and ICT In Teaching and Learning English Language
The present study investigated the effectiveness of integrated form-focused instruction (FFI) vs. isolated FFI on certain target structures, namely passives and condition type two. Three experienced female teachers taught 60 EFL learners... more
The present study investigated the effectiveness of integrated form-focused instruction (FFI) vs. isolated FFI on certain target structures, namely passives and condition type two. Three experienced female teachers taught 60 EFL learners in two experimental groups receiving isolated and integrated FFI treatment packages and in one control group for 12 sessions. The treatment in the integrated group included the use of videos, games, free discussions, essay writing, and readings with follow-up questions. After homogenizing the participants through a proficiency test, all of them were briefed on the concept of integrated and isolated FFIs and experienced this type of instruction through some concrete tasks on one grammatical structure. Similarly, the teachers were briefed on these two types of FFIs and practiced micro-teaching of one grammatical structure. Parallel preand post-tests in the form of recognition and production types were administered to all three groups in order to measu...
Research Interests: Psychology, Teaching and Learning, Teaching English as a Second Language, Teacher Education, Iraqi History, and 10 moreLearning and Teaching, Iranian Archaeology, Iranian Studies, History of Iran, Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language (TAFL), Teaching English As A Foreign Language, English language teaching, English Language Teaching, teaching English language and translation studies, and ICT In Teaching and Learning English Language
The importance of incorporating graduate students' needs into academic writing courses has established a good reputation in EAP/ESP research. In addition, writing and publishing research articles (RA) is a universally established... more
The importance of incorporating graduate students' needs into academic writing courses has established a good reputation in EAP/ESP research. In addition, writing and publishing research articles (RA) is a universally established benchmark for students' academic flourish. The present study examines the status quo of academic writing courses in graduate programs to determine the extent to which academic writing needs of TEFL students, mainly RA writing needs, are addressed and practiced in the course. Drawing insights from the literature on academic writing, we developed two similar interview protocols for graduate students and course instructors to capture these key stakeholders' retrospective views on the course. We found that the course mainly focuses on proposal/thesis writing, not regarded as a critical need based on students' perspectives. Moreover, both students and instructors echoed the importance of RA writing as a significant area to be covered while emphas...
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The importance of incorporating graduate students' needs into academic writing courses has established a good reputation in EAP/ESP research. In addition, writing and publishing research articles (RA) is a universally established... more
The importance of incorporating graduate students' needs into academic writing courses has established a good reputation in EAP/ESP research. In addition, writing and publishing research articles (RA) is a universally established benchmark for students' academic flourish. The present study examines the status quo of academic writing courses in graduate programs to determine the extent to which academic writing needs of TEFL students, mainly RA writing needs, are addressed and practiced in the course. Drawing insights from the literature on academic writing, we developed two similar interview protocols for graduate students and course instructors to capture these key stakeholders' retrospective views on the course. We found that the course mainly focuses on proposal/thesis writing, not regarded as a critical need based on students' perspectives. Moreover, both students and instructors echoed the importance of RA writing as a significant area to be covered while emphas...
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An extensive number of studies have examined the effectiveness of incidental focus on form (FonF) measured through uptake in primarily communicative activities and established an association between learners’ uptake of linguistic features... more
An extensive number of studies have examined the effectiveness of incidental focus on form (FonF) measured through uptake in primarily communicative activities and established an association between learners’ uptake of linguistic features and their subsequent second language development. In this strand of research, the analysis of linguistic forms has been constrained to grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and spelling. However, as self-contained units of meaning, formulaic sequences (FSs), comprising collocations, lexical bundles, idioms, compounds, etc., have not yet been the object of FonF research. Inspired by the fact that a substantial proportion of natural discourse consists of FSs, the present study investigated the degree to which incidental focus-on-form episodes (FFEs) with formulaic vis-à-vis other linguistic foci occur, and the extent to which they result in (successful) uptake in English as a foreign language (EFL) classes. The data consisted of 36 hours of audio-recor...
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Research Interests: Engineering, Computer Science, Computer Assisted Language Learning, Language Acquisition, Vocabulary, and 12 moreTeacher Research, Social Media, Qualitative Research, Reflection, Blogging, CALL, Language Teaching, Language Learning, MALL (Mobile Assisted Language Learning), Teacher Reflection, Modern Foreign Languages Teaching and Learning, and MFL
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Teaching English in public schools in Iran lasts 10 hours a week in junior high schools and 11 unit credits at high schools. Numerous research studies investigating English teaching in the public education system have unanimously... more
Teaching English in public schools in Iran lasts 10 hours a week in junior high schools and 11 unit credits at high schools. Numerous research studies investigating English teaching in the public education system have unanimously confirmed inadequacy of public schools. This study investigated factors behind inefficiency of English language teaching in Iranian public educational system and made a comparison between public schools and private language institutes. As a descriptive study, the research sample included 270 junior and senior high school male and female English teachers, who were selected through a cluster sampling. Meanwhile, teaching methods of 64 English teachers from private institutes and public schools were observed. Moreover, language learning standards of 32 private institutes and 32 public schools were accounted for through a questionnaire. The Cronbach alpha for the questionnaires was 0.91 and 0.85, and 0.90 for the checklist. The results of one sample t-test indicated that curriculum content, use of technology, teacher interest, sociocultural factors, teacher training, students’ cooperation, student-teacher interaction, classroom management, teaching methods, evaluation, teaching skills, and lack of extracurricular activities had different effects on the inefficiency of teaching English at public educational system. The analysis of the t-test of classroom observation through the checklist showed that there was significant difference as to classroom context, teacher motivation, using realia, students’ factors and the methods of evaluation between these two groups, although the study did not find a significant discrepancy between private language institutes and public schools as far as teachers’ proficiencies were concerned. The findings of this study are very insightful in helping policy makers and EFL teachers in public schools to make a constructive transition towards implementing the English teaching criteria that are well honored in private language institutes.
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In line with Applied ELT (Pishghadam, 2011), English for Life Purposes (ELP) advocates boosting learners' life skills along with the enhancement of their language proficiency. In this respect, the present study investigates social... more
In line with Applied ELT (Pishghadam, 2011), English for Life Purposes (ELP) advocates boosting learners' life skills along with the enhancement of their language proficiency. In this respect, the present study investigates social withdrawal (anxiety, shyness and depression) levels of Iranian high school students with and without communicative language learning experience. The data was collected from a total of 183 high school students between the ages of 14-18 in two cities in the North West of Iran. The first group (N=96) had communicative and interaction-based language learning experience in private language schools for over three years, while the other one (N=87) had no systematic communicatively-driven language learning experience in private language schools. All participants completed the Cattell’s Anxiety Scale (Cattle, 1957), the Beck Depression Inventory (Beck, 1983), and Shyness questionnaire (Samouei, 1994). The results of t-tests revealed meaningful differences in th...
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In this article, on the basis of Habermas’ universal pragmatics, we have tried to indicate that empirical pragmatics in linguistics, suffers from ‘normativity deficit’ in the field of foreign language education. What we mean by... more
In this article, on the basis of Habermas’ universal pragmatics, we have tried to indicate that empirical pragmatics in linguistics, suffers from ‘normativity deficit’ in the field of foreign language education. What we mean by ‘normativity deficit’, is the lack of normative resources required for judging the validity claims inherent in social interactions. Since agreement on the validity claims is fundamental for reaching mutual understanding and establishing linguistic communications, empirical-pragmatic approach, due to its ‘normativity deficit’ would not be able to give proper moral-educational thread to the field of foreign language education. Keywords: Empirical Pragmatics, Universal Pragmatics, Normativity Deficit, Communicative Language Education.
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Preemptive focus on form (FonF) is perhaps the youngest branch in the field of incidental focus on form, and as such, it remains an under-researched area in the field. While examining the rate and characteristics of learner- and... more
Preemptive focus on form (FonF) is perhaps the youngest branch in the field of incidental focus on form, and as such, it remains an under-researched area in the field. While examining the rate and characteristics of learner- and teacher-initiated preemptive FonF, this book also explores the rate and attributes of uptake which is considered to be the best measure to gauge the effectiveness of focus on form instruction. Therefore, this book investigates what is (not) meant and (not) measured by uptake. While eliminating the shortcomings of previous empirical studies on FonF, the authors describe their research involving an elicitation instrument, namely "uptake sheet" and how to employ it to get a more accountable picture on uptake. Studying this book will help SLA researchers and language teachers enrich their vision on the nature and rate of uptake and would pave the way for further research on exploring multiple instances of uptake not accounted so far in the literature.
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Research Interests:
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While previous research has found beneficial effects for form-focused instruction (FFI), there is still contention over the relative effectiveness of different types of FFI. This study investigated the effects of focus on form (FonF) and... more
While previous research has found beneficial effects for form-focused instruction (FFI), there is still contention over the relative effectiveness of different types of FFI. This study investigated the effects of focus on form (FonF) and focus on forms (FonFs), as two FFI options, on developing EFL learners’ explicit and implicit knowledge of the English present unreal conditional. Learning was measured through two testing devices: discrete-point items and oral interviews. The results indicated that while both FonF and FonFs were effective in developing the learners’ explicit and implicit knowledge in both the short and long terms, they differed in the extent to which they fostered these types of knowledge. FonF was found to be more effective in developing the learners’ implicit knowledge, whereas FonFs was more beneficial in fostering their explicit knowledge. Moreover, it was found that time had a role in consolidation of the form in the FonF group.
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Intralingual translation is mainly motivated by the intention to modify the text to facilitate the listener's understanding. The present study attempts to examine the differences between VOA Special English and Regular English due to... more
Intralingual translation is mainly motivated by the intention to modify the text to facilitate the listener's understanding. The present study attempts to examine the differences between VOA Special English and Regular English due to intralingual translation at the levels of phonology, lexicon, and syntax. To this end, 36 samples of passages of varying lengths dealing with academic discourse from non-modified (Regular English) and VOA’s modified (Special English) corpora were randomly selected and analyzed. The comparative analysis showed a significant difference between the modified and non-modified corpora in speech rate, syntax, and lexicon. Further investigation revealed that Special English was characterized by slower readings, increased pauses and tone units, more frequent and limited words, no idioms, repetitive and unmarked nominal clauses, and impersonal subjects in active voice structures. The findings of the study have implications for English teachers and material de...
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The present study was undertaken to investigate the effects of varying frequency patterns (FPs) of words on the productive acquisition of a young EFL learner in a home setting. Target words were presented to the learner using games and... more
The present study was undertaken to investigate the effects of varying frequency patterns (FPs) of words on the productive acquisition of a young EFL learner in a home setting. Target words were presented to the learner using games and role plays. They were subsequently traced for their frequencies in input and output. Eighteen immediate tests and delayed tests were administered to measure the oral production following the treatments. To examine the efficacy of varying FPs, target words were grouped into four sets: High Input/High Output (HIHO), Low Input/Low Output (LILO), High Input/Low Output (HILO), and Low Input/High Output (LIHO). The findings revealed that the differences among the FPs were statistically significant. Meanwhile, Wilcoxon signed-rank test identified a significant discrepancy between the words with LILO and HIHO frequency patterns. The findings demonstrated that the differences in FPs led to different productive gains, and higher word production cropped up when ...
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APA Citation: Gholami, J., & Gholizadeh, M. (2015). The impact of language play-oriented tasks with planned focus on form on Iranian EFL learners' accuracy in controlled writings. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 11(1),... more
APA Citation: Gholami, J., & Gholizadeh, M. (2015). The impact of language play-oriented tasks with planned focus on form on Iranian EFL learners' accuracy in controlled writings. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 11(1), 117-136. Abstract Language play and its effects on second language learning have been addressed by many scholars in recent years with instances of language play being identified both inside and outside the classroom. However, only a few have integrated language play with classroom tasks, and they just sufficed to the qualitative analyses of the learners' interactions. The present study investigated the possible effect of language play-oriented tasks with planned focus on form on Iranian EFL learners' accuracy in controlled writings. Employing a pretest-posttest design, the participants of the study were introduced to a series of meaningful tasks focusing on particular linguistic features. The tasks were accompanied by language play types such a...
This quasi-experimental study adopted a pretest/posttest design to investigate the effect of instructional intervention in teaching polite refusal strategies explicitly on Iranian EFL learners’ performance of the speech act of refusing.... more
This quasi-experimental study adopted a pretest/posttest design to investigate the effect of instructional intervention in teaching polite refusal strategies explicitly on Iranian EFL learners’ performance of the speech act of refusing. The participants, consisting of 24 male elementary EFL learners aged 12-18, responded to a discourse completion task (DCT) prior to and after they had been provided with explicit instruction concerning the polite performance of refusals in English. Adopting Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory and Beebe, Takahashi and Uliss-Weltz’s (1990) taxonomy of refusal strategies, the researchers found that the participants’ refusal semantic formulas in the pretest contained a variety of impoliteness markers including directness, lack of mitigation, and terseness of responses. The pedagogical instruction was directed at eliminating these inappropriacy elements, addressing the lengthening and intensification of refusal semantic formulas, use of adjuncts...
Research Interests: Computer Science, Pragmatics, Sociolinguistics, Interlanguage Pragmatics, English as a Foreign Language (EFL), and 7 moreInterlanguage, Iranian EFL learners, Refusal Speech Act, Native Speaker, Interlanguage and Intercultural Pragmatics Cross Cultural Pragmatics, Elementary Foreign Language, and Pragmatic Transfer of Refusal Strategies
Integrated writing tasks require the writers to juxtapose the concepts and ideas presented in the given reading and/or listening based prompts in their essays. The issue of integrated writing has received considerable attention in recent... more
Integrated writing tasks require the writers to juxtapose the concepts and ideas presented in the given reading and/or listening based prompts in their essays. The issue of integrated writing has received considerable attention in recent years. This study explores the essential strategies employed and preferred by EFL learners in dealing with integrated writing tasks. This study relied on Yang and Plakans’ (2012) framework on the use of and relationship among discourse synthesis, self-regulatory and test–wiseness strategies. The Strategy Inventory for Integrated Writing (SIIW), adopted from Yang and Plakans (2012), was the major instrument of data collection in the study. A total of 101 EFL learners undertaking a TOEFL iBT preparation course completed the questionnaire in the last session of the course to ensure their familiarity with integrated writing tasks and explore the strategies used by the participants in doing the tasks. Based on Friedman rank test results, it was found tha...
Many L2 teachers baffle when it comes to classroom participation scoring(CPS) of their students. Through a researcher-made questionnaire, this study explored EFL teachers' perceptions of classroom participation scoring(CPS) in Iranian... more
Many L2 teachers baffle when it comes to classroom participation scoring(CPS) of their students. Through a researcher-made questionnaire, this study explored EFL teachers' perceptions of classroom participation scoring(CPS) in Iranian private language schools. Moreover, it investigated the participants' views on a newly-developed objective and analytic rubric as part of this study for CPS. To this end, 120 EFL teachers completed the questionnaire on the typical CPS framework they used in English classrooms. Detailed analysis of teachers' perceptions of CPS indicated that most Iranian EFL teachers used holistic and subjective CPS approach and had little knowledge of the objective methods of CPS. After having been introduced to the proposed analytic CPS rubric, the participating teachers showed a positive attitude to the rubric and reported the rubric's applicability and flexibility in assessing EFL learners' classroom participation. The findings suggest adopting ...
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Nowadays, in line with trends in language teaching that follow the use of student-centered teaching/testing activities, there is growing consensus that students differ in their multiple intelligences. Furthermore, self-efficacy is one of... more
Nowadays, in line with trends in language teaching that follow the use of student-centered teaching/testing activities, there is growing consensus that students differ in their multiple intelligences. Furthermore, self-efficacy is one of the determining factors of success for people almost in any context. Assuming that the multiple intelligences profiles in tandem with self-efficacy of teachers may jointly work in shaping the efficiency and effectiveness of their teaching careers, this study investigated the relationship between Iranian EFL student-teachers’ multiple intelligences and their self-efficacy. Thirty five male and female EFL student-teachers from private language schools in Urmia completed Multiple Intelligences (McKenzie 1999) and the Teachers’ Senses of Efficacy Scale (Tschannen-Moran and Woolfolk-Hoy, 2001) questionnaires. A positive large correlation was found between total multiple intelligence and total self-efficacy of the student-teachers. The amount of R square ...
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Research Interests:
This study investigates the practices of public (high) school, private language institute, and public-private teachers. In particular, it aims at addressing the role of contextual factors, the variations teachers introduce to cope with... more
This study investigates the practices of public (high) school, private language institute, and public-private teachers. In particular, it aims at addressing the role of contextual factors, the variations teachers introduce to cope with them, and the degree of sustainable behaviour among these three groups of teachers. High school teachers consisted of those who taught only in high schools and the ones teaching both in high schools and private language institutes. For this purpose, classroom practices of 60 EFL teachers (N=20 per group) with 3 to 6 years of teaching experience and BA degree in TEF) were compared in terms of group/pair work, teacher talking time, L1 use, questioning, corrective feedback, and coverage of language skills. The findings of the study indicate that a significant difference exists among these three groups of teachers in terms of their practices. It is noteworthy that in the same teaching context of high school, the practices of teachers with and without priv...
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As English has increasingly become the lingua franca in science and international journals require native-like academic writing standards from nonnative researchers, there is more pressure on nonnative scholars to write their research... more
As English has increasingly become the lingua franca in science and international journals require native-like academic writing standards from nonnative researchers, there is more pressure on nonnative scholars to write their research articles more accurately and appropriately in English. This study was conducted to determine the most-occurring language-related errors which Iranian medical authors/researchers commit while trying to have their research published in international English journals. Also, this article seeks to provide useful guidelines to reduce such linguistic mistakes. The present study investigated the most common language-related errors in Iranian medical specialists' research articles. To this end, the first drafts of 60 published research articles in medical sciences were cross-checked against their peer-reviewed published versions in order to identify the most frequent non-target language forms which received discoursal, lexical, grammatical, and mechanical r...
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Research Interests:
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Research Interests: Psychology, Perception, Teaching and Learning, Teaching English as a Second Language, Mathematics Education, and 8 moreEnglish as a Foreign Language (EFL), Good Language Learners, Students Attitudes, Iranian EFL learners, Viewpoints, Iranian EFL Context, Qualities of good language teacher, and poor language learners
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Research Interests:
Preemptive focus on form (FonF) is perhaps the most under-researched area in the field of incidental focus on form. However, between the two subsets of preemptive focus on form, teacher-initiated preemptive FonF seems to be the least... more
Preemptive focus on form (FonF) is perhaps the most under-researched area in the field of incidental focus on form. However, between the two subsets of preemptive focus on form, teacher-initiated preemptive FonF seems to be the least favored one. To put this stance into a test, 18 sessions of an intermediate EFL class were observed, audio-recorded and analyzed for the instances of learner- and teacher-initiated focus on form episodes (FFEs), as well as the rate of uptake moves following them. To triangulate the observational data on uptake, an elicitation instrument, namely, a think-aloud incidental focus on form sheet was also devised to collect on-the-spot, written instances of learner and teacher generated FFES. The quantitative results derived both from the audio-data and the sheets demonstrated that teacher-initiated FFEs strongly came first regarding their frequency and the rate of follow-up uptake moves. An in-depth qualitative analysis of the uptake sheets also revealed that...